Treating Sex Offenders in Prison

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Devon L. L. Polaschek ◽  
Kristina M. Blackwood
Keyword(s):  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Cognitive Strategies ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
Behavioral Strategies ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
Criminogenic Needs ◽  
Composite Risk ◽  
General Recidivism

This essay considers the challenges associated with managing and treating sex offenders within the prison setting. What is known from scientific research about the most effective approaches to treating sex offenders is reviewed, followed by the major rehabilitation theories. The role of assessment with sex offenders (e.g., interviews, composite risk and need assessments for both sexual and general recidivism, penile plethysmography) as well as the challenges and limitations of conducting assessments with incarcerated sex offenders are also discussed. The various approaches to sex offender treatment are critiqued, including physiological strategies, behavioral strategies, cognitive strategies, and relapse prevention. Each phase of treatment (preparation, addressing criminogenic needs, planning for the future) is considered separately, and directions for future research are considered.

scholarly journals Volunteering With Sex Offenders: The Attitudes of Volunteers Toward Sex Offenders, Their Treatment, and Rehabilitation

Sexual Abuse ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (6) ◽  
pp. 659-675 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan Kerr ◽  
Ruth J. Tully ◽  
Birgit Völlm
Keyword(s):  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Sexual Offenders ◽  
General Public ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Management Strategies ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
Offender Rehabilitation ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
Attitudes Toward Sex

The general public has been shown to hold negative attitudes toward sexual offenders, sex offender treatment, and the rehabilitation of sexual offenders. It appears pertinent to the success of sex offender management strategies that utilise volunteers that selected volunteers do not share these attitudes. Here, volunteers for Circles of Support and Accountability (CoSA), a community-based initiative supporting the reintegration of sex offenders, completed three validated psychometric measures assessing attitudes toward sex offenders in general and toward their treatment and rehabilitation. Responses were compared with a U.K. general public sample. The results showed that volunteers held more positive attitudes toward sex offenders, sex offender treatment, and sex offender rehabilitation than the U.K. general public sample. The significance of these findings is discussed alongside directions for future research.

Measuring the effectiveness of sex offender treatment

2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (S2) ◽  
pp. 2062-2062
Author(s):  
J. Endrass ◽  
A. Rossegger ◽  
F. Urbaniok
Keyword(s):  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Treatment Effectiveness ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
Recidivism Rates ◽  
Therapy Effectiveness ◽  
Key Factor ◽  
Sex Offense

Depending on the subject of the evaluation different outcome measures are necessary. Generally recidivism rates are considered to be state of the art in the assessment of forensic therapy effectiveness. In this context, recidivism can be defined differently. Thus a definition may include only new convictions for a specific type of offense or any offense or may even include new charges as well. In the evaluation of sex offender treatments it is often considered to be self-evident to define recidivism as a reconviction or new charge for a sex offense. Some authors however argue - not without reason - to include any type of violent offense in the definition. The evaluation of treatment effectiveness suggests however, also including therapeutic criteria such as level of openness of the patient. Especially openness about sexual fantasies relevant to the sex offense may be a key factor in the treatment of sex offenders. It is suggested that future research in the area include such ‘softer’ criteria as well.

scholarly journals “Mr S, you do have sexual fantasies?” The Parole Hearing and Treatment of a Sex Offender at the Turn of the 21st Century

2013 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dany Lacombe
Keyword(s):  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Treatment Program ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
Sexual Fantasies ◽  
Parole Board ◽  
Clear Sign ◽  
Prevention Plan

How does the Parole Board decide a sex offender is rehabilitated and can be released into the community? This case study of a parole hearing reveals the significance the Parole Board gives to a sex offender’s management of his arousal as a clear sign of his rehabilitation. To explain the Board’s preoccupation with a sex offender’s sexual fantasies and arousal, I draw on a prison ethnography of a sex offender treatment program. Rehabilitation as risk management relies on the development of a crime cycle and relapse prevention plan designed to grasp the connection between fantasies, arousal and offending. I argue the parole hearing and treatment program exist in a symbiotic relationship that fabricates the sex offender into a species larger than life, one at risk of offending all the time. Key words: rehabilitation, sex offenders, parole, sexual fantasies, ethnography, prison.

