Assessing Protective Factors of Youth Who Sexually Offended in Singapore

Sexual offending has attracted increasing public concern because of its long-term effects. Although there is an increasing amount of research on the risk factors for recidivism among youth who have sexually offended, there is a dearth of research on the protective factors for desistence from recidivism. The current study investigated the associations between protective factors and recidivism among 97 Singaporean youth who sexually offended (YSO). In addition, the predictive validity with regard to two new measures of protective factors-the Desistence for Adolescents Who Sexually Harm (DASH-13), and Structured Assessment of Protective Factors for Violence Risk (SAPROF)-were also evaluated. Results indicated that both the DASH-13 and the SAPROF were inversely related to the Estimate of Risk of Adolescent Sexual Offense Recidivism (ERASOR). However, neither the DASH-13 nor the SAPROF were found to have adequate predictive validity or incremental validity for sexual or nonsexual recidivism. The implications for the assessment and management of YSO are discussed.