the cognitions of violent offenders

i have just read a very interesting article indeed. I know it makes me a bit of a geek but reading the science of psychology give me a bit of a thrill, especially if makes clinical sense as well. The article is called, social cognitive processing in violent male offenders and you ll find in a recent issue of psychiatry, psychology and law.

The basic idea is that violent offenders are different to other offenders because of their cognitions, their thoughts. In other words we can begin to understand why some people are violent and others not by understanding how they think. The study found that violent offenders and non violent offenders do differ a bit on how generally angry they are; their trait anger. violent men are more generally angry than non violent men. However, What makes the most difference between them is their ...wait for it...."hostile attribution bias." What this means is that the violent men believe that others are acting with hostility toward them even if the communication is relatively benign or neutral. You know the scenario at the pub: "what are you looking at?" when the look was innocent.

This is so very important to the clinician treating offenders. If we can identify offenders who believe that others are intending to hurt then when they have no intention then we can (hopefully) change those beliefs.