Dimensions of Sexual Aggression

Dimensions of Sexual Aggression Darren Charles Francis Bishopp Thesis submitted to the University of Surrey in partial fulfilment for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. 2003 Acknowledgements To my Father I would like to thank Derek Perkins for his insights and ongoing support of this work at Broadmoor Hospital. I would also like to thank my supervisor, Jennifer Brown for her patience and tolerance in guiding me through the PhD process, and for her help in clarifying my ideas. I would also like to thank my colleague and friend, Sean Hammond for his knowledge and psychometric inspiration, not to mention his software. I would also like to thank my friends and family who have been very understanding and my thanks go to Steve and Sara Bishopp who put up with me through the final stages of writing. I am also highly appreciative to Rupert Heritage for providing some of the data and allowing me to use it, and hope that this work provides some useful insights for understanding sexual offenders. Daz Index Page Chapter 1. The Biosocial Dimensions of Aggression 1 Chapter 2 The Biosocial Dimensions of Sexual Variation 16 Chapter 3 Motivational Dimensions of Sexual Aggression 28 Chapter 4 Personality Dimensions 53 Chapter 5 Assessment and Treatment of Sexual Offenders 64 Chapter 6. Discriminating Sexual Offenders 81 Chapter 7 Methodological Orientation 100 Chapter 8 Studies of Sexual Aggression 113 Chapter 9 Discussion 173 Chapter 10 Supplementary: Etymology of Sexual Aggression 196 Bibliography 201 Appendix I BADMAN Coding Scheme Abstract This thesis explores sexual aggression in men, focussing primarily on the bases and manifestations of rape in western society. A multivariate, meta-theoretical approach is adopted, given the diversity, and complexity of the phenomenon drawing on general, and specific literature, both ancient and modem. There are many seminal and classic pieces of work which are often overlooked when doing contemporary research on re defined constructs and ambiguous concepts which have their basis in much older theoretical considerations of human constructs; concepts which have puzzled philosophers and scientists for millennia. It offers a critique of clinical, forensic and offender profiling approaches adopted to discriminate sexual offenders, and proposes the use of behavioural scales to characterise them. The research and discussion reflect a facet-theoretic influence with respect to methodological orientation in the study of behaviour. This work de constructs the psychological perspectives on sexual aggression and re integrates them within the proposed multi-dimensional model of sexual aggression. The approach is necessarily general, since there is neither a definitive model of human behaviour that can be applied to sexual aggression, nor a model of sexual aggression that can fully explain the differences between sex offenders. The empirical data derives from police and clinical sources and is examined for the presence of underlying components, or dimensions, within the spectrum of sexually aggressive acts. Associations between these dimensions, and clinically identified motivations are explored, revealing intuitive associations between action and intent. Statistical analyses lend support for the constructs themselves, while the conceptual model is inevitably theoretical, because statistics only simplify reality. The resultant model is defined in terms of Context (societal and localised), Biological pre-disposition (Temperamental variation), Interpersonal style (Aggressive to Intimate and Dominant to Submissive), Motivation (Cognition and Affect), and Sexual Variation (Normal to Deviant Appetites). It is proposed that these domains are correspondent to each other within a generalised model of sexual aggression. Introduction to Sexual Aggression "All cruelty springs from weakness" Seneca As a feature of human behaviour it is ancient phenomenon, and recorded in mythological and historical texts around the world. Such antiquity suggests that rape may have served some evolutionary function in the development of the species, while its persistence suggests that humankind has not quite left the trees. Our tribal ancestry will have impacted on contemporary forms of rape and violence, but social and cultural factors also play some role in the maintenance of aggression. While one section of the public seems prepared to lynch a suspected child molester, or rapist, another section of society is involved in carefully hiding incidents of child sexual abuse, and exploitation. The understanding and management of sexual aggression and deviation, within society, crosses religious, political, medico-legal, and scientific boundaries. Chapter 1 is a broad introduction to sexual aggression, including a discussion of the biological (nature), and cultural factors, which contribute to sexual and aggressive diversity. Although all human action takes place within a broad cultural context, the acquisition of aggressive behaviour or negative attitudes towards women, often occurs within more immediate social contexts such as the family. Social learning theory has made a significant contribution to the understanding of socially acquired traits, but is not a complete explanation for sexual aggression. The environment provides a context, but individual variations in Personality influences a person's disposition to act in an aggressive, or sexually deviant, way. Motivational aspects of aggression comprise a range of cognitive processes and differing mood states which are conceptually difficult to disentangle, and so are proposed as a couplet. Chapter 2 considers the broader psychological perspectives on aggression in society, while Chapter 3 provides an overview of more specific elements of motivation and personality which drive individual action. Clinical perspectives, in the psychological tradition, have emphasised the underlying problems, deficits or needs associated with sex offenders, including aspects of social, cognitive and emotional function. The role of psychological treatment is to assess and alter these maladaptive personality traits and cognitive processes. Psychiatric approaches to sexual offending have often operated under the assumption that a person can be categorized by particular sets of features, in the same way that an illness can be diagnosed by the presence of particular criteria. Unfortunately, the medical model has little to offer in the way of explanation for sexually aggressive behaviour, and it seems unlikely that rape is a diagnostic condition. More importantly, such discrimination depends on identifying meaningful characteristics on which to base the classification. Approaches to assessment and treatment are outlined in Chapter 4. The literature on sexual offending reflects both an understanding of factors associated with particular behaviours, as well as attempts to classify, or typologise, sexual offenders on the basis of shared components. One area of sexual aggression that has received a great deal of attention is rape, informed by research and practise in both clinical and forensic settings. Overall the evidence suggests that sexual offenders can not be psychiatrically classified on the basis of a few bipolar constructs such as impulsivity, or aggression. More specific consideration is given to the theoretical distinctions made between forms and levels of aggression such as instrumental or sadistic. Often the way in which aggression is treated empirically does not correspond to the way it is understood theoretically. Sexual and non-sexual aggression share some useful theoretical concepts, but the way in which people vary is considered as continuous, rather than categorical. While there has been a great deal of progress in identifying the core components of personality on which people vary generally, there is some way to go before psychology can offer a full scientific explanation of human aggression. The difficulty is that people can be discriminated from each other in more than one way; people can vary on a particular aspect of human function such as intelligence, or they can be "typed" according to shared characteristics. Obviously there are differences, but to what extent are these differences, more conceivable as variations on psychological dimensions, or continua, rather than discrete classes, is problematic. Across disciplines, there are some clear, consistent themes relevant to both detection (in police investigations) and treatment, which provide a useful basis for scientific examination. Unfortunately there are also inconsistencies in both definitions and concepts used, reflecting more fundamental differences in ideological perspectives. As a consequence, question such as Are sex offenders born or made?, or Do sex offenders vary on particular psychological constructs or do they form distinct groups?, are still being asked, and answers still evoke dispute. Taxonomies, typologies and classification are outlined in Chapter 5, together with a discussion around the qualitative and quantitative aspects of aggression. Discriminating between groups of people on the basis of shared characteristics has been a central theme of psychological science. The basis for such discrimination depends on identifying clearly defined characteristics upon which people vary. Often the discriminating characteristics used to classify sexual offenders are ambiguous and not mutually exclusive. Aggression and sadism, for example, are often considered as discrete categories, or proposed as either absent or present. Often these distinctions

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