The sample is made up of 90 men condemned for IPV, serving two different types of sentence: 50 are sentenced to prison in the Penitentiary Center of Alicante-II (Spain), and 40 comply with a Mandatory Community Intervention/Program in the Management Service of Penalties and Alternative Measures of Murcia (Spain). The main sociodemographic characteristics of the sample are: mean age 35.6 years (SD=8.62), 46.7% (n=42) are Spanish and 20% (n=18) are Latin American, 70% (n=66) have only primary studies, complete or incomplete, and 54.4% (n=49) state that their economic situation is insufficient.

Spousal Assault Risk Assessment Guide, SARA (Kropp et al., 1999). We used the SARA guide, in its adaptation for Spanish population carried out by Andrés-Pueyo and López (2005). This is a semi-structured instrument that estimates the risk of recidivism for IPV by means of the study of 20 risk factors, grouped into four blocks: (I) Criminal history, (II) Psychosocial adjustment, (III) Spousal assault history, and lastly, (IV) Index offense factors. These 20 risk factors are described in Table 1. Each factor is rated using the information collected from the judicial, penitentiary, and social file of each participant, together with the diagnostic interview conducted by specialized professionals. Each factor can receive a score of 0, 1, or 2, depending on its absence, partial/discontinuous presence, or permanent presence, respectively. The assessment was conducted jointly by two specialized psychologists, obtaining an inter-evaluator kappa value of .82.

The information required to complete the SARA guide and classify the aggressors according to Holtzworth-Munroe and Stuart's (1994) typology was obtained from the review of expert technical case files (penal, penitentiary, and social), structured interviews and self-reports, described below:

• a)

  Review of the expert technical case files (criminal, penitentiary, and social). These documents contain the information collected by professionals such as police officers, psychologists, social workers, health professionals, judicial agents, penitentiary officials, etc. These three case files contain the historical data of the different sentences that the prisoner had served, and his evolution in prison.

• b)

  Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis-II Personality Disorders (SCID-II; in the authors’ Spanish version (First, Gibbon, Spitzer, Williams, & Smith, 1999), to assess the presence of antisocial, borderline, and passive-aggressive personality disorders. The reliability studies reveal a kappa index between .78 and .91 (Lobbestael, Leurgans, & Amtz, 2010) and, in our case, an inter-interviewer kappa of .81, and an inter-encoder kappa of .73.

• c)

  Self-reports:

  • •

    Dominating and Jealous Tactics Scale of Kasian and Painter (1992), in its version adapted for Spanish population of González (2008). This scale describes 7 tactics of dominance or control that is exerted on the partner, and 4 tactics of jealous feelings and behaviors in the relationship. According to the author of the adaptation employed, this scale presents Cronbach alphas of .67 and .73 for dominance and jealousy, respectively. In the present study we have obtained a Cronbach's alpha of .71.

  • •

    Inventario de Pensamientos Distorsionados sobre la Mujer y la Violencia (IPDMV [Inventory of Distorted Thoughts about Women and Violence]; Echeburúa & Fernández-Montalvo, 1998). We used the version by Ferrer, Bosch, Ramis, Torres, and Navarro (2006), presenting four factors, two related to cognitive distortions about women and two concerning violence, with internal consistency (Cronbach alpha) of .84.

  • •

    Conflict Tactics Scales-2 (CTS-2) of Straus, Hamby, Boney-McCoy, and Sugarman (1996), in the Spanish version of Loinaz (2009). This scale yields five factors: Negotiation, Psychological Violence, Physical Violence, Sexual Violence, and Injuries. In the present study, we only used the subscale of Psychological Violence, made up of 8 items, which provides two measures, Minor and Severe Psychological Violence. The other subscales are discarded to obtain the expert technical files. It presents adequate internal consistency with a Cronbach alpha of .82 (Loinaz, Echeburúa, Ortiz-Tallo, & Amor, 2012).

