The Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory–Short Form (YPI-S) is a convenient measure for assessing psychopathy in settings with constraints on resources. However, the YPI-S does not contain a means of detecting careless or random response styles. The present study describes the development and evaluation of an inconsistent responding scale for the YPI-S using five archival samples that vary in language (English, German, Italian, Dutch) and other participant characteristics (juvenile offenders, adolescent students). Inconsistency scores resulting from the new scale effectively distinguished genuine participant responses from randomly generated cases (area under the ROC curve [AUC] = .85-.90) and from cases in which 50% of original responses were replaced with random data (AUC = .75-.82). The associations between the YPI-S and theoretically relevant correlates were reduced among participants exceeding proposed cutoff scores for profile validity compared with associations among more consistent respondents.
American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.
3.
AndershedH.KerrM.StattinH.LevanderS. (2002). Psychopathic traits in non-referred youths: Initial test of a new assessment tool. In BlaauwE.SheridanL. (Eds.), Psychopaths: Current international perspectives (pp. 131-158). The Hague, Netherlands: Elsevier.
4.
AndersonJ. L.SellbomM.WygantD. B.EdensJ. F. (2013). Examining the necessity for and utility of the Psychopathic Personality Inventory—Revised (PPI–R) validity scales. Law and Human Behavior, 37, 312-320. doi:10.1037/lhb0000018
5.
BanduraA.BarbaranelliC.CapraraG. V.PastorelliC. (1996). Mechanisms of moral disengagement in the exercise of moral agency. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 364-374. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.71.2.364
6.
BenningS. D.FreemanA. J. (2017). The Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire’s inconsistency scales identify invalid profiles through internal statistics and external correlates. Psychological Assessment. Advance online publication. doi:10.1037/pas0000452
7.
BermanA. H.BergmanH.PalmstiernaT.SchlyterF. (2002). Evaluation of the Drug Use Disorders Identification Test (DUDIT) in criminal justice and detoxification settings and in a Swedish population sample. European Addict Research, 11, 22-31. doi:10.1159/000081413
8.
ButcherJ. N.DahlstromW. G.GrahamJ. R.TellegenA.KaemmerB. (1989). Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory–2 (MMPI-2): Manual for administration and scoring. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press
9.
CampbellM. A.DoucetteN. L.FrenchS. (2009). Validity and stability of the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory in a nonforensic sample of young adults. Journal of Personality Assessment, 91, 584-592. doi:10.1080/00223890903228679
ColinsO. F. (2016). The clinical usefulness of the DSM–5 specifier for conduct disorder outside of a research context. Law and Human Behavior, 40, 310-318. doi:10.1037/lhb0000173
12.
ColinsO. F.AndershedH. (2015). The DSM-5 with limited prosocial emotions specifier for conduct disorder among detained girls. Law and Human Behavior, 39, 198-207. doi:10.1037/lhb0000108
13.
ColinsO. F.AndershedH. (2016). The Youth Psychopathic Traits-Short Version in a general population sample of emerging adults. Psychological Assessment, 28, 449-457.
14.
ColinsO. F.BijttebierP.BroekaertE.AndershedH. (2014). Psychopathic-like traits among detained female adolescents: Reliability and validity of the Antisocial Process Screening Device and the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory. Assessment, 21, 195-209. doi:10.1177/1073191113481997
15.
ColinsO. F.FantiK. A.AndershedH.MulderE.SalekinR. T.BloklandA.VermeirenR. R. J. M. (2017). Psychometric properties and prognostic usefulness of the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory (YPI) as a component of a clinical protocol for detained youth: A multiethnic examination. Psychological Assessment, 29, 740-753. doi:10.1037/pas0000437
16.
ColinsO. F.NoomM.VanderplasschenW. (2012). Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory-Short Version: A further test of the internal consistency and criterion validity. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment, 34, 476-486. doi:10.1007/s10862-012-9299-0
17.
CookN. E.FaustD.MeyerJ. F.FaustK. A. (2016). The impact of careless and random responding on juvenile forensic assessment: Susceptibility of commonly used measures and implications for research and practice. Journal of Forensic Psychology Practice, 5, 425-447. doi:10.1080/15228932.2016.1234146
18.
