Ms Sarah Miller1, Dr Katarina Fritzon1, Dr Cher McGillivray1
1Bond University, Robina, Australia
Biography:
Sarah Miller has been working in the field of Forensic Psychology in the UK and Australia for 24 years and has published research on deliberate fire-setting, trauma and offending, therapeutic communities and attachment-based change in offenders. She currently conducts forensic risk assessments, offending behaviour interventions for offenders with sexual, violent and fire-setting behaviours and EMDR therapy.
Abstract:
Associations between childhood trauma and offending behaviours have been well documented. Less is known about variables that might explain the associations. The objective of this presentation is to report findings from a systematic review of cognitive and emotional variables that possibly underly the connection between childhood trauma and violent offending in males. The review focused on males as research has suggested gender differences in the trauma-offending relationship. Four databases were systematically searched in February 2024 for relevant studies. Study inclusion criteria were peer reviewed and English published empirical studies of a retrospective or prospective design, and community or offender samples. Initial database screening identified n=7335 studies, of which n=3327 duplicates were removed. N=4008 study title and abstracts were screened for inclusion resulting in n=121 studies eligible for full text screening. A further n=2379 records were identified from forward citation searching. At the time of writing, eligibility screening of these additional studies was near to completion. The final systematic review steps will involve two researchers completing full text screening and critical appraisal of study bias. This presentation will provide an overview of the systematic review method, attempts to optimise validity of findings, a summary of key extracted data and a discussion of the inherent challenges in trying to understand such a complex relationship. It is anticipated that the review findings will be used to inform the theoretical development and subsequent empirical examination of possible trauma-offending pathways which in turn will assist in the assessment and treatment of offenders.