David A Boothroyd Psychopathy & Sexual Offending 200249144 January 2021 Supervised by Dr Luna Centifanti and Dr James Reilly Submitted in partial fulfilment of the degree of Doctorate in Clinical Psychology, University of Liverpool 1 Word Count Total (including appendices): 21,372 Chapter One: 8,936 Chapter Two: 8,393 Chapter Three: 959 2 Contents CONTENTS ............................................................................................................................................................ 3 Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................................................... 5 CHAPTER ONE: PSYCHOPATHY AND RAPE MYTH ACCEPTANCE: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW & META-ANALYSIS .. 6 ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................................................. 7 INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................................................................... 8 Psychopathy ................................................................................................................................................. 8 Rape myth acceptance (RMA) .................................................................................................................... 10 Psychopathy and RMA ................................................................................................................................ 13 METHOD ............................................................................................................................................................ 15 Aims ............................................................................................................................................................ 15 Searches ..................................................................................................................................................... 15 Inclusion & exclusion criteria ...................................................................................................................... 16 Data extraction & transformation .............................................................................................................. 16 Risk of bias assessment .............................................................................................................................. 18 Meta-analyses ............................................................................................................................................ 18 RESULTS ............................................................................................................................................................. 20 Study setting, population & design ............................................................................................................ 22 Measures .................................................................................................................................................... 23 Risk of bias .................................................................................................................................................. 33 Primary psychopathy & RMA ..................................................................................................................... 37 Publication bias .......................................................................................................................................... 38 Secondary psychopathy & RMA .................................................................................................................. 40 Publication bias .......................................................................................................................................... 41 DISCUSSION ........................................................................................................................................................ 43 CHAPTER TWO: THE ROLE OF PSYCHOPATHIC TRAITS, REJECTION SENSITIVITY AND EMOTION REGULATION IN PREDICTING SEXUAL COERCION AND ATTITUDES TOWARDS RAPE, WITHIN UNDERGRADUATE UNIVERSITY STUDENTS. ................................................................................................................................................... 49 ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................................................... 50 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................................................... 51 Psychopathy & rape myth acceptance (RMA) ............................................................................................ 52 Psychopathy & sexual coercion .................................................................................................................. 53 Rejection sensitivity .................................................................................................................................... 54 Emotion regulation ..................................................................................................................................... 56 The present study ....................................................................................................................................... 57 METHOD ............................................................................................................................................................ 59 Participants ................................................................................................................................................ 59 Procedure ................................................................................................................................................... 59 Measures .................................................................................................................................................... 60 DATA ANALYSIS PLAN ........................................................................................................................................... 65 RESULTS ............................................................................................................................................................. 68 Does psychopathy relate to rape myth acceptance after controlling for emotion regulation and rejection sensitivity? .................................................................................................................................................. 70 Does psychopathy relate to sexual coercion after controlling for emotion regulation and rejection sensitivity? .................................................................................................................................................. 71 DISCUSSION ........................................................................................................................................................ 74 CHAPTER THREE: CLINICAL IMPLICATIONS FOR PSYCHOPATHY – RELATED SEXUAL VIOLENCE. ..................... 82 REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................................................ 87 LIST OF APPENDICES ........................................................................................................................................... 110 APPENDIX A – AXIS TOOL ............................................................................................................................ 110 APPENDIX B – ETHICS APPROVAL LETTER ..................................................................................................... 111 3 APPENDIX C – PARTICIPANT INFORMATION SHEET ...................................................................................... 112 APPENDIX D – PARTICIPANT CONSENT FORM .............................................................................................. 117 APPENDIX E – SELF REPORT PSYCHOPATHY SCALE (SRP-4) ............................................................................ 118 APPENDIX F - THE POST REFUSAL SEXUAL PERSISTENCE SCALE (PSP) ............................................................ 120 APPENDIX G - THE ILLINOIS RAPE MYTH ACCEPTANCE SCALE SHORT-FORM (IRMA-SF) .................................. 122 APPENDIX H - THE REJECTION SENSITIVITY QUESTIONNAIRE (RSQ) ............................................................... 123 APPENDIX I - THE EMOTION REGULATION QUESTIONNAIRE (ERQ) ............................................................... 127 APPENDIX J – DEBRIEF SHEET ...................................................................................................................... 128 APPENDIX K – POWER CALCULATION .......................................................................................................... 130 4 Acknowledgements First of all, massive thanks to Luna for sharing all your knowledge and expertise around psychopathy and quantitative statistics especially. I don’t feel as though I have been the easiest person to supervise and I have appreciated your patience in helping me to get through the research process. I cannot believe how much my writing skills have improved since we began working together. A huge thanks to you, James for your continued support and encouragement. Your clinical knowledge