CookeD. J.MichieC. (2001). Refining the construct of psychopathy: Towards a hierarchical model. Psychological Assessment, 13, 171-188. doi:10.1037/1040-3590.13.2.171
19.
CornellD.KleinJ.KonoldT.HuangF. (2012). Effects of validity screening items on adolescent survey data. Psychological Assessment, 24, 21-35. doi:10.1037/a0024824
20.
CredéM. (2010). Random responding as a threat to the validity of effect size estimates in correlational research. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 70, 596-612. doi:10.1177/0013164410366686
21.
CredéM.HarmsP.NiehorsterS.Gaye-ValentineA. (2012). An evaluation of the consequences of using short measures of the Big Five personality traits. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 102, 874-888. doi:10.1037/a0027403
22.
CurranP. G. (2016). Methods for the detection of carelessly invalid responses in survey data. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 66, 4-19. doi:10.1016/j/jesp.2015.07.006
23.
de JongC. A. J.van den BrinkW.JansmaA. (2000). ICL-R: Handleiding bij de vernieuwde versie van de Interpersonal Checklist (ICL) [Manual of the revised Dutch version of the Interpersonal Checklist (ICL)]. Sint-Oedenrode, Netherlands: Novadic.
24.
DeLisiM.VaughnM. G.BeaverK. M.WexlerJ.BarthA.FletcherJ. (2011). Fledgling psychopathy in the classroom: ADHD subtypes, psychopathy, and educational outcomes in a community sample of adolescents. Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice, 9, 43-58. doi:10.1177/1541204010371932
25.
DolanM. C.RennieC. E. (2007). The relationship between psychopathic traits measured by the Youth Psychopathic Trait Inventory and psychopathology in a UK sample of conduct disordered boys. Journal of Adolescence, 30, 601-611. doi:10.1016/j.adolescence.2006.07.002
26.
EdensJ. F.MowleE. N.ClarkJ. W.MagyarM. S. (2016). “A psychopath by any other name?” Juror perceptions of the DSM-5 “Limited Prosocial Emotions” specifier. Journal of Personality Disorders, 31, 90-109. doi:10.1521/pedi_2016_30_239
27.
EisenbarthH.CentifantiL. M. (2017). Dimensions of psychopathic traits in a community sample: Implications from different measures for impulsivity and delinquency. Manuscript submitted for publication.
28.
ElliottD. S.AgetonS. (1980). Reconciling race and class differences in self-reported and official estimates of delinquency. American Sociological Review, 45, 95-110.
29.
ElliottD. S.HuizingaD.MenardS. (1989). Multiple problem youth: Delinquency, substance use, and mental health problems. New York, NY: Springer.
30.
FaustK. A.FaustD.BakerA. M.MeyerJ. F. (2012). Refining video game use questionnaires for research and clinical application: Detection of problematic response sets. International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction, 10, 936-947. doi:10.1007/s11469-012-9390-5
31.
FirstM. B.SpitzerR. L.GibbonM.WilliamsG. B. W.BenjaminL. (1997). Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis II Personality Disorders (SCID-II). Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association.
32.
FossatiA.SommaA.BorroniS.FreraF.MaffeiC.AndershedH. (2016). The factor structure of the short version of the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory in two independent samples of nonreferred adolescents. Assessment, 23, 683-697. doi:10.1177/1073191115593628
33.
GillenC. T. A.MacDougallE. A. M.ForthA. E.BarryC. T.SalekinR. T. (2017). Validity of the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory–Short Version in justice-involved and at-risk adolescents. Assessment. Advance online publication. doi:10.1177/1073191117700723
34.
GrissoT.BarnumR. (2000). Massachusetts Youth Screening Instrument-2 (MAYSI-2): User’s manual and technical report. Worcester: University of Massachusetts Medical School.
35.
HandelR.Ben-PorathY. S.TellegenA.ArcherR. P. (2010). Psychometric functioning of the MMPI-2-RF VRIN-r and TRIN-r scales with varying degrees of randomness, acquiescence, and counter-acquiescence. Psychological Assessment, 22, 87-95. doi:10.1037/a0017061
36.
HareR. D. (2003). The Psychopathy Checklist–Revised (PCL-R) (2nd ed.). Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Multi-Health Systems.
37.