Prison-based sex offender treatment programs in the post sexual psychopath era

1995 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 555-581 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia M. Harris
Keyword(s):  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Behavioral Treatment ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Treatment Programs ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Treatment Methods ◽  
State Prisons ◽  
New Generation

Throughout the 1980s sex offender treatment programs proliferated in state prisons in the wake of repealed sexual psychopath legislation, driven by much favorable publicity over novel cognitive and behavioral treatment methods. This article examines the scope and likely impact of the new generation of sex offender treatment programs and concludes that heightened optimism may be premature. The new programs embody the same defects that the repeal of psychopath legislation was intended to correct. The enterprise of sex offender treatment would benefit from participation of social scientists outside of the treatment field in research on sex offenders.

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy in the Treatment and Management of Sex Offenders

2010 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 92-103 ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan Schaffer ◽  
Elizabeth L. Jeglic ◽  
Aviva Moster ◽  
Dorota Wnuk
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy ◽  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Behavioral Therapy ◽  
Sexual Offending ◽  
Cognitive Behavioral ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
Sex Offending ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
Adult Sexual Offending

In this article, current methods of conceptualizing and treating adult sexual offending are reviewed. First, the Risk-Needs-Responsivity (RNR) approach to sex offender management is presented and critiqued. Then, the newer Good Lives Model is discussed and contrasted with the aforementioned RNR approach. The discussion of these approaches to sex offender management and rehabilitation is followed by a review of those cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) techniques used to treat risk factors associated with sex offending, as such techniques are employed in both paradigms. Finally, research regarding the efficacy of using CBT techniques to treat sex offending behavior is presented, and future directions for sex offender treatment and management are discussed.

scholarly journals Establishing a sex offender treatment programme within a prison

1996 ◽  
Vol 20 (5) ◽  
pp. 261-263
Author(s):  
C. Jones
Keyword(s):  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
Treatment Programme ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
The Core

In 1991 the Prison Service began to develop a programme of treatment for sex offenders in custody. HMP Risley was the first establishment to successfully establish and run the ‘Core Treatment Programme’. This paper examines some of the issues involved in setting up such a programme, which was designed to be implemented by relatively inexperienced staff.

Evaluation of New Jersey's Sex Offender Treatment Program at the Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Center: Preliminary Results

2003 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 133-164 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristen M. Zgoba ◽  
Wayne R. Sager ◽  
Philip H. Witt
Keyword(s):  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Sexual Offenders ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Prison Population ◽  
Correctional Facility ◽  
Treatment Center ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
Sexual Offense ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
Sexual Offenses

This study examined 10-year sexual and non-sexual offense recidivism for sex offenders released from New Jersey's general prison system and from the Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Center (ADTC), New Jersey's correctional facility and treatment center for repetitive-compulsive sexual offenders. The study found that sexual offenders released from the ADTC had significantly lower rates of committing both non-sexual offenses and any offense, compared with the general prison population of sex offenders. For both groups, the 10-year sexual offense reconviction rates were relatively low, 8.6% for the ADTC offenders and 12.7% for the general prison sexual offenders, while reoffense rates for non-sexual offenses were 25.8% and 44.1% for ADTC and general prison sex offenders, respectively.

Desistance From Sexual and Other Violent Offending Among Child Sexual Abusers

2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 416-431 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael P. Lasher ◽  
Robert J. McGrath
Keyword(s):  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Sex Offender ◽  
Risk Measure ◽  
Offender Treatment ◽  
First Year ◽  
Sex Offender Treatment ◽  
Community Reentry ◽  
Dynamic Risk ◽  
Violent Offending ◽  
Child Sexual Abusers

Most sex offenders appear to desist from sexual and other violent offending; however, research on this population has historically focused more on the characteristics of individuals who persist offending versus those who desist from offending. The present study examined change patterns of 563 child sexual abusers’ scores on the Sex Offender Treatment Intervention and Progress Scale, a dynamic risk measure, at three points of time over 2 years. Individuals who did versus did not commit a new serious offense, defined as a new sexual or other violent offense, at 5-year follow-up were contrasted. Desisters demonstrated most changes during their first year in treatment, whereas change among persisters more often occurred during their second year in treatment. All classes of offenders made gains in addressing dynamic risk related to sexually specific needs, whereas desisters made significantly greater gains in social stability needs. Findings are discussed in light of treatment dose allocation and community reentry needs.

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