Abstract
After discussing the historical, legal, and criminal justice context, the article reviews risk assessment principles for sex offenders. Issues of actuarial vs. clinical prediction, base-rate considerations, and duration of prediction are reviewed. The article next addresses specific factors found to predict sex offender recidivism, factors such as indicators of deviant sexual interest and an antisocial, psychopathic lifestyle. Finally, the article provides a current application in the form of New Jersey's Registrant Risk Assessment Scale to illustrate the risk assessment principles.
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