Anger, hostility, and depression in domestically violent versus generally assaultive men and nonviolent control subjects.

Anger, hostility, and depression were examined across four groups: a clinical sample of domestically violent men, two samples of more generally assaultive men, and a nonviolent control group. All subjects (N?=?129) were assessed using the Buss-Durkee Hostility Inventory, the Hostility and Direction of Hostility Questionnaire, and the Beck Depression Inventory. The domestically violent men and the generally assaultive men evidenced significantly higher levels of anger and hostility than the control subjects. The anger and hostility scores were very similar in the domestically violent and the generally assaultive men. However, the domestically violent men were more likely to be significantly depressed. The findings support the idea that anger dyscontrol is a key issue in the psychological profile of domestically violent men and indicate the need for clinical attention to depression as well as anger. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Individual, family, and peer characteristics of adolescent sex offenders and assaultive offenders.

This study examined the individual functioning, family relations, and peer relations of 60 male adolescents who were divided into 4 demographically matched groups (sex offenders, assaultive offenders, nonviolent offenders, and nondelinquent controls). Mothers and adolescents completed self-report inventories and a video-taped interaction task, and teachers completed a rating measure. Results showed that assaultive offenders' family relations were characterized by rigidity and low cohesion and that their peer relations evidenced high levels of aggression. Nevertheless, assaultive offenders and their mothers reported little anxiety or interpersonal discomfort. In contrast, sex offenders and their mothers reported high rates of neurotic symptoms, and the peer relations of sex offenders showed relatively low levels of emotional bonding. Implications for research and emerging theories of delinquency are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A multinational study of psychiatric nursing staffs' beliefs and concerns about work safety and patient assault

In an effort to understand beliefs and concerns about work safety and patient assault, the author describes the results of a multinational survey of 999 nursing staff members working in psychiatric facilities across the United States, Canada, United Kindgom, and South Africa. Although the majority of the sample (75%) reported being physically assaulted at least once during their careers, 62% responded that they felt safe in their work environment most of the time. Significant differences were found among the nurses with regard to beliefs about adequacy of staffing, safety of the physical environment, admission of assaultive patients, expectations about being victims of assault, overall level of safety, and taking legal action against a patient. A significant difference in attitudes was also found among nursing staff members, who reported previous assaults. They believed that assaults are expected events in their work with psychiatric patients.     

Risk marker analysis of the cessation and persistence of wife assault.

This study evaluated the utility of specific risk markers of wife assault in understanding the cessation and persistence of violence against women over a 3-year period. Longitudinal data were used to identify violent men who ceased the violence for 2 years and violent men who persisted in using violence. A group of nonviolent men was used for comparison. Factor analysis indicated that marital conflict, socioeconomic status (SES), and witnessing violence in the family of origin were the most powerful discriminators of these groups. Moreover, it was found that high levels of marital conflict and low SES were associated not only with the occurrence of violence but also with the continuity of wife assaults over time. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fixed prostheses in the treatment of tooth wear

Thirty case reports published in Japan that refer to psychiatric symptoms accompanying interferon (IFN) therapy were examined. These papers covered a total of 49 cases. We categorized these 49 cases into 35 cases of mood disorder, 10 of delirium and four of psychotic disorder. The key findings of our study of these cases are as follows: (i) in total, 11 patients had psychiatric past histories: five patients in the mood disorders group were susceptible to the influence of social or psychological factors; (ii) whereas the symptoms of mood disorder or delirium appeared soon after IFN was administered, the symptoms of psychotic disorders appeared later. The patients with delirium displayed many neurological abnormalities, which were reduced by suspending IFN therapy. This suggests the neurological toxicity of IFN; (iii) the outcome of most patients was good; and (iv) we suspect that IFN-induced psychiatric symptoms other than delirium are connected with psychoneuroimmunological functions.     

Predicting violent behavior from WAIS characteristics: A replication failure.

Attempted to replicate the findings of M. W. Kunce et al (see record 1976-10022-001) on an index for predicting violent behavior derived from differential WAIS characteristics. The present study, with 16 violent and 10 nonviolent psychotic White males, found that, in contrast with the Kunce et al findings, violent Ss earned higher Similarities Ratio scores than did nonviolent Ss. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Context-processing deficits in schizophrenia: Diagnostic specificity, 4-week course, and relationships to clinical symptoms.

