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A psychological test battery to detect prison inmates who fake insanity or mental retardation
Author(s) -
Schretlen David,
Arkowitz Hal
Publication year - 1990
Publication title -
behavioral sciences and the law
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.649
H-Index - 74
eISSN - 1099-0798
pISSN - 0735-3936
DOI - 10.1002/bsl.2370080109
Subject(s) - malingering , psychology , minnesota multiphasic personality inventory , psychiatry , test (biology) , prison , clinical psychology , generalizability theory , recidivism , developmental psychology , social psychology , personality , paleontology , criminology , biology
A contrasted groups design was used to investigate the accuracy with which a test battery could detect persons faking mental disorder. The MMPI and Bender Gestalt were used in combination with a Malingering Scale that was developed for initial validation. One hundred adult males comprised five groups of 20 subjects each. Noncriminal psychiatric inpatients and mental retardates were compared with prison inmates who were given a financial incentive to successfully fake ‘insanity’ or mental retardation, and with inmate controls. Based on discriminant analyses, 92 to 95% of subjects were correctly classified as either faking or not faking. Although cross‐validation is needed, this study reduced many of the analog factors which have comprised the generalizability of previous findings.