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There is limited evidence in the literature that hostility, anger, and aggression are involved with social anxiety. The present study examined the relationship of personality traits and aggression with social anxiety and social skills in forensic psychiatric outpatients convicted of a violent crime. Social anxiety was mainly contributed to by neuroticism, state anger, and social skills, while neuroticism and social anxiety were the main contributors to social skills. Anger, next to neuroticism and social skills, appeared to be involved in the outpatients' social anxiety. Neuroticism and social anxiety were found to be the main contributors to social skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examined the psychometric properties of the Novaco Anger Scale--Provocation Inventory (NAS-PI, 1994 version) in Dutch violent forensic psychiatric patients and secondary vocational students. A confirmatory factor analysis of the subscale structure of the NAS was carried out, reliability was investigated, and relations were calculated between NAS-PI scores and other measures of personality traits and problem behaviors. The 3-subscale structure of the original NAS could not be confirmed. However, the internal consistency of the NAS and the PI was excellent, and the test-retest reliability of the NAS was good. The validity of the NAS and the PI was supported by a meaningful pattern of correlations with alternative measures of anger and personality traits. Forensic psychiatric outpatients displayed higher NAS scores than secondary vocational students, but inpatients scored even lower than this nonclinical control group. Our preliminary conclusion is that the NAS-PI is a valuable instrument for the assessment of anger in Dutch violent forensic psychiatric patients. (Contains 1 footnote and 5 tables.)

The psychometric properties of a Dutch version of Buss and Perry's Aggression Questionnaire (AQ) were examined in a sample of violent forensic psychiatric inpatients and outpatients and a sample of secondary vocational students. The internal consistency, interitem correlations, and item--scale correlations of the subscales Physical Aggression, Anger, and Hostility were good but turned out to be unsatisfactory for the subscale Verbal Aggression. The four-factor structure of the AQ could not be confirmed, but the four-factor structure of a 12-item version (short form) of the AQ, the AQ-SF, produced an acceptable fit. The test--retest reliability of the AQ and AQ-SF total scores was good, although the test--retest reliability of the AQ-SF subscale Physical Aggression was not satisfactory. The validity of both the AQ and AQ-SF could be demonstrated by meaningful correlations with alternative measures of aggression and personality, but inpatients were not found to display higher scores on the AQ or AQ-SF than the students. (Contains 6 tables.)

A group of 63 domestically violent patients and a group of 103 generally violent patients at a Dutch forensic psychiatric outpatient clinic are examined with regard to personality traits and problem behaviors to develop treatment programs for domestically violent patients. The domestically violent patients are more unstable from a psychological viewpoint but not more inclined to anger than the average Dutch male. They report less anxiety in situations in which criticism can be given but more anxiety in situations in which someone can be given a compliment. When comparing domestically violent patients with generally violent patients, domestically violent patients score lower on anger as disposition and on aggressive behavior than the generally violent patients do. However, both groups do not differ from each other in their score on the dimension of psychopathy. (Contains 1 table.)

This follow-up study presents psychometric data and norms of the Adapted Version of the Picture-Frustration Study (PFS-AV) from 422 male violent forensic psychiatric in- and outpatients, 101 male violent long-term prisoners, and 319 secondary vocational students (160 males and 159 females). The PFS-AV is a production instrument to measure hostility with 12 items. A diagnostician scored the responses on a seven-point scale, running from not at all hostile (0) to extremely hostile (7). Support was found for the PFS-AV construct, concurrent, and discriminant validity in all three samples. Therefore, the present results underline the generalizability and applicability of the PFS-AV in different populations. Furthermore, for clinical diagnosis, norms are presented for the three samples, just as examples for the scoring on the Likert scale. Also, Dutch, English, and German versions of the PFS-AV with scoring instructions are available. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Psychological determinants of aggressive behavior (personality traits and problem behaviors) in 59 Dutch female offenders (outpatients and detainees) were compared with those in 170 male offenders (outpatients and detainees) who were all convicted of a violent crime. The violent female offenders scored significantly higher on neuroticism and trait anger, and significantly lower on hostility than the male offenders; however, effect sizes were small. A subgroup of female forensic psychiatric outpatients did not differ from a subgroup of male outpatients on all measures, whereas a subgroup of female detainees scored significantly higher on anger and aggression, but lower on hostility and psychopathy than did a subgroup of male detainees. These first results might indicate that violent female offenders do not differ much from violent male offenders regarding personality traits and problem behaviors. The differences between both groups of violent offenders were largely borne by the subgroup of violent female detainees compared with the subgroup of violent male detainees. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effects of Aggression Replacement Training (ART) were explored in a group of Dutch violent young men aged 16 to 21 years, who were obliged by the court to follow a treatment program in a forensic psychiatric outpatient clinic. To evaluate the training, patients completed a set of self-report questionnaires at three moments in time: at intake/before a waiting period, after the waiting period/before the training, and after the training. During the waiting period, the patients did not change on most measures, although they displayed a significant increase in anger. The patients who completed the therapy scored significantly lower on psychopathy than the patients who dropped out. The training produced significant decreases in physical aggression and social anxiety and showed trends toward a decline in self-reported hostility, general aggression, and anger. After the training, the patients scored comparably with a reference group on measures of hostility and aggressive behavior. Altogether, these results provide tentative support for the efficacy of the ART for violent young men referred to forensic psychiatric outpatient settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In The Netherlands, the Ministry of Security and Justice requires the assessment of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; Hare, 1991; Hare, 2003) in all forensic psychiatric inpatients. To examine the four-factor structure of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted using a Dutch sample of forensic psychiatric inpatients (N=411) and the results indicated acceptable fit. Also, using multiple group CFA, the four-factor model provided an acceptable fit in both patients with a personality disorder and patients with a psychotic disorder, and there was reasonably good evidence of measurement invariance between these two subgroups. Furthermore, correlations with external measures of aggression and personality traits provided additional support for the validity of the four-factor model in patients with a personality disorder. In patients with a psychotic disorder fewer significant correlations with external measures were found. Taken together, the results support the use of the four-factor structure in Dutch offenders who are detained under hospital order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]