  • •

    Revised NEO Personality Inventory, NEO–PI–R (Costa & McCrae, 1992) in the Spanish adaptation (Inventario de Personalidad Revisado, NEO PI-R; Arribas, 1999). This is a non-pathological Personality Questionnaire, rated on five domains: Neuroticism, Extroversion, Openness to Experience, Agreeableness, and Responsibility. Each domain is made up of six facets; in this investigation, we used two of them, Hostility and Depression, included within the Neuroticism domain. In the adaptation used, the inventory presents an internal consistency ranging between .82 (Openness) and .90 (Neuroticism).

This is a descriptive, relational, cross-sectional study, which received the corresponding authorizations of the Secretary of State of Penitentiary Institutions and Penitentiary Center (Spain). Inclusion criteria for sample selection were to be serving a sentence for partner violence and voluntary participation in the study, and as exclusion criterion, the incapacity to participate in a diagnostic interview. The assessment was carried out jointly by two psychologists from the penitentiary center, specialized in expertise of aggressors.

This investigation was authorized by the bioethical committee of the University of Murcia (Spain), meeting the ethical criteria of psychology and code of conduct proposed by the American Psychological Association (2002, 2010): beneficence and nonmaleficence; professional responsibility and confidentiality; personal integrity, no deception; justice and equity in the benefits from the contributions; and respect for the person's dignity, not excluding any collective of persons from the benefits. The participants received prior information about the study and provided their informed consent to participate. The results will have implications in preventive measures against IPV, the assessment, risk management and treatment of aggressors, providing benefits for society in general.

The procedure used to classify the participants into homogeneous groups was hierarchical cluster analysis with Ward's method. This method is recommended for qualitative variables (Campbell, Greeson, Bybee, & Raja, 2008), and is one of the most commonly used to obtain typologies of aggressors (Huss & Ralston, 2008). Nonparametric statistics were used to identify significant group differences, as the assumptions of normality and variance homogeneity were not met. Specifically, we used the Kruskal-Wallis test with exact significance and the Mann-Whitney U for paired comparisons, in this case with the Bonferroni correction for the level of significance (α=.05/3=.017). For categorical variables, we used the chi-squared test, measuring the effect size by means of phi and Cramer's V.

Cluster analysis was carried out with the values of the factors the SARA guide, as shown in Table 1. As the best option, three homogeneous groups were obtained, Group 1 with 43 participants (47.8%), Group 2 with 20 (22.2%), and Group 3 with 27 participants (30%). According to the mean value of the total SARA score, Group 1 obtained the highest value of the three (M=26.56, SD=3.83), Group 2, an intermediate score (M=14.05, SD=3.50), and Group 3, the lowest score (M=9.59, SD=3.36). According to these results, the groups could be denominated high risk (HR), medium risk (MR), and low risk (LR).

The three groups presented significant differences in the global SARA score, according to the Kruskal-Wallis test, χ2(2)=70.30, p<.001. Multiple comparisons also indicate differences, according to the Mann-Whitney U (HR/MR: z=- 6.32, p<.001; HR/LR: z=- 7.01, p<.001; MR/LR: z=- 3.76; p<.001).

Figure 1 shows the percentage of subjects with a score of YES/Present (2), in each one of the SARA risk factors. As reflected in Figure 1, there are significant group differences in 17 risk factors, and only Factors (4) Recent partner relationship problems, χ2(2, N=90)=3.53,ns, ϕ=.19; (16) Minimization or denial of IPV, χ2(2, N=90)=1.99,ns, ϕ=.11; and (18) Severe and/or sexual assault, χ2(2, N=90)=4.57,ns, ϕ=.22, presented no differences.

Figure 1.

Porcentages with Yes/Present (2) Score.

Note. FR: Factor Risk; HR: High Risk; MR: Medium Risk; LR: Low Risk; *p<.05; **p<.01; ***p<.001.

