Types Of Rapists Research Articles

THE PSYCHOLOGICAL MIND SET OF A SEX OFFENDER: A CRITICAL INSIGHT

This paper attempts to understand the mindset of a rapist. It is one of the most heinous crimes, and its impact on the victim is extremely deep rooted and difficult to treat. There are several types of rapists who have different reasons for committing such crimes. Researchers have emphasised on remedial measures that could be adopted such that one can reduce the number of such incidents. There have been increasing numbers of research studies, in recent times, as all citizens are deeply concerned with increasing numbers of rapes that are occurring. The paper concludes with a serious attempt to recognise the symptoms of crime at an early age, which could be effectively treated in the hope that it would result in the reduction of such monstrous episodes.

Predicting rapist type based on crime-scene violence, interpersonal involvement, and criminal sophistication in U.S. stranger rape cases

Stranger rape cases are one of the most difficult sexual assault crimes to solve for law enforcement. This study aimed to compare crime-scene characteristics between serial rapists and single-victim rapists in stranger rape cases and build a predictive model to predict rapist type. An archival database of released sex offenders included 385 who committed stranger rapes. Of those, 244 were single-victim rapists and 141 were serial rapists. The single-victim rapists were significantly more likely to have violently themed crime-scene characteristics than serial rapists, whereas serial rapists were significantly more likely than single-victim rapists to engage in criminally sophisticated behavior and induce participation from their victims. A logistic regression using 10 crime-scene characteristics correctly identified 75.8% of cases as perpetrated by either single-victim or serial rapists. The most significant predictors of rapist type were whether the offender digitally penetrated their victim, whether the offender choked their victim, whether they were at a new/unknown location or whether they threatened their victim. The implications of these results are that they benefit law enforcement in the investigation of stranger rape cases by potentially narrowing down their suspect pool and add to the classification of stranger rapists in offender profiling literature.

From Crime Scene Actions in Stranger Rape to Prediction of Rapist Type: Single‐Victim or Serial Rapist?

The differences in crime scene actions in cases of stranger rape committed by convicted offenders were examined between 31 single-victim rapists and 35 serial rapists. Data were collected from police files, court verdicts, psychiatric evaluations, and criminal records. Findings indicate that the serial rapists were more criminally sophisticated than the single-victim rapists, during their first and second rapes. The single-victim rapists were significantly more likely to engage in the interpersonal involvement behavior of kissing the victim, and to engage in pre-assault alcohol use, than the serial rapists. There was, however, no significant difference in physically violent or sexual behaviors. To investigate the possibility of predicting rapist type, logistic regression analyses were performed. Results indicate that three behaviors in conjunction, kissed victim, controlled victim, and offender drank alcohol before the offense, predicted whether an unknown offender is a single-victim or serial rapist with a classification accuracy of 80.4%. The findings have implications for the classification of stranger rapists in offender profiling.

Why Do Men Rape? An Evolutionary Psychological Perspective

Rape of women by men has occurred throughout recorded history and across cultures. In this article, we discuss rape from an evolutionary psychological perspective. Evolutionary psychology is a powerful heuristic tool that allows researchers to develop and test novel hypotheses about complex behaviors such as rape. Some researchers have argued that men have evolved psychological mechanisms that motivate them to rape in specific contexts. We discuss evidence consistent with this claim, and argue that a more nuanced view of men's rape behavior is necessary. We propose that it may be useful to characterize rapists as belonging to one of several types, distinguished by individual differences as well as by the circumstances in which they are predicted to commit rape. We discuss research evidence in support of each rapist type, as well as the need for future research. Finally, we discuss research concerning women's rape-avoidance psychology and behavior.

Predicting the Time Interval Till the Next Crime Using a Bayesian Network Model Based on Severity of the Serial Rapists' Criminality

The relationship between serial rapist type and the time interval from the first to the second crime was investigated in Study 1. A Bayesian Network (BN) model, included rapists' type derived in Study 1 and the time interval from the first to the second crime, was constructed to predict the time interval till the second crime, and this model was tested in Study 2. In Study 1, 147 serial rapists were classified according to the severity of the rapists' criminality by using categorical principal components analysis (CatPCA). Results indicated that the interval from the first to the second crime for rapists with a low severity of the criminality (mean 158.0 days) was longer than that for rapists with a high severity of the criminality (mean 82.1 days). In Study 2, A BN model was constructed from the following variables: rapists' characteristic derived in Study 1 (the severity of the criminality), time interval from the first to the second crime, as well as criminal behaviors. The model was tested by using new data, 20 serial rapists committed, as virtual cases. The results of model estimation indicated that the accuracy of predicting the time interval from the first to the second crime, either within 42 days or later, was 80.0%. In detail, if the model predicted that a rapist would commit the second crime in less than 42 days, the accuracy of the prediction was 75.0%, whereas if the model predicted that a rapist would commit the second crime in over 42 days, the accuracy of the prediction was 87.5%.