Previous research on schizophrenia suggests that context-processing disturbances are one of the core cognitive deficits present in schizophrenia. However, it is not clear whether such deficits are specific to schizophrenia as compared with other psychotic disorders. To address this question, the authors administered a version of the AX Continuous Performance Test designed to assess context processing in a sample of healthy controls, patients with schizophrenia, and patients with other psychotic disorders. Participants were tested at index (when medication naive and experiencing their first contact with psychiatric services) and 4 weeks later, following medication treatment. At index, patients with schizophrenia and the psychotic comparison group demonstrated similar impairments in context processing. However, context-processing deficits improved in the psychotic comparison group at 4 weeks but did not improve in patients with schizophrenia. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A multiregional study of nurses' beliefs and attitudes about work safety and patient assault

OBJECTIVE: The study attempted to increase understanding of nursing staff members' beliefs and concerns about work safety and patient assault. METHODS: A study conducted at a university-affiliated psychiatric facility in California in the late 1980s was replicated in five other psychiatric settings. Data were collected using the Attitudes Toward Patient Physical Assault Questionnaire, containing 31 statements designed to elicit nurses' beliefs about safety concerns, staff performance, and legal issues related to assaults. RESULTS: A total of 557 nursing staff members at the six sites responded to the questionnaire; 84 percent were female. The majority (76 percent) had been physically assaulted at least once, but 71 percent reported feeling safe in their work environment most of the time. Compared with female staff members, males tended to believe that assaults were to be expected, that assaulted staff have personality traits that make them vulnerable to assault, and that legal action against assaultive patients might jeopardize their jobs. Recently hired staff were more confident that their facilities did not admit unmanageable patients and that the environment was adequate to prevent assaults. Staff who had been assaulted more frequently tended to believe that assaults were to be expected. CONCLUSIONS: The study highlights a nationwide concern among nursing staff about safety. Ensuring a safe working environment requires better training, more adequate staffing, and a security plan to protect staff, patients, and others.     

Temperature and aggression: Effects on quarterly, yearly, and city rates of violent and nonviolent crime.

The hypothesized relation between uncomfortably hot temperatures and aggressive behavior was examined in two studies of violent and nonviolent crime. Data on rates of murder, rape, assault, robbery, burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft were gathered from archival sources. The first three crimes listed are violent; the latter four are less violent (labeled nonviolent). On the basis of previous research and theory (Anderson & Anderson, 1984), it was predicted that violent crimes would be more prevalent in the hotter quarters of the year and in hotter years. Furthermore, it was predicted that this temperature–crime relation would be stronger for violent than for nonviolent crime. Study 1 confirmed both predictions. Also, differences among cities in violent crime were predicted to be related to the hotness of cities; this effect was expected to be stronger for violent than for nonviolent crimes. Study 2 confirmed both predictions, even when effects of a variety of social, demographic, and economic variables were statistically removed. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Extraction of carboxylic acids as adducts with trioctylphosphine oxide

Simulated jurors were asked to render judgements in a case involving either a violent or a nonviolent armed robbery. The defendent either did or did not have a stated history or previous psychiatric hospitalization. The former mental patient received fewer guilty verdicts than did the nonhospitalized defendant in the nonviolent robbery condition, while no difference existed in the violent robbery condition. It was predicted that, relative to the nonhospitalized defendant, subjects would be more punitive when the former mental patient was judged guilty of the violent crime than when he was judged guilty of the nonviolent robbery. This prediction was confirmed only for male subjects. The data suggest that while males responded in terms of conventional stereotypes about the mentally ill, females did not. Results are discussed in terms of attribution of responsibility and fear reactions toward the mentally ill.     

Patterns of violent incidents by patients in a general hospital psychiatric facility

Reports of attempted or actual physical assaults by patients in the inpatient, outpatient, and emergency settings of a psychiatric facility within a general hospital were prospectively surveyed during a one-year period. Among 397 patients discharged during the period, 46 patients were responsible for 133 violent incidents. Most incidents occurred on the locked inpatient unit during the daytime and after the first week of admission. Schizophrenia was the only diagnosis significantly associated with violence. Hitting was the most prevalent form of violence, and nurses were the most frequent targets.     

Crime specialization, seriousness progression, and Markov chains.

