Professional Perspectives on Sexual Sadism

Significant controversy surrounds the diagnosis of sexual sadism. Research suggests that many characteristics attributed to sexual sadists fail to differentiate sexual offenders with and without this diagnosis. Furthermore, when there are differences between sadists and nonsadists, “sadistic” featur...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inSexual abuse Vol. 20; no. 3; pp. 272 - 304
Main Authors McLawsen, Julia E., Jackson, Rebecca L., Vannoy, Steven D., Gagliardi, Gregg J., Scalora, Mario J.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01.09.2008
Subjects
Adult
Antisocial Personality Disorder - diagnosis
Attitude of Health Personnel
Clinical Competence
Diagnosis, Differential
Female
Humans
Male
Middle Aged
Offenses
Paraphilic Disorders - diagnosis
Practice Patterns, Physicians
Respect
Sadism - classification
Sadism - diagnosis
Sex Offenders
Sex Offenses - classification
Surveys and Questionnaires
United States
United States
diagnostic validity
sexual offenders
mental health professionals
behavioral indicators
sexual sadism
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Summary:Significant controversy surrounds the diagnosis of sexual sadism. Research suggests that many characteristics attributed to sexual sadists fail to differentiate sexual offenders with and without this diagnosis. Furthermore, when there are differences between sadists and nonsadists, “sadistic” features are frequently associated with nonsadists. Finally, diagnosticians appear to use idiosyncratic methods to diagnose sexual sadism. These findings raise concerns about the reliability and validity of a diagnosis of sexual sadism, particularly with respect to how professionals conceptualize this diagnosis. This study examines how professionals understand the relative importance of behaviors associated with sadistic versus nonsadistic sexual offending. Professionals rated behaviors according to their “essentialness” for this diagnosis. Results show that professionals rated behaviors associated with three out of four conceptualizations of sexual sadism as significantly more essential to making a diagnosis of sexual sadism, compared to behaviors associated with nonsadistic sexual offending. Results suggest that professionals reliably discriminate between sadistic and nonsadistic offense behaviors.
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ISSN:1079-0632
1573-286X
DOI:10.1177/1079063208320250