Power, Anger, and Sadistic Rapists

The extant research on rapists repeatedly indicates that particular offender types can be specified. These include the power, anger, and sadistic assailants. Despite such classifications, limited empirical or anecdotal efforts have undertaken the task of exploring the personality features of each rapist type. This article endeavors to fill this gap in the literature. Using the heuristic analytical lens and the case study method, the high-profile crimes of Gilbert Escobedo (power type), Paul Bernardo (anger type), and Jeffrey Dahmer (sadistic type) are reviewed. As the article discloses, unique personality features were exhibited. Moreover, each rapist type displayed a number of convergent as well as divergent character traits. Given these findings, the article concludes with a series of summary observations relevant for future research on rape and personality as well as prospects for clinical diagnosis, treatment, and prevention.

Behavioral Characteristics of Men Accused of Rape: Evidence for Different Types of Rapists

The aim of this study was to determine whether the behavioral characteristics demonstrated by rapists clustered together into groups that were similar to the common rapist typology in the literature: anger, power exploitative, power reassurance, and sadistic. Two studies were conducted to examine the evidence for this typology. Study 1 involved the analysis of data from 130 men charged with sexual assault and Study 2 involved the analysis of court transcripts from 50 rape cases tried through the court system. The results of Study 1 revealed that there was some validity to the characteristics usually associated with each of the four types of rape, especially for the power reassurance and sadistic rapists. However, there were some unexpected outliers within both the anger and power exploitative types of rapists, which may suggest that there is more than one type of anger rapist and more than two types of power rapists. The results of Study 2 very closely replicated the results of Study 1. Future research needs to focus on the behavioral, motivational, and cognitive characteristics associated with each of the types of rapists and research them separately, so that it is possible to further evaluate the evidence for the typology identified in this study.

Predicting Rapist Type from Crime-Scene Variables

Secondary data analyses on two analogous data sets assessed the ability of crime-scene variables observed in serial rapes to predict classification in the Massachusetts Treatment Center, Rapist Typology Version 3 (MTC:R3). Data sets from the FBI containing extensive coding of crime-scene information but minimal offender data were analyzed to select optimal predictors by examining the frequencies and both within-crime and across-crime consistencies of crime-scene indicators. Analogous predictors were identified in the MTC database, which contains extensive offender data but minimal crime-scene data, and these indicators were employed to predict rapist type. Promising predictive results emerged in the domains of adult antisocial and expressive aggression. In addition, the domains of sadism, offense planning, and relation with victim showed high internal consistency and good to high cross-crime consistency, suggesting that predictive scales are possible for these domains.

Women's Resistance Strategies to Different Rapist Types

Women's resistance strategies to rape were examined using police reports and the court testimonies of 147 women who either had avoided rape or were raped by subsequently incarcerated rapists. Analyses examined whether particular resistance strategies used by women were differentially effective in response to attacks by different types of rapists. The results provided little evidence that the type of rapist influenced the efficacy of women's resistance strategies for avoiding rape and physical injury. This overall lack of significance suggests that previous findings showing that women's use of forceful resistance strategies enhances their ability to avoid rape without increasing their physical injury are accurate and do not need to be qualified based on the type of rapist committing the assault.

Prediction of Rapist Type and Violence from Verbal, Physical, and Sexual Scales

Offender and victim accounts of rapes were rated on 33 verbal, physical, and sexual behavioral scales. Rapist type, according to a classification scheme derived from Groth by Hazelwood and Burgess, and whether the rapist had increased in violence over successive rapes were known for each rape. Two discriminant analyses were performed on the offender data and were replicated on the victim data. The first analysis produced a subset of scales classifying rapes according to the type of rape with an overall accuracy of 83% in the offender data and 89% in the victim data. The second analysis produced a subset of scales classifying rapists as to their increaser/nonincreaser status, with an overall accuracy of 92% in the offender data and 89% in the victim data. Practical applications of these classification schemes are discussed.

Use of Pornography in the Criminal and Developmental Histories of Sexual Offenders

The present study examined exposure to and use of pornography in the familial, developmental and criminal histories of 38 rapists and 26 child molesters incarcerated at the Massachusetts Treatment Center. While both groups reported similar exposure to pornography in the home and during development, child molesters indicated significantly more exposure than rapists in adulthood and were significantly more likely both to use such materials prior to and during their offenses and to employ pornography to relieve an impulse to act out. The findings are discussed with regards to the “catharsis hypothesis” and the role of pornography in the commission of sexual offenses for certain types of rapists and child molesters.

Victim Responses by Rapist Type

This study of 108 convicted, incarcerated rapists and their 389 victims had two goals. The first goal was to examine empirically the hypothesized interaction of differentiated subgroups of rapists with combative and noncombative victim responses. If such an interaction exists, it is imperative to understand its implications for a potential victim of sexual assault. Consequently, the second goal was to address that issue by setting forth clinically derived recommendations for alternative resistive responses based upon the presumptive psychological and motivational themes underlying four subgroups of rapists. Although relatively abstract suggestions are being made about behavior in a highly traumatic situation, knowledge may be the only weapon a victim has. As such, knowledge can provide a sense of power as well as the confidence necessary to act rather than resign out of helplessness.