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In the diverse pairwise group comparisons, the greatest number of factors with significant differences occurred in the comparison of Groups HR and LR: in the same 17 above-mentioned factors. In contrast, between HR and MR, the significant differences decreased to 14 factors, to which must be added the 3 factors with no group differences: (1) Past assault of family members, χ2(2, N=63)=3.15,ns, ϕ=.22; (10) Personality disorder, χ2(2, N=63)=1.46,ns, ϕ=.15; and (12) Past sexual assault and/or jealousy, χ2(2, N=63)=3.32,ns, ϕ=.23. There were only 5 risk factors with significant differences between Groups LR and MR: (2) Past assault of strangers or acquaintances, χ2(2, N=47)=17.83, p<.001, ϕ=.61; (6) Victim and/or witness of childhood violence, χ2(2, N=47)=12.65, p<.01, ϕ=.52; (10) Personality disorder, χ2(2, N=47)=47.01, p<.001, ϕ=1.00; (11) Past physical assault, χ2(2, N=47)=7.73, p<.05, ϕ=.41; and (14) Increase/severity of aggressions, χ 2(2, N=47)=7.23, p<.05, ϕ=.41.

There were significant group differences as a function of the origin of the participants, Penitentiary Center and Mandatory Community, χ2(2, N=90)=52.81, p<.001, ϕ=.76. In the HR group, 95.3% (n=41) were from prison, and in the other two groups, there was a predominance of aggressors sentenced to mandatory community, in Group MR, 80% (n=16), and in Group LR, 81.5% (n=22). In the paired group comparisons, there were significant differences between HR and MR, χ2(1, N=63)=37.97, p<.001, ϕ=.78, and between HR and LR, χ2(1, N=70)=43.45, p<.001, ϕ=.79. There were no significant differences between Groups MR and LR, χ2(1, N=47)=.02,ns, ϕ=.02.

Table 2 shows the variables with typological value according to the classification of Holtzworth-Munroe and Stuart (1994), with the exception of the variables Drug use and extension of violence (Relatives/Non-relatives), as they are SARA risk factors included in the cluster analysis. There were significant group differences in all of them, except for the variable Abusive alcohol consumption, which was present in almost all the sample.

Of these variables, we especially highlight the distribution of the personality disorders assessed (borderline, antisocial, and passive-aggressive), which presented significant differences in all three groups, χ2(2, N=90)=97.68, p<.001, ϕ=.73. The pairwise group comparisons also revealed significant differences: HR/MR: χ2(2, N =63)=12.45, p<.01, ϕ=.45; HR/LR: χ2(2, N=70)=62.14, p<.001, ϕ=.94; and MR/LR: χ2(2, N=43)=47.01, p<.001, ϕ=1.00.

As can be seen in the distribution of the disorders, Group HR concentrates most of the participants with a diagnosis of borderline disorder, either as an exclusive diagnosis (30.2%) or in combination with antisocial disorder (39.5%). Antisocial disorder without the association of another disorder is noteworthy in Group MR, with 70% of the participants. Lastly, Group LR includes the participants without a personality disorder (100%). We did not include passive-aggressive disorder in the statistical analyses due to its low incidence in the sample (n=2).

In the rest variables of this block, in the pairwise group comparisons, there were significant differences between Groups HR and LR in all the variables and, in contrast, there were no differences between Groups HR and MR. There were significant differences between Groups MR and LR in Criminal antecedents, χ2(1, N=43)=10.05, p<.01, ϕ=.46, and Hostility, χ 2(1, N=47)=8.56, p<.01, ϕ=.43.

The specific IPV variables considered in this study are shown in Table 3. The Kruskal-Wallis test identified significant differences in the variable Minor psychological aggression, χ2(2)=8.15, p<.05, and Factor 3, Attitudes favoring IPV, χ2(2)=8.28, p<.05. The analysis to detect pairwise group differences using the Mann-Whitney U and Bonferroni's correction yielded significant differences in the variable Minor psychological aggression between HR and LR, z=-2.53, p=.011, and between MR and LR, z=-2.42, p=.015, and in Factor 3 between HR and MR, z=-2.81, p=.005.