HillegeS.DasJ.de RuiterC. (2010). The Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory: Psychometric properties and its relation to substance use and interpersonal style in a Dutch sample of non-referred adolescents. Journal of Adolescence, 33, 83-91. doi:10.1016/j.adolescence.2009.05.006
38.
HuangJ. L.LiuM.BowlingN. A. (2015). Insufficient effort responding: Examining an insidious confound in survey data. Journal of Applied Psychology, 100, 828-845. doi:10.1037/a0038510
39.
JohnO. P.SrivastavaS. (1999). The Big Five trait taxonomy: History, measurement and theoretical perspectives. In PervinL. A.JohnO. P. (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (2nd ed., pp. 102-138). New York, NY: Guilford Press.
40.
KeeleyJ. W.WebbC.PetersonD.RoussinL.FlanaganE. H. (2016). Development of a response inconsistency scale for the Personality Inventory for DSM-5. Journal of Personality Assessment, 98, 351-359. doi:10.1080/00223891.2016.1158719
41.
KelleyS. E.EdensJ. F.DonnellanM. B.RuchenskyJ. R.WittE. A.McDermottB. E. (2016). Development and validation of an inconsistent responding scale for an abbreviated version of the Psychopathic Personality Inventory—Revised. Personality and Individual Differences, 91, 58-62. doi:10.1016/j.paid.2015.11.033
42.
KelleyS. E.van DongenJ. M.DonnellanM. B.EdensJ. F.EisenbarthH.FossatiA.. . . SörmanK. (2017). Examination of the Triarchic Assessment Procedure for Inconsistent Responding in six non-English language samples. Psychological Assessment. Advance online publication. doi:10.1037/pas0000485
43.
LilienfeldS. O.WidowsM. R. (2005). Psychopathic Personality Inventory–Revised: Professional manual. Lutz, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources.
44.
MarcusD. K.ChurchA. S.O’ConnellD.LilienfeldS. O. (2016). Identifying careless responding with the Psychopathic Personality Inventory–Revised validity scales. Assessment. Advance online publication. doi:10.1177/1073191116641507
45.
McGrathR. E.MitchellM.KimB. H.HoughL. (2010). Evidence for response bias as a source of error variance in applied assessment. Psychological Bulletin, 136, 450-470. doi:10.1037/a0019216
46.
MeadeA. W.CraigS. B. (2012). Identifying careless responses in survey data. Psychological Methods, 17, 437-455. doi:10.1037/a0028085
47.
MillerJ. D.LynamD. R.WidigerT. A.LeukefeldC. (2001). Personality disorders as extreme variants of common personality dimensions: Can the Five-Factor Model adequately represent psychopathy?Journal of Personality, 69, 253-276. doi:10.1111/1467-6494.00144
48.
MoreyL. C. (1991). The Personality Assessment Inventory: Professional manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources.
49.
MoreyL. C. (2012). Detection of response bias in applied assessment: Comment on McGrath et al. (2010). Psychological Injury and Law, 5, 153-161. doi:10.1007/s12207-012-9131-x
50.
MowleE. N.KelleyS. E.EdensJ. F.DonnellanM. B.SmithS. T.WygantD. B.SellbomM. (2017). Development of an inconsistent responding scale for the Triarchic Psychopathy Measure. Psychological Assessment, 29, 990-1000. doi:10.1037/pas0000395
51.
NikolovaN. L.HendryM. C.DouglasK. S.EdensJ. F.LilienfeldS. O. (2012). The inconsistency of inconsistency scales: A comparison of two widely used measures. Behavioral Sciences & the Law, 30, 16-27. doi:10.1002/bsl.1996
52.
NunnallyJ.BernsteinI. (1994). Psychometric theory (3rd ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
53.
OshukovaS.Kaltiala-HeinoR.MiettunenJ.MarttilaR.TaniP.AronenE. T.. . . LindbergN. (2015). Self-reported psychopathic traits among non-referred Finnish adolescents: Psychometric properties of the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory and the Antisocial Process Screening Device. Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health, 9, 1-11. doi:10.1186/s13034-015-0047-6
54.
PatrickC. J.FowlesD. C.KruegerR. F. (2009). Triarchic conceptualization of psychopathy: Developmental origins of disinhibition, boldness, and meanness. Development and Psychopathology, 21, 913-938. doi:10.1017/S0954579409000492
55.
