The relationship of violent attitudes with self-reported offending and antisocial personality traits

Abstract

Violent cognitive style is known to be associated with self-reported offending. The main purpose of the study was to investigate if violent attitudes add to the variance in self-reported offending after controlling for antisocial personality traits (e.g. poor self-control and pursuance of self-interest). In the present study, 184 males and 166 females attending colleges of further education completed the Mak Self-reported Delinquency Scale, the Gough Socialisation Scale and the Maudsley Violence Questionnaire (Machismo and Acceptance of violence). Multiple regressions (hierarchical) confirmed the unique variance of cognitive style in self-reported offending for both males and females. For males and females, the proportion of the variance in offending explained increased from 14 to 31% and from 23 to 38%, respectively, after Machismo and Acceptance of violence were entered in the second block. The findings add to the growing evidence of the importance of violent attitudes in explaining general offending.

Keywords:

• self-reported offending
• violent attitudes
• machismo
• acceptance of violence

Acknowledgements

The late Professor Jakob Smari and Mr Emil Einarsson assisted with the local supervision of the study.