Sequences of violent and nonviolent offenses by 300 male offenders (mean age 26.47 yrs) were subjected to log-linear analyses of the stabilities and magnitudes of their transition probabilities (TPs). Results show that all patterns resembled a Markov process wherein the TPs were stable. The relative magnitude of these TPs indicated that there was specialization in nonviolent offenses and little tendency toward consistently violent behavior. Seriousness progression from nonviolent to violent misconduct was infrequent; however, there was substantial retrogression from violent to nonviolent offenses. (11 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Affect, verbal content, and psychophysiology in the arguments of couples with a violent husband.

Studied the affect, psychophysiology, and verbal content of arguments in couples with a violent husband. On the basis of self-reports of violent arguments, there were no wife behaviors that successfully suppressed husband violence once it began; moreover, husband violence escalated in response to nonviolent as well as violent wife behaviors, whereas wife violence escalated only in reaction to husband violence or emotional abuse. Only wives were fearful during violent and nonviolent arguments. The observational coding of nonviolent arguments in the laboratory revealed that both battering husbands and their wives (DV) were angrier than their maritally distressed but nonviolent (DNV) counterparts. As predicted, on the more provocative anger codes, only DV men differed from their DNV counterparts. However, DV wives were as verbally aggressive toward their husbands as DV husbands were toward their wives. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Homicidal sex offenders: psychological, phallometric, and diagnostic features

Homicidal sex offenders represent an understudied population in the forensic literature. Forty-eight homicidal sex offenders assessed between 1982 and 1992 were studied in relation to a comparison group of incest offenders. Historical features, commonly used psychological inventories, criminal histories, phallometric assessments, and DSM diagnoses were collected on each group. The homicidal sex offenders, compared with the incest offenders, self-reported that they had more frequently been removed from their homes during childhood and had more violence and forensic psychiatric contact in their histories. On the self-report psychological inventories, the homicidal sex offenders portrayed themselves as functioning significantly better in the areas of sexuality (Derogatis Sexual Functioning Inventory) and aggression/hostility (Buss-Durkee Hostility Inventory). However, on the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R), researchers rated the homiciders significantly more psychopathic than the incest offenders on Factor 1 (personality traits) and Factor 2 (antisocial history). Police records revealed the homicidal subjects also had been charged or convicted of more violent and nonviolent nonsexual offenses. The phallometric assessments indicated that the homicidal sex offenders demonstrated higher levels of response to pedophilic stimuli and were significantly more aroused to stimuli depicting assaultive acts to children, relative to the incest offenders. Despite the homiciders' self-reports of fairly good psychological functioning, DSM-III diagnoses reliably discriminated between the groups. A large number of homicidal sex offenders were diagnosed as suffering from psychosis, antisocial personality disorder, paraphilias, sexual sadism, sexual sadism with pedophilia, and substance abuse. Seventy-five percent of the homicidal sex offenders had three or more diagnoses compared with six percent of the incest offenders. The article addresses the role of "hard" versus "soft" measures in the assessment and treatment of violent sex offenders. In addition, the usefulness of phallometric assessments and the PCL-R and its subscales are considered.     

Prediction of violent versus nonviolent recidivism from prior violent and nonviolent criminality.

Analyzed frequencies of prior violent and nonviolent criminal convictions among 198 adult male felony offenders (mean age 27 yrs) in relation to probation outcome defined as success, nonviolent failure, or violent failure. The probation follow-up was conducted after 32 mo. Only the results for prior nonviolent offenses were significant, and although nonviolent failures on probation were nearly 4 times more common than were violent failures, the nonviolent predictor set was equally sensitive to the 2 types of recidivism. The association between prior nonviolent offenses and probation outcome was attenuated by the influence of age. Persistent nonviolent criminality usually reflects a generalized propensity for social deviance and is therefore of some predictive value with heterogeneous groups of offenders. In contrast, because violence is often due to transitory psychological states that emerge in response to atypical circumstances, it is a relatively poor indicator of the likelihood of future similar behavior. (20 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development of personality disorder symptoms and the risk for partner violence.

