School and Workplace
Violence: Assessment,
Prediction, and Reporting of
Violence
KPA Teleconference August 20, 2007
D. Ida Dickie
Spalding University
Epidemic or Not
The media promotes the problem of
school violence or work place
violence as an epidemic.
The media’s inaccurate depiction of
the issue contributes to an
increased fear in the general public
The reality: Base rate is very low
School/Workplace Violence
 Devoe et al., (2003)- Children between 5
and 19 were 70 times more likely to be
murdered away from school.
 US Dept of Labor (2007)-Work place
homicide declined over 50% from 19942006.
 Low base rate of the problem does not
mean attention should not be given to
the problem of school place violence
Definition of School Place Violence
 Different forms of anti-social aggression
and violence have different antecedents
and require different types of
assessment and Intervention.
 Strong empirical literature base of risk
factors to predict general aggression,
violent behaviour and other anti-social
behaviour during adolescent and to
some degree it is normative during
adolescence.
Broad definition Versus Specific
Type of School violence
 If use a broad definition and include
bullying, threats and fist fights in
definition then base rate increases and
the empirical literature and existing
assessment and prediction instruments
may be useful.
 BUT IT IS THE SPECIFIC/TARGETED
VIOLENCE OF SCHOOL SHOOTINGS
THAT PEOPLE WANT TO BE ABLE TO
PREDICT
Who are we talking about- targeted
violence
 Is there an accurate profile of schoolshooter/ Work place –shooter
 Individual Factors- Difficult temperament,
Substance Abuse, Psychiatric
Conditions, Attitudes and beliefs
 Family Factors-Poor monitoring,
exposure to violence, poor attachment
 School/Peers- peer rejection, bullying,
social isolation, low school commitment
Risk Factors and School Violence
 Verlinden et al. (2000)- 1/3 of the
variables contained in targeted school
violence checklists were not included in
checklists for generalized adolescent
violence
 Particularly 1) poor achievement in
school, 2) low commitment to school 3)
history of school discipline problems 4)
bringing a weapon to school- may not be
important in predicting targeted school
violence
Key Findings from Secret Services and
Department of Education task ForceSafer Schools Initiative
http://www.secretservice.gov/ntac/ssi_final_report.pdf
There is no accurate or useful
profile of students who engaged in
targeted school violence.
Incidents of targeted violence at
school rarely are sudden, impulsive
acts.
Key Findings
 Prior to most incidents, other people
knew about the attacker’s idea and/or
plan to attack. In most cases, those who
knew were other kids–friends,
schoolmates, siblings, and others.
However, this information rarely made its
way to an adult.
 Most attackers did not threaten their
targets directly prior to advancing the
attack.
Key Findings
Most attackers engaged in some
behavior, prior to the incident, that
caused others concern or indicated
a need for help.
Most attackers had difficulty coping
with significant losses or personal
failures. Many had considered or
attempted suicide.
Key Findings
Many attackers felt bullied,
persecuted, or injured by others
prior to the attack.
Most attackers had access to and
had used weapons prior to the
attack.
Key Findings
In many cases, other students were
involved in the attack in some
capacity.
Despite prompt law enforcement
responses, most attacks were
stopped by means other than law
enforcement intervention and most
were brief in duration.
Definition of Workplace Violence
 Workplace Aggression and Workplace Violence
 Gregorie (2000)- Four types
 Type 1- offender has no legitamate relationship
to workplace- theft, robbery, terrorist, hate
crime- 80% this type
 Type 2- had received some service provided by
the workplace-ex-patient, customer
 Type 3-offender employed by workplacedisgruntled employee
 Type 4-offender has indirect involvement with
workplace- current spouse, friend etc
Who Commits Workplace Violence
Source: Critical Incident Response Group, 2001 pp 21-22
 Ominous specific threats
 Hyper-sensitivity to criticism
 Recent fascination with weapons
 Increasing Belligerence
 Obsession with supervisor or co-worker
 Pre-occupied with violent themes
 Outbursts of anger
 Extreme disorganization
 Noticeable changes in behaviour
 Homicidal/suicidal comments or threats.
What contributes to
School/Workplace Violence
 Societal Level- Culture of violenceresort to violence if problems can’t be
solved
 Easy access to weapons- right to bear
arms
 School environment can be very
invalidating
 Social selection and hierarchal ordering
of young people
 Support for those who are high
achievers in school and workplace
 Downsizing
What Predicts Violence
A variety of demographic,
behavioural, biological and social
factors are associated with violence
in both Juveniles and Adults.
