A Second Proof of Concept Investigation of Strengths Using the Structured Assessment of Violence Risk in Youth Tool With Justice-Involved Youth: Item Level Risk-Based Effects and Interactions

• Published date: 01 October 2024
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/15412040241241508
• Author: Calvin M. Langton,James R. Worling,Gabriela D. B. Sheinin
• Date: 01 October 2024
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice

2024, Vol. 22(4) 251–276

© The Author(s) 2024

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DOI: 10.1177/15412040241241508

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A Second Proof of Concept

Investigation of Strengths Using

the Structured Assessment of

Violence Risk in Youth Tool

With Justice-Involved Youth:

Item Level Risk-Based Effects

and Interactions

Calvin M. Langton

1

, James R. Worling

2

, and Gabriela D. B. Sheinin

1

Abstract

Despite efforts to incorporate protective factors or ‘strengths’in applied risk assessments for

criminal reoffending, there has been limited progress towards a consensus regarding what is

meant by such terms, what effects predictors can exert, or how to describe such effects. This

proof of concept study was undertaken to address those issues. A struc tured professional

judgment tool was used to create lower and higher historical/static risk groups with a sample of

273 justice-involved male youth with sexual offenses followed over a f‌ixed 3-year period. Using

risk and protective poles to create pairs of dichotomous variables from trichotomously rated risk

and protective items, risk-based exacerbation and risk-based protective effects were found. These

varied in terms of whether the effect on the outcome of a new violent (including sexual) offense

was larger, smaller, or absent for youth at higher or lower historical/static risk. So me of these

potentially dynamic dichotomous variables were shown to have a protective (or risk) effect after

controlling for both historical/static risk and that same item’s risk (or protective) effect. Some

moderated the association between historical/static risk and recidivism, strengthening or reducing

it. Terms for these effects and implications of incorporating strengths in research and applied

practice were considered.

Keywords

risk assessment, protective factors, strengths, recidivism, desistance

1

Department of Psychology, University of Windsor, Windsor, ON, Canada

2

Private Practice, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

Corresponding Author:

Calvin M. Langton, Department of Psychology, University of Windsor, 401 Sunset Avenue, Windsor, ON N9B 3P4,

Canada.

Email: clangton@uwindsor.ca

The once nascent evidence base for protective factors in applied risk assessment practices in

forensic mental health, adult corrections, and youth justice has been growing in the past two

decades (de Ruiter & Nicolls, 2011;Fortune & Ward, 2017;Langton, 2020;Langton &

Worling, 2015). But the primary focus has been on the directassociation between desistance

from crime as a discrete outcome (the absence of a new offense) and scores on a variable

purported to be a protective factor or ‘strength.’Beyond that, there is a lack of consensus

about what kind of effects protective factors or ‘strengths’might be expected to exert. Nor is

there agreement on how these effects on recidivism in applied risk assessment practices can

be demonstrated or how best to describe them (Langton et al., 2022). This study involved the

adoption of an approach used in criminological research to demonstrate distinct types of

effects for strengths. It was undertaken to test whether trichotomous items of the sort used in

applied forensic assessment practices exert various types of effects.

Items from the Structured Assessment of Violence Risk in Youth (SAVRY; Borum et al.,

2006), a structured professional judgment (SPJ) tool, were selected for the study because

these items tap historical/static risk as well as constructs intended to be dynamic and

operationalized as either risk factors or protective factors. The validity of the SAVRY

in predicting types of recidivism is well established (see Borum et al., 2021), with studies

indicating predictive validity with samples of various ethnicities and from various geo-

graphical regions (cf. Ortega-Campos et al., 2017;Shepherd et al., 2014;Woods, 2013).

Focusing f‌irst on groups of lower or higher historical/static risk in the present study’ssample

of justice-involved youth, the methodology described by Farrington et al. (2016) was used

to test for risk-based protective, risk, or mixed effects for constructs tapped by SAVRY

items (these types of effects and the methodology are described below). Then analyses

were undertaken to test whether distinct protective (and risk) variables had incremental

validity over both historical/static risk and their corresponding risk (or protective) vari-

able. Finally, formal tests of moderation were carried out to determine if these variables

moderated the association between historical/static risk and recidivism, strengthening it

(essentially exacerbating the risk effect already present in the static index) or reducing it

(representing an interactive protective effect). In what follows, the inclusive term ‘strength’

is used to refer to variables that exert one or more types of effect (e.g., a main or direct effect,

a risk-based effect, or an interactive/moderating effect) that lowers the likelihood of

reoffending.

The evidence base supports a focus in applied forensic assessment practices on the direct

effect of strengths in lowering the rate of recidivism, particularly practices representing the

SPJ approach. Frequently this involves summing of item ratings or a simple counting of

multiple purported strengths for a cumulative effect. That evidence base attests to the

promise of higher predictive accuracy. It also has the potential to improve clinical utility for

service planning and targeted interventions in contrast to an exclusive reliance on as-

sessment tools comprised only of risk factors (Langton et al., 2022). But a major problem

with this focus on a direct effect for strengths is that it does not provide a clear or compelling

answer to the fundamental question about what strengths actually are. It also ignores the

possibility that there are additional types of effects that strengths may exert that would be

important to demonstrate with applied forensic assessment practices. If the f‌ieldistomove

beyond a focus on a simple direct effect for strengths, it will be necessary to investigate the

possible effects of a strength in conjunction with a validated index of risk. It will also be

necessary to consider possible conceptualizations of strength as more than simply the

converse of a risk factor, that is, the opposite pole to that of risk along a single dimension for

a construct or domain. The present study was undertaken for this purpose.

252 Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice 22(4)