Encyclopedia of Psychology and Law

as 3 years, the focus of this entry is on preteens and

adolescents.

Extending Psychopathy

From Adults to Youths

Several factors have encouraged the extension of psy-

chopathy from adults to youth. Foremost among them

are (a) the recognition that the chief tools for diagnos-

ing psychopathy predict violence and criminal recidi-

vism and (b) the juvenile justice system’s increasingly

punitive policies, which have created a demand for

identifying inalterably dangerous youths. Although

researchers hoped that psychopathy assessments

would be used to identify a subgroup of at-risk youths

to target for intervention, recent legal reviews suggest

that the youths identified are likely to be excluded

from treatment and set up for harsh sanctions.

Most measures of juvenile psychopathy modify the

PCL–R items and scoring criteria to reference youths’

peer, family, and school experiences. They are built on

the assumption that the features of psychopathy man-

ifested by adult psychopaths will, when exhibited in

youths, identify a small subgroup of offenders who

are maturing into psychopaths. That is, psychopathy is

manifested similarly, whether one is 13 or 33 years

old. This assumption is challenged by a study of clin-

ical psychologists’ conceptions of juvenile psychopa-

thy. Clinicians viewed some of the features of adult

PCL–R psychopathy (e.g., impulsivity, the failure to

accept responsibility, a parasitic lifestyle, criminal

versatility) as nonprototypic of juvenile psychopathy.

Although this raises the possibility that the manifesta-

tions of psychopathy differ as a function of develop-

mental stage, no “bottom-up” measures of juvenile

psychopathy have been developed.

Reliability and Predictive Utility of

Juvenile Psychopathy Measures

The most widely validated measures of juvenile psy-

chopathy were derived from the PCL–R, including the

Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version (PCL:YV), the

Antisocial Process Screening Device (APSD), and the

Child Psychopathy Scale (CPS). Like its parent mea-

sure, the PCL:YV is based on a clinical interview and

file review; the other measures are based on self- or

collateral report. Perhaps, given these method differ-

ences, the PCL:YV correlates only moderately with

the remaining measures.

These measures share two general strengths. First,

each has been shown to be reliable (interrater, internal

consistency, and/or short-term test-retest). Second,

each has demonstrated some utility in predicting

youths’ violent or antisocial behavior. The typical

degree of association with these behavioral outcomes

is similar to that observed in adults (i.e., r ≠.25).

Although most prospective studies follow youths for

only 1 to 2 years, one retrospective study indicates that

youths’ (mean age =16) file-based PCL:YV scores

moderately predict violent recidivism over an average

10-year follow-up period. Most of the PCL:YV’s pre-

dictive utility in this study, however, was attributable to

its assessment of an impulsive, antisocial lifestyle

rather than traits of emotional detachment. This find-

ing is consistent with much of the adult literature and

challenges the assumption that the measure’s associa-

tion with violence is an indication that emotionally

detached psychopaths use violence to prey on others.

Instead, the measures may tap traits of aggression or

externalizing features that predict violence but are not

specific to psychopathy.

Construct Validity of

Juvenile Psychopathy: Potential

Mechanisms and Etiology

For such reasons, predictive utility (which seeks clinical

utility) cannot be mistaken for construct validity (which

seeks construct identification). To determine whether

psychopathy is a valid construct when applied to youths,

juvenile psychopathy must be (a) evaluated against a

validation hierarchy dictated by a theory of the disorder

and (b) shown to be a stable personality disorder that

does not dissipate as youths become adults.

Despite the differences among them, most theories

describe psychopathy as a largely inherited affective

or cognitive processing deficit. These theories dictate

a validation hierarchy that places pathophysiologic

and etiologic mechanisms at the top, as they offer the

greatest potential for explaining the disorder and

potentially altering its course. The question is whether

diagnostic criteria for juvenile psychopathy identify a

homogeneous group of youths with clearly delineated

deficits and largely genetic pathophysiology.

Paul Frick and his students have begun to address

this question. Their work highlights the importance

of features of emotional detachment, or “callous/

unemotional” (C/U) traits, in defining juvenile psy-

chopathy. Theoretically, traits of emotional detachment

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