The personality of female prisoners.

The article reports on the study of 264 female prisoners, in which they were administered personality questionnaires purporting to measure psychoticism (P), neuroticism (N) and extraversion (E). Results of the test were compared to the questionnaire responses of male prisoners and male and female control groups. It was shown that female prisoners are characterized by high P scores, high N scores and high E scores. One unexpected finding was the discovery of P scores among the female prisoners which were in excess of those found among male prisoners. The authors opine that this finding may be related to the psychiatric observation of much greater instability in female than in male prison populations.