Citation

Dyck HL, Campbell MA, Schmidt F, Wershler JL. Youth Violence Juv. Justice 2013; 11(3): 230-248.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2013, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/1541204012469414

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The current study examined long-term offending patterns in relation to youth psychopathic traits. Criminal records of 126 adolescent offenders (80 male; 46 female) were analyzed for criminal activity between the ages of 12 and 23. Total scores on the Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version were positively correlated with a higher number of overall offending incidents. After classifying youths into low (n = 62), moderate (n = 26), and high (n = 38) psychopathic trait groups, results indicated that the moderate- and high-trait groups had consistently higher mean rates of criminal events (i.e., violent, nonviolent, drug related, and technical violations) throughout the follow-up period than the low-trait group. Contrary to what has been argued in previous psychopathy literature, a decrease in offending over time was observed in all three psychopathic trait groups. These results suggest that youths with psychopathic traits tend to display a higher level of criminal activity during adolescence, but are similar to lower psychopathic groups in also showing at least an initial decline in this behavior as they approach early adulthood.

Language: en