Can psychiatrists and other mental health practitioners predict violence?
Because of the shootings on the Virginia Tech campus, in Tucson and, more recently, in Aurora, it’s an important question.
A recent article published in the Association for Psychological Science magazine examines trends in how mental health professions assess risk and predict violence. The article’s authors, John Monahan of the University of Virginia, and Jennifer L. Skeem, of the University of California, Irvine, begin by examining the mostly commonly used methods.