Temperament and character dimensions of sex offenders in relation to their parental rearing

Abstract

The aim of the present study was to investigate the interrelation between the personality dimensions, according to the temperament and character theory of Cloninger, and the parenting received in childhood, of subjects who have been convicted for rape and child molestation. For this purpose, 59 rapists, 37 child molesters, and 25 healthy controls completed: (1) The Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI), which measures the heritable temperament dimensions Novelty Seeking (NS), Harm Avoidance (HA), Reward Dependence (RD), and Persistence (PE), and the character dimensions Self Directedness (SD), Cooperativeness (CO), and Self Transcendence (ST). (2) The Measurement of Parental Style (MOPS), which creates the subscales ‘indifference’, ‘overcontrol’ and ‘abuse’ for each parent. We found that NS levels were significantly increased and RD, SD, and CO levels were significantly decreased in both sex offender groups, while PE levels were significantly decreased only in the rapists, and ST levels were significantly increased only in the child molesters, in relation to the controls. The reported father abusiveness in rapists, as well as the reported mother abusiveness in child molesters were significantly increased, in relation to the controls. In the group of rapists, CO levels were negatively correlated with the reported father abusiveness, while the observed low levels of CO could be predicted from father abusiveness. In child molesters, PE levels were negatively correlated with the reported mother abusiveness, while the RD dimension was negatively correlated with the reported father overcontrol. In conclusion, the low levels of RD, PE, and CO of this sex offender sample seems to be linked with the reported abusive/affectionless control style of their parental rearing, while the abusive parental rearing in the group of rapists may contribute to the development of personalities with low CO.