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Archives of Sexual Behavior, VoL 8, No. 4, 1979 The Intelligence of Rapists" New Data Heman Vera, Ph.D. 1 George W. Barnard, M.D., 2 and Charles Holzer, Ph.D. 2 IQs of violent sexual offenders (rapists) were compared to those of alleged non- violent sexual offenders, nonsexual violent offenders, and nonsexual nonviolent offenders. Data were gathered from defendants referred to the medical coauthor for pretrial psychiatric evaluation. Rapists seored lower in the IQ test, but this difference did not appear to be significant in the pairwise ?~2 comparisons. This held true after controlling for the race of the defendant. KEY WORDS: rapist; defendants; violent crimes; nonviolent crimes; IQ; sex. INTRODUCTION This article reports the comparison of offenders charged with sexual violence (rape) to those charged with nonviolent sexual offenses, nonsexual violent offenses, and nonsexual nonviolent offenses in terms of their intelligence. Several re- portshad suggested that rapists tended to be of low intelligence (Allen, 1969; Ran- dell, 1973 ; Walker, 1965). On a comparative basis, Karacan et al. (1974) reported significantly lower IQs for rapists than for other prison control subjects using the Quick IQ Test. Ruff et aL (1976) confirmed these findings using the Wechster Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) in a comparison of rapists with violent and non- violent convicts. Although the measuring instrument used was not specified, Perdue and Lester (1972) found that the IQs of rapists did not differ signifi- cantly from the IQs of inmates convicted of aggressive nonsexual crimes. Ruff et al. (1976) suggest that the difference in findings could well be attributable to a difference in the criteria of selection for the control subjects. Ruff et al. com- Department of Sociology, The University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32611. 2Department of Psychiatry, The University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32610. 375 0004-0002/79/0700-0375503.00/0 © 1979 Plenum Publishing Corporation

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Page 1: The intelligence of rapists: New data

Archives of Sexual Behavior, VoL 8, No. 4, 1979

The Intelligence of Rapists" New Data

Heman Vera, Ph.D. 1 George W. Barnard, M.D., 2

and Charles Holzer, Ph.D. 2

IQs o f violent sexual offenders (rapists) were compared to those o f alleged non- violent sexual offenders, nonsexual violent offenders, and nonsexual nonviolent offenders. Data were gathered from defendants referred to the medical coauthor for pretrial psychiatric evaluation. Rapists seored lower in the IQ test, but this difference did not appear to be significant in the pairwise ?~2 comparisons. This held true after controlling for the race o f the defendant.

KEY WORDS: rapist; defendants; violent crimes; nonviolent crimes; IQ; sex.

INTRODUCTION

This article reports the comparison of offenders charged with sexual violence (rape) to those charged with nonviolent sexual offenses, nonsexual violent offenses, and nonsexual nonviolent offenses in terms of their intelligence. Several re- portshad suggested that rapists tended to be of low intelligence (Allen, 1969; Ran- dell, 1973 ; Walker, 1965). On a comparative basis, Karacan et al. (1974) reported significantly lower IQs for rapists than for other prison control subjects using the Quick IQ Test. Ruff et aL (1976) confirmed these findings using the Wechster Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) in a comparison of rapists with violent and non- violent convicts. Although the measuring instrument used was not specified, Perdue and Lester (1972) found that the IQs of rapists did not differ signifi- cantly from the IQs of inmates convicted of aggressive nonsexual crimes. Ruff et al. (1976) suggest that the difference in findings could well be attributable to a difference in the criteria of selection for the control subjects. Ruff et al. com-

Department of Sociology, The University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32611. 2 Department of Psychiatry, The University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32610.

375

0004-0002 /79 /0700-0375503 .00 /0 © 1979 Plenum Publishing Corporat ion

Page 2: The intelligence of rapists: New data

376 Vera, Barnard, and Holzer

pared those guilty of sexual violence with those guilty of nonsexual violence. Ruf f s research, however, ignored the issue of the nonviolent criminal - both sexual and nonsexual. In the research reported here these additional dimen- sions were examined.

METHOD

From 964 reports on alleged offenders referred for the pretrial psychi- atric evaluation of the medical coauthor by judges in counties of north and central Florida over the past 8 years, 339 were drawn to compare the IQs of four groups of defendants. The comparison groups were composed of the alleged (1) violent sexual offenders (50), (2) nonsexual violent offenders (95), (3) nonviolent sexual offenders (67), and (4) nonsexual nonviolent offenders (127). The group labeled "violent sexual offenders" included those charged with rape, sexual assault, and sexual bat tery. Those labeled "nonsexual violent offenders" included those charged with assault, assault and bat tery, bat tery, armed robbery, and kidnapping. The "nonviolent sexual offenders" were those those charged with child molesting, child fondling, lewd and lascivious behavior, exposure, and incest. The "nonsexual nonviolent offenders" included those

charged with theft, auto theft, burglary, larceny, grand larceny, and possession o f stolen property. Those charged with a combinat ion of felonies that fell in different comparison groups were excluded for purposes of clarity. All subjects were administered the Rapid Approximate Intelligence Test (RAIT), which has been standardized against the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) (Wilson, 1967).

Table I. Rapid Approximation Intelligence Test Results of Four Types of Alleged Offendersa

Violent Nonviolent Nonsexual Nonsexual sexual sexual violent nonviolent

N % N % N % N %

Retarded 4 8.0 2 2.8 4 4.2 6 4.7 Borderline 13 26.0 14 19.4 21 22.1 26 20.5 Average 31 62.0 54 75.0 66 69.5 88 69.3 High 2 4.0 2 2.8 4 4.2 7 5.5

Total 50 100.0 67 100.0 95 100.0 127 100.0

aOverall X 2 = 4.65, df = 9, n.s. Violent sexual × nonsexual violent ×2 = 1.34, df = 3, n.s. Violent sexual × nonviolent sexual X 2 = 3.90, df = 3, n.s. Violent sexual × nonsexual nonviolent ;(2 = 1.62, df = 3, n.s.

Page 3: The intelligence of rapists: New data

The Intelligence of Rapists 377

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

Table I shows that the group labeled "violent sexual offenders" scored lower in the test than other types o f alleged felons. Notwithstanding, these dif- ferences do not appear to be significant at 0.05 or bet ter in an overall X 2 com- parison or in a pairwise comparison of the violent sexual offenders with the other three groups. The same holds true after controlling for the race of the alleged of- fender. Thus our results are closer to those of Perdue and Lester (1972) than to those ofKaracan etal . (1974) and R u f f e t a l . (1976).

REFERENCES

Allen, C. (1969). A Textbook o f Psychosexual Disorders, Oxford University Press, London. Karacan, I., Williams, R. L., Guerrero, M. W., Salis, P. J., Thornby, J. I., and Hursch, C. J.

(1974). Nocturnal penile tumescence and sleep of convicted rapists and other prison- ers. Arch. Sex. Behav. 3: 19-25.

Perdue, W. C., and Lester, D. (1972). Personality characteristics of rapists. Percept. Motor Skills 35: 514.

Randell, J. (1973). Sexual Variations, Priory Press, London. Ruff, C. F., Templer, D. I., and Ayers, J. L. (1976). The intelligence of rapists. Arch. Sex.

Behav. 5 : 4. Walker, N. (1965). Crimes and Punishment in Great Britain, Edinburgh University Press,

Edinburgh. Wilson, I. C. (1967). Rapid Approximate Intelligence Test. Am. J. Psyehiat. 123(10):

1289-1290.