Early Maladaptive Schemas in Sex and Non- Sex Offenders

The aim of this study was to compare early maladaptive schemas in sex and non-sex offenders. In current descriptive post-hoc study، 45 sex offenders were selected by voluntary sampling method from Tehran Ghezel Hesar and Karaj Rajaei Shahr prisons. Forty five homogeneous non-sex offenders in terms of age، marital status، education and job were selected from Karaj detention camp. The short form of Young Schema Questionnaire was administered to both groups and the data was analyzed by one-way analysis of variance and stepwise discriminate analysis. The mean score of non-sex offenders for subjugation schema was higher than that of sex offenders (p=0. 006). The stepwise discriminate analysis showed no difference between sex and non-sex offenders (p=0. 001)، though the subjugation and mistrust/ abuse schemas were the best predictor schemas of being in sex or non-sex offender groups. However، the success rates of stepwise discriminant analysis in predicting involvement in offender groups were not satisfactory. Due to the limited number of different schemas between the two groups، it seems that the core psychopathology and fundamental schemas for two types of sex and non-sex offence are approximately identical and except for schemas other factors affect the kind of offence.