Validity and Predictive Accuracy of the Structured Assessment of Protective Factors for Violence Risk in Criminal Forensic Evaluations

Abstract

Some actuarial and structured professional judgment (SPJ) risk-assessment instruments have already demonstrated their validity and predictive accuracy in expert criminal forensic evaluations. In contrast, little is known about the effectiveness of instruments identifying protective factors in risk of recidivism prediction. The present study was designed to evaluate the validity and predictive accuracy of the Structured Assessment of Protective Factors for Violence Risk (SAPROF) in 94 violent and sexual violent offenders assessed in a Swiss pretrial criminal forensic context. The SAPROF showed good interrater reliability, and was significantly correlated to predominately dynamic instruments but not to predominately actuarial instruments. However, in terms of predictive accuracy, the SAPROF did not perform as well as expected when compared with other instruments and with previous SAPROF accuracy validation studies. These results have implications for the use of the SAPROF in criminal forensic contexts risk assessment.

Assessing Protective Factors for Violence Risk in U.K. General Mental Health Services Using the Structured Assessment of Protective Factors

“…These significant correlations were present in each setting, although a relatively poor correlation with HCR-20 in the general inpatient group stands out. These strong associations support the conceptual model underpinning the development of the SAPROF and fit with those reported elsewhere (Abbiati et al, 2016;Abidin et al, 2013: de Vries Robbe at al., 2011de Vries Robbe et al, 2015;Persson et al, 2017).…”

“…The relatively strong level of protective factors in the community sample here is actually lower than that reported for some inpatient forensic samples (Abidin et al, 2013;Davoren et al, 2013) but is comparable with another community sample surveyed by Yoon et al (2016), although the latter was an offender group. Both the forensic and general in-patient groups here are comparable with other forensic samples examined by Viljoen et al (2016) and Abbiati et al (2016) but somewhat stronger in terms of protective factors than others (de Vries Robbe et al, 2011; de Vries Robbe et al 2015).…”

Predicting physically violent misconduct in prison: A comparison of four risk assessment instruments

“…A previous study had found good inter-rater reliability between these same researchers and good to excellent intraclass correlation coefficient values (Abbiati et al, 2017). Information was gathered from prison records and forensic assessment reports, both of which included evaluations, summaries of interviews with the offenders, sometimes summaries of interviews with the offender's family, and the courts' and/or judges' conclusions and recommendations about the risk of future violence or reoffending and about treatment plans.…”

“…Although some studies show that actuarial risk assessment instruments are more predictive than SPJs (Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2004;Sjöstedt & Grann, 2002), others have found that SPJs outperform actuarial risk assessment instruments (Desmarais, Nicholls, Wilson, & Brink, 2012;deVries Robbé, deVogel, & Douglas, 2013;Pedersen et al, 2010). Similarly, some studies support the incremental validity of protective factors, especially when they are combined with other risk assessment instruments and used in secure hospital settings (Chu, Thomas, Ogloff, & Daffern, 2011;deVries Robbé et al, 2013;deVries Robbé, deVogel, Douglas, & Nijman, 2015), whereas others do not (Abbiati, Azzola, Palix, Gasser, & Moulin, 2017;O'Shea & Dickens, 2016).…”

Predictive Validity of the Dynamic Risk Assessment for Offender Re-Entry Among Intimate Partner Violence Offenders

“…While there is a dearth of research on protective factors that are not inverted risk factors (Polaschek, 2016), both conceptualizations have been supported in the literature. Divergent validity analyses between risk and protective factor measures have yielded significant inverse correlations between the two constructs (e.g., see Abbiati, Azzola, Palix, Gasser, & Moulin, 2017;Averill, 2016;Hanby, 2013;Persson, Belfrage, Fredriksson, & Kristiansson, 2017;Smeth, 2013;Tamatea &Wilson, 2009;. This supports the notion that protective factors are the opposite of risk factors.…”