Officer attitudes towards adult male prisoners who self-harm: development of an attitudinal measure and investigation of sex differences

Purpose: The aim of the current study was to explore attitudes towards self‐harm in a sample of prison officers, with subsidiary aims of assessing if these attitudes alter as a function of the prisoner's behavior and the sex of the participant. Method: One hundred and sixty‐two officers (100 men and 62 women) completed a general measure of their attitudes towards prisoners and one designed to assess Attitudes towards Prisoners who Self‐Harm (APSH). Participants rated their perceptions of two adult male prisoners depicted in vignettes. The vignettes depicted identical types of self‐harm but varied the behavioral characteristics of the prisoners involved, with one depicted as “well‐behaved” and the other as “disruptive”. Results: Women were more likely than men to report positive attitudes towards self‐harm and in particular were less likely than men to endorse negative myths regarding self‐harm. The prisoner depicted as “disruptive” invoked increased negative attitudes than the “well‐behaved” prisoner. This finding was consistent across sex. Conclusion: The current study indicates that APSH are comprised of a number of components that were influenced by the sex of the participant and the behavioral characteristics of the prisoners depicted. The implications of these findings to practice are discussed. Aggr. Behav. 33:63–72, 2007. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Correction to: Children’s Perspectives on Emotions Informing a Child-Reported Screening Instrument

Journal of Child and Family Studies -     

Aggression and offence motivation in prisoners: exploring the components of motivation in an adult male sample

This study examined aggression and offending motivation. Participants were 206 adult male prisoners. All completed the Aggression Motivation Questionnaire [Ireland, 2008], the Offending Motivation Questionnaire [Gudjonsson and Sigurdsson, 2004], the Multidimensional Anger Inventory [Siegel, 1986] and the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding [Paulhus, 1991]. It was predicted that aggression motivation would separate into two factors, one reflecting proactive aggression and the other reactive aggression. It was predicted that aggression motives would vary by offence type. It was also predicted that the offending motives identified in previous research (i.e. Excitement, Compliance, Provocation and Financial) would be reflected in this study. Levels of anger and social desirability were also examined for their relationship with aggression and offending motives. Results indicated that aggression motivation separated into four core motives; protection, social recognition, perceived positive outcome, and pleasure. Violent and nonviolent offenders were found to differ in their underlying motives for recent acts of aggression. Anger was related to all core aggression motives, whereas social desirability was related only to some. Offending motives were similar to previous research although some differences were found. Results are discussed with reference to their theoretical and clinical implications.