Author(s): Gouveia, Cláudia ; Sousa, Marta ; Cunha, Olga ; Seto, Michael ; De Castro Rodrigues, Andreia ; Gonçalves, Rui Abrunhosa
Date: 2024
Persistent ID: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.12/9931
Origin: Repositório do ISPA - Instituto Universitário
Subject(s): Child sexual abuse; Pedophilia; Assessment; Atypical sexual interests
The accurate assessment of pedophilic sexual interests is crucial for the treatment andmanagement of individuals who have sexually offended children. This study aimed tovalidate the Revised Screening Scale for Pedophilic Interests (SSPI-2) in a Portuguesesample of 170 men convicted of sexual offenses against children, 104 serving sentencesin the community, and 66 in prison. The findings indicated that SSPI-2 demonstratedgood convergent validity, as evidenced by its significant and positive associations withthe “sexual deviance” item of SVR-20, the number of previous convictions for sexualcrimes against children, and having 3 or more child victims, which is associated withhigh sensitivity and specificity in distinguishing men who show greater sexual arousal tochildren than to adults. Furthermore, the SSPI-2 exhibited good divergent validity, withno significant correlations observed with a self-report measure of psychopathy or witha nonsexual criminal history
