Anger Management Training in Incarcerated Male Offenders: Differential Impact on Proactive and Reactive Criminal Thinking

Abstract

Forty-seven male federal prison inmates who completed a six-week/eight-hour anger management class were administered the 35-item short form of the Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles (PICTS) during the first class session and again during the final class session. It was hypothesized that anger management training would have an ameliorative effect on the hostile or reactive component of criminal thinking, as measured by the PICTS Reactive (R) criminal thinking scale, but have little or no effect on the instrumental or proactive component of criminal thinking, as measured by the PICTS Proactive (P) criminal thinking scale. Consistent with this hypothesis, the R scale displayed a significant pre-test/post-test decline, whereas the P scale showed no significant change between the two testings. The theoretical and clinical implications of these findings are discussed.