Citation

Polaschek DLL, King LL. Aust. Psychol. 2002; 37(3): 215-221.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2002, Australian Psychological Society, Publisher Wiley-Blackwell)

DOI

10.1080/00050060210001706896

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Rapists' rehabilitation attracts little attention compared to the rehabilitation of child sexual offenders. One consequence of being overlooked, is that there is surprisingly little research to guide whether and how rapists can be rehabilitated effectively. Examination of traditional cognitive-behavioural treatment programs for sex offenders suggests a common core of offence-specific treatment targets, but little agreement on other components of treatment that are not sexually oriented. Furthermore, some dynamic recidivism risk factors (i.e., criminogenic needs) that are commonly addressed in general offender programs, are seldom the focus of intervention for sex offenders. Yet, research on the offence process in rapists, and on the dynamic predictors of recidivism in sexual and other offenders suggests considerable overlap in these rehabilitative needs. There are a variety of common responsivity barriers for rapists that compromise rehabilitation, and these barriers may also be desirable treatment targets. We argue that the inclusion of a broader range of criminogenic needs, the design of specialist rehabilitation programs for rapists, or referral to existing specialist sexual or violent offender programs on the basis of individually assessed needs, are useful future directions. An urgent research priority is the publication of more treatment outcome studies for rapists, that include an analysis of both sexual and violent recidivism.