Antisocial personality disorder as a predictor of criminal behaviour in a longitudinal study of a cohort of abusers of several classes of drugs: Relation to type of substance and type of crime.

• Mixed findings have been made with regard to the long-term predictive validity of antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) on criminal behaviour in samples of substance abusers. A longitudinal record-linkage study of a cohort of 1052 drug abusers admitted 1977-1995 was undertaken. Subjects were recruited from a detoxification and short-term rehabilitation unit in Lund, Sweden, and followed through criminal justice registers from their first treatment episode to death or to the year 2004. In a ML multinomial random effects regression, subjects diagnosed with antisocial personality disorders were 2.16 times more likely to be charged with theft only (p<0.001), and 2.44 times more likely to be charged committing multiple types of crime during an observation year (p<0.001). The findings of the current study support the predictive validity of the DSM-III-R diagnosis of ASPD. ASPD should be taken seriously in drug abusers, and be targeted in treatment to prevent crime in society.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Psykologi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Psychology (hsv//eng)

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