Citation

Holt SE, Meloy JR, Strack S. J. Am. Acad. Psychiatry Law 1999; 27(1): 23-32.

Affiliation

California School of Professional Psychology, San Diego, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1999, American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, Publisher American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

10212024

Abstract

A nonrandom sample (N = 41) of inmates from a maximum security prison were classified as either psychopathic or nonpsychopathic (using the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R)) and violent or sexually violent. Sadism was measured using the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II (MCMI-II) Scale 6B, the Personality Disorder Examination (PDE) items for sadistic personality disorder, and the sexual sadism criteria of DSM-IV. Psychopaths were found to be significantly more sadistic than nonpsychopaths (MCMI-II and PDE). Overall power was relatively high. Sadism did not differentiate the violent and sexually violent groups. A diagnosis of sexual sadism was too infrequent (n = 3) for meaningful statistical analysis. The trait measures of sadism and psychopathy measures (PCL-R, Factor 1 and Factor 2) significantly and positively correlated. Results provide further empirical validity for the theoretically proposed and clinically observed relationship between sadistic traits and psychopathic personality.

Language: en