Introduction Overview of the ASUS-R

1. Criterion Validity of the Antisocial and Antilegal Subscales of the Adult Substance Use Survey-Revised Damon Mitchell, Central Connecticut State University Jake Villeneuve, The Connection, Inc Stephen M. Cox, Central Connecticut State University • Measures (continued) • Criminal Thinking • CriminogenicThinking Profile (CTP; Mitchell & Tafrate, 2011): This self-report measure of criminal thinking was also administered to clients at intake. The CTP yields a Total Score as well as scores on 8 subscales, each reflecting a different thinking pattern (see Table 1). • Table 1 • Results • Correlations Between the Antilegal Subscale and Criminal History, Criminal Risk Assessment, and Criminal Thinking (see Tables 2 & 3) • The Antilegal subscale was significantly correlated with: • number of arrests, • number of incarcerations, • number of tickets while incarcerated, • LSI Total Score, • Inability to Cope subscales of the CTP. • Table 2 • Method • Participants • 146 male offenders on parole or work-release consecutively admitted to a halfway house. • Average age of 33 (SD= 9) • 52% Black, 30% White, 17% Latino • Average of 10 arrests (SD= 10), 4 incarcerations (SD = 3) • Halfway House • An all male, 30 bed, post incarceration facility located in an urban setting. The facility utilizes a case management service model to develop individualized service plans that address clients risks and needs. Services include: vocational counseling, housing/transitional Planning, cognitive skills and daily living skills training, substance Abuse education, GED classes, & AA/NA meetings. • A typical course of stay is 90 to 120 days. Clients are assigned a case manager who works with them to complete their assessments and identify key risk/need factors. The intake process includes assessment of the client’s criminal history, substance abuse use, emotional stability, employment concerns, and other risks/needs. After the intake process has been completed, the clients complete five days of orientation during which time they are not allowed to leave the facility. After orientation, clients are allowed out of the facility to work, job search, address basic needs, and attend mental health substance abuse treatment, or church. Clients attend a job search group at least twice a week . While at the facility, clients are assigned to one or more group interventions addressing criminal and addictive thinking, relapse prevention, and community reentry challenges. When the clients are nearing their end of stay, their case manager will complete a discharge plan with the client. • Procedure • The present study was conducted through analysis of an existing database that contained demographic, criminal history, intake assessment, program, and outcome data on all clients discharged from the halfway house over a 2.5 year period (N = 146). • Measures • We studied the following hypothesized correlates of the ASUS-R Antisocial and Antilegal subscales • Criminal History • Number of arrests as an adult • Number of incarcerations as an adult • Number of tickets for institutional misconduct • Number of disciplinary reports at the halfway house • Criminal Risk Assessment • Level of Service Inventory-Revised (LSI-R; Andrews & Bonta, 1994): This interview based criminal risk/need instrument was administered to clients at intake. • Introduction • Overview of the ASUS-R • The Adult Substance Use Survey - Revised (ASUS-R; Wanberg, 2004) is a self-report screening tool intended to: • identify offenders who may have a substance use disorder, • Identify other relevant concerns such as mood problems and antisocial behaviors and attitudes, • provide referral suggestions , • assess changes due to treatment. • The ASUS-R is employed by a variety of community corrections agencies. • Unfortunately, there are no reports in the peer reviewed literature concerning the validity of the survey. • Content of the ASUS-R • The ASUS-R does not yield a single score. Instead, it consists of a series of 15 subscales focused on: • substance use and its associated consequences, • psychological distress, • antisocial attitudes/behavior , • defensiveness/reluctance to acknowledge problems . • The subscales focused on antisocial attitudes/behavior are the • 1) Antisocial subscale, which measures anti-authority attitudes and juvenile conduct problems; • 2) Antilegal subscale, which measures degree of lifetime involvement with the criminal justice system; • 3) Antilegal Last 6 Months subscale, which measures degree of involvement with the criminal justice system in the past 6 months. This subscales was not of interest in the present study because its information is subsumed within the Antilegal subscale. • Purpose of the Present Study • The present study sought to explore the criterion validity of the Antisocial and Antilegal subscales by examining their correlation with official criminal history data and measures of criminal risk and criminal thinking. • We hypothesized that • 1) both subscales would be correlated with criminal history, criminal risk, and criminal thinking, • 2) the Antilegal scale would be more strongly correlated with criminal history than criminal thinking, • 3) the Antisocial subscale would be more strongly correlated with criminal thinking than criminal history. • Correlations Between the Antisocial Subscale and Criminal History, Criminal Risk Assessment, and Criminal Thinking (Tables 2 & 3) • The Antisocial subscale was significantly correlated with • number of tickets while incarcerated, • LSI Total Score, • CTP Total Score, • five of the 8 CTP subscales • Table 3 • Conclusions • Results provide preliminary support for the validity of the ASUS-R subscales under investigation. • Both the Antilegal and Antisocial subscales were correlated with criminal history, criminal risk, and criminal thinking. • As hypothesized, the Antilegal subscale was more strongly correlated with criminal history than criminal thinking, while the Antisocial subscale was more strongly correlated with criminal thinking than criminal history. • The strongest correlates of the Antilegal subscale were the number of arrests and LSI Total Score, while the strongest correlates of the Antisocial subscale were thinking patterns reflecting passive/ ineffective coping strategies and avoidance of emotional expressions that lead to intimacy with others. • Future validation research should: • examine the predictive validity of the Antilegal and Antisocial subscales with respect to probationer and parolee outcomes, • examine the construct validity of the subscales with a measures of personality disorders and psychopathy.