In a community sample (N = 543) followed over 20 years, the authors studied associations among childhood family violence exposure, personality disorder (PD) symptoms, and adult partner violence. PD symptoms (DSM-III-R Clusters A, B, and C) in early adulthood partially mediated the effect of earlier childhood risks on the odds of perpetrating partner violence. The authors tested whether stability of PD symptoms from adolescence to the early 20s differs for individuals who later perpetrated partner violence. Cluster A ("Odd/Eccentric") symptoms declined less with age among partner violent versus nonviolent men and women. Cluster B ("Dramatic/Erratic") symptoms were more stable through late adolescence in partner violent men, compared with nonviolent men and violent women. Cluster C ("Anxious") symptoms were most stable among partner violent men. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The relationship between confidence and accuracy in clinical assessment of psychiatric patients' potential for violence

The authors studied the relationship between confidence and accuracy in clinical assessments of psychiatric patients' short-term risk of violence. At the time of entry to the hospital, physicians (N = 78) estimated the probability that each of 317 patients would physically attack other people during the first week of psychiatric hospitalization. The clinicians also indicated the degree of confidence they had in their estimates of violence potential. Nurses rated the occurrence of inpatient physical assaults with the Overt Aggression Scale. The results showed that when clinicians had a high degree of confidence, their evaluations of risk of violence were strongly associated with whether or not patients became violent. At moderate levels of confidence, clinicians' risk estimates had a lower, but still substantial relationship with the later occurrence of violence. However, when clinicians had low confidence, their assessments of potential for violence had little relationship to whether or not the patients became violent. The findings suggest that the level of confidence that clinicians have in their evaluations is an important moderator of the predictive validity of their assessments of patients' potential for violence.     

The role of histamine in platelet aggregation by physiological and immunological stimuli

This paper reviews the current state of the debate on the relationship between mental disorder and violent behaviour. Starting from the discussion of methodological approaches to assessing a possible association, the most important studies carried out on the issue in recent years are discussed. Their results concur in supporting the assumption that there is a moderate but reliable association between mental disorder and violence. However, this does not imply that people with mental illness are generally more likely to commit violent acts than members of the general population. An elevated risk of violent behaviour is only evident for specific psychiatric diagnoses and for particular symptom constellations. For schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders, a significant increase in the likelihood to commit violent acts is reported. Substance use disorder and antisocial personality disorder, however, represent a markedly higher risk for violent behaviour. The article further discusses possible determinant of violent behaviour such as psychotic symptoms and comorbidity with substance abuse, and considers who is at particular risk of becoming a target of violent acts.     

Mental illness and violence: an epidemiological appraisal of the evidence

OBJECTIVE: To conduct a critical review of the literature on the matter of mental illness and violence, to examine whether there is enough evidence to establish a causal link, and to provide epidemiological background to measure the risk to the population. METHOD: Based on a computerized search of the literature on mental illness and violence previously conducted for Health Canada, studies in the area were critically reviewed and divided into 3 main categories: 1) studies of criminal and violent behaviour among psychiatric patients, 2) studies of psychiatric illness among offenders (prevalence studies in institutions, analytical studies, and community follow-up of offenders), and 3) epidemiological community-based studies on the issue of mental illness and violence (police-citizen encounters, representative samples, and other epidemiological studies). Causality rules and measures of risk were then applied to the evidence elicited. RESULTS: The review of the literature suggests that only a small minority of hospitalized patients, typically those suffering from acute psychotic symptoms, are involved in violent incidents. Formerly hospitalized patients are at a higher risk of committing violence if they are not properly treated and are experiencing threat/control-override psychotic symptoms. Substance abuse disorders significantly raise the risk for violence. Family members are the most at risk of being victimized. CONCLUSION: An association exists between mental illness and violence, but the many covariations that naturally affect the equation between them introduce uncertainties in establishing causality.     

Anhedonia and perceptual aberration in first-episode psychotic patients and their relatives.

One hundred eighteen psychiatric patients, each experiencing his or her first lifetime episode of psychosis, 125 of their first-degree relatives, and 155 normal subjects were assessed using the physical anhedonia, social anhedonia, and perceptual aberration scales of L. J. Chapman et al (1976; see also PA, Vol 62:3733). We hypothesized that psychotic subjects would obtain higher scores on these scales than their relatives and the controls, and we expected the group of relatives to score more deviantly than the normal controls. The physical anhedonia and social anhedonia scales successfully differentiated the psychiatric patients from the relatives and the latter from the normal subjects. These findings testify to the construct validity of the scales and suggest that they tap a predisposition to psychosis. Unexpectedly, the relatives scored lower on the perceptual aberration scale than did the normal controls, perhaps because the relatives adopted a defensive response set. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)