Treatment of Sex Offenders

D.Richard Laws, Ph.D., was the director of the Sexual Behavior Laboratory at Atascadero State Hospital in California from 1970-1985; project director at the Florida Mental Health Institute from 1985-1989; manager of forensic psychology at Alberta Hospital, Edmonton, Alberta from 1989-1994; and most recently a psychologist with Adult Forensic Psychiatric Services in Victoria, British Columbia from 1994 until his retirement in 1999. Dr. Laws is known in the field of sexual deviation as a developer of assessment procedures and in program development and evaluation. He is the author of numerous articles and book chapters in this area and serves on the editorial board of several journals. He is past president of the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers. He is adjunct faculty at the University of Victoria and Simon Fraser University in British Columbia and is Honorary Professor at the University of Birmingham (UK) and Cardiff University (UK). William O’Donohue, Ph.D. is a licensed psychologist and chairman and professor of psychology at the University of Nevada, Reno, and an adjunct professor in the department of philosophy and a faculty member of the National Judicial College. He has published over 70 books and 150 journal articles and book chapters. He holds advanced degrees both in philosophy and psychology. For the past 14 years, he has been director of a free clinic that treats children who have been sexually abused and adults who have been sexually assaulted.

Problems in diagnosis.- Problems in classification: major vs. minor paraphilias.- A brief history of risk assessment.- Strengths of risk assessment.- Weaknesses of risk assessment.- Community control of sex offenders.- Phallometry vs. viewing time.- Polygrtaphy in the treatment of sex offenders.- Shortcomings of sex offender treatment.- Two models: Risk-Need-Responsibility (RNR) vs. Good Lives Model (GLM).- Desistance-focused rehabilitation of sex offenders.- The strengths of sex offender treatment.- Civil commitment of "sexual predators".- Prevention of sex offending: the public health approach.- Early detection: the case for juvenile sex offender treatment.- Summary and conclusions

"High-profile authors have written 14 chapters covering a wide range of topics, including risk assessment, assessment of disordered sexual arousal, strengths and weaknesses of treatment, and community control. ... Treatment of Sex Offenders is a well-written book ... edited by two well-respected figures in the field. ... this appears to be an important contribution to the field and will prove to be quite useful for documenting the current state-of-the-art in assessment and treatment of sexual offenders." (Anita Schlank, PsycCRITIQUES, Vol. 61 (36), September, 2016)
"The intended audience is forensic psychologists, psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, and social workers. The book is written by an international collection of authors from the U.S., the U.K., Canada, Germany, and New Zealand. ... This book does a good job of discussing both theoretical and clinical issues. The strengths/weaknesses approach helps clinicians to better understand what works and what does not. It should be in the libraries of professionals and researchers who work with sexual offenders." (Gary B. Kaniuk, Doody's Book Reviews, August, 2016)