PattersonJ. M.McCubbinH. I. (1987). Adolescent coping style and behaviors: Conceptualization and measurement. Journal of Adolescence, 10, 163-186. doi:10.1016/S0140-1971(87)80086-6
56.
PechorroP.AndershedH.RayJ. V.MarocoJ.GonçalvesR. A. (2015). Validation of the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory and Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory–Short Version among incarcerated juvenile delinquents. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment, 37, 576-586. doi:10.1007/s10862-015-9490-1
57.
PensonB. N.RuchenskyJ. R.EdensJ. F.DonnellanM. B.EisenbarthH.VaughnM. (2017). Development and initial validation of an inconsistent responding scale for the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory. Journal of Personality Disorders. Advance online publication. doi:10.1521/pedi_2017_31_287
58.
PiedmontR. L.McCraeR. R.RiemannR.AngleitnerA. (2000). On the invalidity of validity scales: Evidence from self-reports and observer ratings in volunteer samples. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78, 582-593. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.78.3.582
59.
RaineA.DodgeK.LoeberR.Gatzke-KoppL.LynamD.ReynoldsC.. . . LiuJ. (2006). The Reactive–Proactive Aggression Questionnaire: Differential correlates of reactive and proactive aggression in adolescent boys. Aggressive Behavior, 32, 159-171. doi:10.1002/ab.20115
60.
RiceM. E.HarrisG. T. (2005). Comparing effect sizes in follow-up studies: ROC area, Cohen’s d, and r. Law and Human Behavior, 29, 615-620. doi:10.1007/s10979-005-6832-7
61.
SampsonR. J.BartuschD. J. (1998). Legal cynicism and (subcultural?) tolerance of deviance: The neighborhood context of racial differences. Law & Society Review, 32, 777-804.
62.
SellbomM.LilienfeldS. O.FowlerK.McCraryK. L. (in press). The self-report assessment of psychopathy: Challenges, pitfalls, and promises. In PatrickC. J. (Ed.), Handbook of psychopathy (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Guilford Press.
63.
SchmittN. (1996). Uses and abuses of coefficient alpha. Psychological Assessment, 8, 350-353. doi:10.1037/1040-3590.8.4.350
64.
ShookJ. J.VaughnM.GoodkindS.JohnsonH. (2011). An empirical portrait of youthful offenders who sell drug. Journal of Criminal Justice, 39, 224-231. doi:10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2011.02.014
65.
SmithG. T.McCarthyD. M.AndersonK. G. (2000). On the sins of short-form development. Psychological Assessment, 12, 102-111. doi:10.1037/1040-3590.12.1.102
66.
VahlP.ColinsO. F.LodewijksH. P. B.MarkusM. T.DoreleijersT. A. H.VermeirenR. R. J. M. (2014). Psychopathic-like traits in detained adolescents: Clinical usefulness of self-report. European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 23, 691-699. doi:10.1007/s00787-013-0497-4
67.
van BaardewijkY.AndershedH.SteggeH.NilssonK. W.ScholteE.VermeirenR. (2010). Development and tests of short versions of the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory and the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory-child version. European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 26, 122-128. doi:10.1027/1015-5759/a000017
68.
VaughnM. G.DeLisiM.BeaverK. M.WexlerJ.BarthA.FletcherJ. (2011). Juvenile psychopathic features are associated with poor reading achievement. Psychiatric Quarterly, 82, 177-190. doi:10.1007/s11126-010-9162-y
69.
VidalS.SkeemJ. L. (2007). Effect of psychopathy, abuse, and ethnicity on juvenile probation officers’ decision-making and supervision strategies. Law and Human Behavior, 31, 479-498. doi:10.1007/s10979-006-9077-1
70.
ViljoenJ. L.McLachlanK.VincentG. (2010). Assessing violence risk and psychopathy in juvenile and adult offenders: A survey of clinical practices. Assessment, 17, 377-395. doi:10.1177/1073191109359587
71.
WoodD.HarmsP. D.LowmanG. H.DeSimoneJ. A. (2017). Response speed and response consistency as mutually validating indicators of data quality in online samples. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 8, 454-464. doi:10.1177/1948550617703168
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
