Estimating the risk of recidivism among perpetrators of sex crimes belongs to the area of competence of court sexology experts. In Poland, most often, the assessment is performed at the end of the sentence if the perpetrator has been diagnosed with sexual preference disorders, personality disorders, or intellectual disability.
In these cases, the estimated risk of recidivism may determine whether post-penal measures, such as the transfer to the National Center for Dissocial Behavior Prevention, are applied [ 1 ].
Estimating the risk of recidivism should be performed in line with the actuarial approach [ 2 ]. This approach consists in performing a series of psychological tests and identifying the factors that have a statistically significant effect on the risk of recidivism.
Based on the results of the tests, lists of factors are created, and subsequently risk factors with the best psychometric properties are extracted. For a number of reasons, a structured clinical interview in the assessment of sexual offender recidivism tends to be more subjective compared to a statistical approach. In a structured clinical interview, the information gathered is largely based on the interpretation of the clinician or evaluator. This subjectivity can introduce bias or variation in how different clinicians interpret the same information.
Moreover, clinical interviews typically lack quantifiable measures. They may focus on qualitative information, narrative accounts, and clinical impressions rather than statistical data or specific risk assessment tools that have been validated through empirical research.
