Diagnostic validity of antisocial personality disorder: A prototypical analysis.

Competing models of antisocial personality disorder have important consequences for mentally disordered offenders and their management in the criminal justice system. In order to provide a fresh perspective on these enduring diagnostic problems, we conducted a prototypical analysis on 250 adult subjects' perceptions of psychopathy from a set of criteria, which included DSM-II, DSM-III, DSM-III-R, and Psychopathy Checklist (PCL) scores. Through principal components analysis we identified four factors: (a) impaired relationships and deception, (b) aggressive behavior, (c) nonviolent delinquency, and (d) frequent sexual relationships not attributable to mental illness/substance abuse. These factors appear to be more closely allied with PCL and two new proposals for DSM-IV than the current DSM-III-R model.