Empathy towards victims of sexual and non-sexual crimes amongst men with intellectual disabilities who are convicted sexual offenders

Aim: To investigate differences in empathy towards victims of sexual crimes and victims of non-sexual crimes among men who have intellectual disabilities (IDs) and are either convicted sexual offenders, or have no history of inappropriate criminal conduct.

Method: Both sexual offenders and non-offenders completed the Victim Empathy Scale – Adapted (VESA) after being presented with a vignette depicting a victim of a sexual offence, or a victim of a driving offence. Sexual offenders also completed the VESA in relation to their own victim. A measure of global empathy and two measures of distorted cognitions were also completed.

Results: Non-offenders scored signifi cantly higher than sexual offenders on the measure of global empathy. Sexual offenders had signifi cantly lower levels of empathy towards the sexual offence victim depicted in the vignette than did the non-offenders. Sexual offenders also had signifi cantly lower empathy for their own victim when compared to the victim depicted in the vignette. There were several signifi cant relationships between the measures of empathy and distorted cognitions.

Conclusions: The results indicate that sexual offenders with ID have diffi culties with empathy when compared to non-offenders, which has implications for treatment groups.