NCJ Number
95491
Date Published
1979
Length
118 pages
Annotation
Adolescent rapists tend to have lower intelligence and perform better in nonverbal tasks than normal adolescents.
Abstract
Both the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, Revised, and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory were administered to 35 incarcerated juvenile rapists with mixed racial, religious, and socioeconomic backgrounds. All subjects were tested during the first month of incarceration in California Youth Authority facilities. The research group had significantly higher scores on psychopathic deviance, faking, hypomania, schizophrenia, masculine-femine identification, psychastenia, and depression scales than did the normative population. Contrary to prediction, they did not score significantly higher than the normative population on the paranoid ideation scale. Within-group variations the rapists tended to do better on nonverbal performance tasks, a finding commonly associated with acting-out adolescents. The group profile was that of antisocial personality. Additional research should focus on differences between this group and other delinquents, demographic variables, the effects of early childhood disorders, and treatment effectiveness. Tabular data, sample questions, and a 118-item bibliography are provided.