The Self-Regulation Model: Relationship Between Pathways and Static Risk

Relapse prevention has been considered an important component in sex offender treatment, yet recently has received criticism for its narrow approach to treating this population. Relapse prevention places high importance on understanding the negative affect that accompanies violating a decision to remain abstinent from offending, and thus, a fundamental aspect of it is to assume that negative affect or interpersonal conflict is what induces offending behaviors (Laws, 1999; Carich & Stone, 2001). However, recent research has indicated that there is more than one affective pathway to offending (Ward, Hudson, & Keenan, 1998; Ward & Hudson, 2000). The current study evaluated the prevalence of each of the self-regulation model offense pathways based on static risk as assessed with the STATIC-99 within a sample of adult male sex offenders on community supervision (n = 89). Results revealed significant differences between several of the pathways based on levels of static risk. Implications for treatment and community supervision are addressed