Debate about whether the
knowledge of risk prediction and
assessment can be applied to
targeted violence like school and
workplace shootings
Risk Assessment and Prediction
Methods
Pure Clinical predictions
Actuarial Predictions
Guided Professional Judgements
Prospective Profiling
Threat Assessment Approach
Clinical Approaches
 Inaccurate in the short-term (Melton et
al., 1997)
 Some research suggests better than
chance in the long term (McNeil et al.,
1998)
 Other prediction and assessment
techniques demonstrate superiority to
the clinical approach
 Biggest problem with this approach is
the failure to account for the base-rate
Clinical Predictions and Base rate
Yes
School
Shooter
Yes School
Shooter
No School
Shooter
6
Correctly
identified
as School
Shooters
4
Missed
No School 399,996
Shooter
Falsely
identified
599,994
Correctly
identified as
not school
shooters
Clinical Prediction
Decision relying on clinical
judgement alone subject to several
cognitive errors
1) rely on risk predictors not
supported by the literature- mental
illness
2)Excessive weight on a few risk
factors that are easily assessable
and salient (previous violent
history)
Actuarial Assessment and
Prediction
Use of empirically verified risk
factor that are statiscally combined
to maximize prediction success.
Examples of VRAG,SORAG
Static, dispositional and
dichotomous versus Dynamic ,
contextual and continuous Risk
Actuarial Risk prediction
Problems: 1) generalizability to
samples outside of original sample
2)failure to incorporate rare risk
factors that are specific to
individual cases 3)failure to include
protective factors that may lower
risk.
No actuarial risk assessment tool
currently exist for targeted school
or work place violence
Actuarial contd.
Targeted school violence is a very
specific outcome than those
commonly associated with actuarial
prediction schemes.
If we used actuarial instruments
predicting more generalized
aggression we would miss the
specific problem of targeted
violence
Actuarial Predictions and Base rate
Yes
School
Shooter
Yes School
Shooter
No School
Shooter
9
Correctly
identified
as School
Shooters
1
Missed
No School 99,999
Shooter
Falsely
identified
899,991
Correctly
identified as
not school
shooters
Guided Professional Judgements
Combine the flexibility of clinical
judgements with the scientific
rigour of the actuarial method
Examples- HCR-20 or SVR-20
No valid measures for targeted
school violence.
The Secret Service 10 key findings
may help designing one.
Prospective Profiling
 Includes a range of identification and
assessment techniques use in law and
non law settings to determine
characteristics of who may have
committed a crime or who is likely to .
 Called Prospective profiling in targeted
school and workplace violence
 Prospective profiling- identify types of
individuals likely to become a problem
and assess individuals who have been
deemed a problem
Prospective Profiling
Not overly accurate because relies
on past characteristics to predict
future characteristics of a
perpetrator.
i.e. Washington Sniper shooter
High false positive rate and a false
sense of security.
Threat Assessment
 A risk management Strategy rather than risk prediction
scheme.
 Gathers information about:
 1)motivation for behaviour
 2)communication about ideas and intentions
 3)unusual interest in targeted violence
 4)evidence of attack-related behaviours and planning
 5)mental condition
 6)cognitive abilities
 7)recent losses
 8)consitency between communication and behaviors
 9)concern by others about individuals risk
 10)individual life environment factors that may increase
or decrease risk
Principles of Threat Assessment
 Three principles:
 1)targeted violence results from specific
process of cognition and behaviours
 2)caused by an interaction among the
perpetrator, past stressful events and
current set of circumstances and the
targets of the violence
 3)succesful prevention requires close
attention to behaviours that precede
violent acts
Threat Assessment
Makes a distinction between
making a threat and posing a threat
Targeted violence is not random or
spontaneous but planned- which
can be preventable.
Threat Assessment
Most promising approach to
assessment and prediction of
targeted violence.
Problems include a labour intensive
approach and school or work place
setting often do no have the
resources.
Not sure how well generalize to
preventing assassinations to other
types of targated violence
Violence Prevention Approaches
 Given the problems inherent in
developing a prediction scheme- more
resources spent on;
 1)School and Workplace environmentopen communication, more validating
and supportive.
 Fostering connection to the school and
workplace
 Consistent and fair application of rules
ands procedures
 Promoting healthy relationships in these
environments
Conclusion
 Profiling not effective
 Guided Professional Judgements
inappropriate for assessing and
predicting targeted school violence
 Actuarial tools a problem in targeted
violence because base rate so low.
 Best approach is a deductive, fact based
approach such as threat assessment
Conclusions
 Research needed to investigate how
normative the characteristics are that
the Secret Services report identified
among the school shooter population
are among regular adolescents to
develop a prediction tool
 Resources should be given towards
focusing on promoting healthy work
and school environments, in addition to
the development of prediction and
assessment schemes.
Reference
Verlinden, S., Hersen, M., Jay, T.,
(2000). Risk Factors in School
Shootings. Clinical Psychology
Review, 20(1), 3-56.