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Agency, relatedness, inner peace and problem-solving in sexual offending: How sexual offenders prioritise and operationalise their Good Lives conceptions.

Barnett, Georgia, Wood, Jane L. (2008) Agency, relatedness, inner peace and problem-solving in sexual offending: How sexual offenders prioritise and operationalise their Good Lives conceptions. Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment, 20 (4). pp. 444-465. ISSN 1573-286X. (doi:10.1177/1079063208325202) (KAR id:13157)

Abstract

Untreated imprisoned sexual offenders (N = 42) completed interviews and questionnaires to establish the priority they assigned, at the time of their offending, to three "goods" from the good lives model and to gain insight into how they operationalized these goods at that time. The relationship between the priorities offenders assigned to the goods of ( a) agency, ( b) relatedness, and ( c) inner peace at the time of offending and their problem-solving ability was also explored. A measure of problem-solving ability was obtained with the Social Problem-Solving Inventory-Revised, and a measure of functional and dysfunctional problem solving was obtained from its scales. The results suggest that sexual offenders tend to experience problems in prioritizing, rather than operationalizing, inner peace, as this good is not related to problem-solving ability but tends to be assigned lower priority than agency and relatedness. Although agency and relatedness tend to be given higher importance, and this is related to better problem-solving ability, there appear to be problems with scope in some offenders' good lives conceptions and problems with the capacity, means, and conflict among the means used to achieve these goods. Directions for future research are suggested.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1177/1079063208325202
Uncontrolled keywords: problem solving; sexual offending; good lives model
Subjects: B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Human and Social Sciences > School of Psychology
Depositing User: Jane Wood
Date Deposited: 30 Apr 2010 10:18 UTC
Last Modified: 16 Nov 2021 09:51 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/13157 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

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