At the crossroads

9.30 am - 10.30 am

Workshop 1: Child Pornography Offenders - Kelly Babchishin

Workshop 2: Can We Teach these Kids to Dance?  A Developmental Treatment Approach for Addressing Sexual Behavior Problems in Youth. - Kevin Creeden

Workshop 3: Female Who Sexually Offend: Developments in Psychological Knowledge. - Theresa Gannon

Workshop 4: Offenders with mental disorders / ID - Liam Marshall

Workshop 5: Assessment and Utilization of Change Information from Risk Reduction Agents with Sexual and Violent Offenders - Mark Olver

10.30 am - 11.00 am

Time for coffee and refreshments! 

11.00 am - 12.00 pm

Workshop 1: Child Pornography Offenders - Kelly Babchishin

Workshop 2: Can We Teach these Kids to Dance?  A Developmental Treatment Approach for Addressing Sexual Behavior Problems in Youth. - Kevin Creeden

Workshop 3: Female Who Sexually Offend: Developments in Psychological Knowledge. - Theresa Gannon

Workshop 4: Offenders with mental disorders / ID - Liam Marshall

Workshop 5: Assessment and Utilization of Change Information from Risk Reduction Agents with Sexual and Violent Offenders - Mark Olver

12.00 pm - 1.00 pm

Sandwiches, refreshments and interesting posters

1.00 pm - 2.00 pm

Sexual violence is an urgent social, criminal, and public health problem. Treating offenders so that they do not re-offend is a critically important step, as is preventing sexual violence from occurring in the first place. Evidence demonstrates that sexual violence can be prevented through primary prevention (i.e., strategies for the general population), and also through secondary prevention (i.e., strategies for those determined to be at high risk of offending). Prevention can be controversial, however. For example, some strategies are aimed at victims, which raises ethical concerns. Another major challenge is encouraging schools, service providers, communities, and other entities to use evidence-based strategies—meaning prevention programs that have been rigorously tested and have demonstrated impact. Too many well-meaning organizations create their own prevention programs without regard to the science about what works, and as a result, weak and ineffective prevention programming is now found in some places. Prevention science results suggest that multi-level (or social-ecological) prevention programs are more effective at preventing undesirable behavior that prevention strategies that target individuals for personal behavior change. In this session, we will explore: (1) What is a “multi-level” prevention program?; (2) Why would a multi-level program be more effective than an individual counseling program, in theory?; (3) What is the scientific evidence to support the idea that multi-level prevention programs tend to be more effective?; (4) What kinds of multi-level sexual violence strategies are presently available for universities, schools, and communities?; and (5) How can one create an evidence-informed, multi-level, sexual violence prevention program?  

2.00 pm - 3.00 pm

Any review of the efficacy of interventions to treat sex offenders is likely to produce mixed results with some producing findings that are favourable while others show the reverse.  Given the biological underpinnings of sexual behaviour, intervening with anti-libidinal medication ought to be an obvious candidate; yet here too, the evidence is inconsistent. 

In this talk, I shall first describe the different types of evidence that are relevant when evaluating treatment before describing the results from a recently published Cochrane Review on Medication for Sex Offenders (Khan et al. 2015).  This review found that there were only seven trials that met Cochrane criteria for a systematic review and all of these had major methodological deficiencies including the fact that that none evaluated more recent candidates including SSRIs or gonadotropins.  Moreover, as there are no trials of medication for sex offenders currently registered on the Clinical Trials Register, this situation is unlikely to change in the near future.   

I shall then discuss some of the objections to conducting such trials and argue that sex offenders ought to be entitled to the same level of evidence of efficacy as might be expected in other medical conditions such as heart disease or cancer. Indeed, given that society is prone to preventatively detain at least some sex offenders, there is an even greater obligation to establish the efficacy of interventions so that those that are used are effective.

I will conclude with a case of a sex offender that illustrates the difficulty of applying evidence-based principles in real life clinical practice.      

3.00 pm - 3.30 pm

Time for coffee and snacks! 

3.30 pm - 4.30 pm

Evidence will be presented indicating what issues need to be targeted in sex offender treatment (ie, criminogenic needs); use of effective/rational procedures for modifying these targets; appropriate style of treatment delivery; and the influence, or not, of theoretical orientation. Observations will be made regarding the relevance of these issues for meta-analytic studies of treatment outcome. Finally data on treatment outcome will be presented both from large-scale meta-analytic studies and from an ongoing evaluation of a program that meets the standards set by the above review of the essential elements of sex offender treatment.

*See also: preconference workshops!*

4.30 pm - 5.00 pm

Inspiring closing remarks by Anthony Beech!