The Shedler-Westen Assessment Procedure (SWAP) is a personality assessment instrument designed for use by expert clinical assessors. Critics have raised questions about its psychometrics, most notably its validity across observers and situations, the impact of its fixed score distribution on research findings, and its test-retest reliability. We…

Lynam and colleagues recently developed a new self-report inventory for the assessment of psychopathy, the Elemental Psychopathy Assessment (EPA). Using a sample of undergraduates (N = 227), the authors examined the construct validity of the EPA by examining its correlations with self and stranger ratings on the Five-Factor Model, as well as…

Increases in the availability of gambling heighten the need for a short screening measure of problem gambling. The Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI) is a brief measure that allows for the assessment of characteristics of gambling behavior and severity and its consequences. The authors evaluate the psychometric properties of the PGSI using…

Psychopathy is a personality disorder that includes interpersonal-affective and antisocial deviance features. The Psychopathic Personality Inventory (PPI) contains two underlying factors (fearless dominance and impulsive antisociality) that may differentially tap these two sets of features. In a mixed-gender sample of undergraduates and prisoners,…

This study examined the degree of correspondence between two assessments for narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) in a mixed clinical and community sample--one using a self-report measure (Personality Diagnostic Questionnaire-4) and the other using clinical judgments derived from an assessment based on the longitudinal, expert, all data (LEAD)…

Research linking psychopathic tendencies to childhood behavior problems is predicated on the assumption that the findings are based on using psychometrically sound measures of psychopathic tendencies. Although evaluated with community samples, the psychometric properties of such measures have not been evaluated with inpatient clinical populations…

Using exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, the aims were (a) to obtain, describe, and compare different solutions of three, five, and six first-order factors raised in the previous literature about the Children's Depression Inventory (CDI); (b) analyze the number and nature of the second-order factors; (c) test which model best reproduces…

The Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) has been conceptualized as indexing two distinct but correlated factors. Previous research has established that these factors demonstrate distinct patterns of relations with external criteria. However, more recent findings suggest that the PCL-R psychopathy construct may encompass three distinguishable…

A self-report inventory for the assessment of mindfulness skills was developed, and its psychometric characteristics and relationships with other constructs were examined. Participants included three samples of undergraduate students and a sample of outpatients with borderline personality disorder. Based on discussions of mindfulness in the…

The current study compares the use of two alternative methodologies for using the Five-Factor Model (FFM) to assess personality disorders (PDs). Across two clinical samples, a technique using the simple sum of selected FFM facets is compared with a previously used prototype matching technique. The results demonstrate that the more easily…

This study examined relationship aggression reporting concordance among 303 men with alcohol use disorders and their female partners enrolled in couples-based alcohol abuse treatment. Agreement for physical and psychological aggression was generally consistent with, or higher than, concordance rates reported among other populations. Men's…

Brief measures of the five-factor model (FFM) have been developed but none include an assessment of facets within each domain. The purpose of this study was to examine the validity of a simple, one-page, facet-level description of the FFM. Five data collections were completed to assess the reliability and the convergent and discriminant validity…

This study evaluated the structural reliability, construct-related validity, and cultural validity generalization of the Hare Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version (PCL:SV) in a sample of more than 560 male and female Swedish forensic psychiatric treatment patients, forensic evaluation patients, and criminal offenders. Structural reliability…

This study examined the structure, distribution, and correlates of a new measure of self-reported callous-unemotional (CU) traits in 1,443 adolescents (774 boys, 669 girls) between the ages of 13 to 18 years. The Inventory of Callous-Unemotional Traits was subjected to exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis. Exploratory…

The authors examined the construct and incremental validity of the Interpersonal Measure of Psychopathy (IM-P), a relatively new instrument designed to detect interpersonal behaviors associated with psychopathy. Observers of videotaped Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) interviews rated male prisoners (N = 93) on the IM-P. The IM-P correlated…