Introduction to the Special Issue

• Published date: 01 December 2014
• Date: 01 December 2014
• DOI: 10.1177/0093854814555333

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND BEHAVIOR, 2014, Vol. 41, No. 12, December 2014, 1381 –1383.

DOI: 10.1177/0093854814555333

© 2014 International Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology

1381

INTRODUCTION TO THE SPECIAL ISSUE

Expanding the Global Boundaries of Risk Assessment

EMILY J. SALISBURY

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

JAY P. SINGH

Global Institute of Forensic Research

Molde University College

With interpersonal violence currently a leading cause of death (World Health

Organization, 2004), the world’s prison population at more than 10 million (Walmsley,

2013) and the number of inpatient beds in forensic psychiatric hospitals on the rise (Priebe

et al., 2008), establishing valid and reliable methods of identifying individuals who are

likely to commit criminal acts is an important public health and safety issue. One approach

to identifying future offenders is through the use of risk assessment—structured and unstruc-

tured methods of predicting the likelihood of antisocial behavior. Although unstructured

clinical judgments of dangerousness remain common in practice, numerous structured risk

assessment instruments, the manuals of which claim high rates of reliability and predictive

validity, have been introduced in recent decades (Bonta, 2002). The investigation of these

measures’ psychometric properties has produced a sizable literature (Desmarais & Singh,

2013). However, this literature has largely been circumscribed to North America, Western

Europe, and Australasia (Singh, Grann, & Fazel, 2011).

Nevertheless, violence risk assessment is a global phenomenon. A recent international

survey focused on the practical application of violence risk assessment methods (Singh

et al., 2014) attracted a number of respondents from Asia, Africa, the Middle East,

Norway, and Eastern Europe. These regions’ risk assessment practices are currently a

“black box,” with either little or non-existent literature in English. Hence, researchers,

clinicians, and policymakers interested in getting involved in these regions currently do

not have available to them overviews of current risk assessment guidelines and policies

in these areas.

This special issue of Criminal Justice and Behavior (CJB) begins to open the black box

of violence risk assessment in non-Western countries. First, representing Scandinavia,

Stål Bjørkly, Pål Hartvig, John Olav Roaldset, and Jay P. Singh discuss both the historical

development and current practices of forensic risk assessment in Norway. Interestingly,

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Emily J. Salisbury,

University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 4505 S. Maryland Parkway, Box 455009, Las Vegas, NV 89154-5009; e-mail:

emily.salisbury@unlv.edu.