Personality Disorders & Domestic Violence
I provide our courts Domestic Violence Evaluations upon request. As part of the evaluation I use the MCMI-III. I am seeing a high number of individuals suffering from Axis II PD’s. Does anyone have any recent research showing such a corralation?
Mar 27, 2014 @ 07:17:54
The foremost authority on this topic is Don Dutton, a professor in the psychology department at the University of British Columbia, and an ADVIP member. You might want to read his book, Rethinking Domestic Violence (UBC press, 2008), which provides a very thorough review of the research literature. I also recommend the literature review by Deborah Capalidi on DV risk factors, part of the Partner Abuse State of Knowledge Project (www.domesticviolenceresearch.org). In a nutshell, there is very strong evidence that more severe forms of partner abuse are correlated with personality disturbance, which longitudinal studies have found to begin in childhood in both men and women. Correlations have been found between certain personality traits from the MCMI-III and DV perpetration in samples of male and female offenders (see the Simmons et al. and Henning et al. references below). However, some research (e.g., by Edward Gondolf) finds only weak correlations between personality type and recidivism, and attempts to organize domestic violence into neat typologies have not been altogether successful. There is more support for broader constructions such as “negative emotionality,” which includes negative affect and impulsiveness, and the “abusive personality,” a Dutton formulation which takes into account childhood trauma and insecure attachment.
Simmons, C., Lehmann, P., Cobb, N., & Fowler, C. (2005). Personality profiles of women and men arrested for Domestic Violence: An analysis of similarities and differences. Journal of Offender Rehabilitation, 41 (4) 63-81.
Henning, K., Jones, A. & Holdford, R. (2003). Treatment needs of women arrested for domestic violence: A comparison with male offenders. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 18 (8), 839-856.
Mar 27, 2014 @ 17:23:20
John;
Thanks for the helpful information.
Scott