Rapists and child abusers share low levels in executive updating, but do not in fluid reasoning

Abstract

Research findings suggest that sex offenders show worse performance than the general population in neuropsychological tests. Nevertheless, moderators such as age of the victim, use of antisocial control groups, and characteristics of administered measures have been highlighted. Here, 100 participants completed a battery of cognitive measures tapping fluid reasoning, verbal ability, and three basic executive processes (inhibition, switching, and updating). They were matched by educational level and classified in four groups: controls, non-sex offenders, rapists, and child abusers. The analyses revealed that rapists showed lower fluid reasoning scores than controls and child abusers. Furthermore, rapists and child abusers showed lower executive updating performance than controls and non-sex offenders. Importantly, child abusers did show fluid reasoning scores on a par with controls (controlling for updating differences), but their executive updating performance was equivalent to the one revealed by rapists (controlling for fluid intelligence differences). Implications of these findings for the design of efficient intervention programs are discussed.