The Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles: A Scoping Review of its Reliability, Factor Structure, Concurrent Correlates, Predictive Correlates, Change Scores, and Cross-National Comparability in Non-U.S. Samples

The Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles (PICTS) is an 80-item self-report measure developed in the United States to assess criminal thought process or how an offender thinks. The first and most important goal of this review was to ascertain whether the PICTS has utility in assessing criminal thought patterns in non-U.S. participants. Eighteen studies conducted on populations outside the United States, to include China, Croatia, Czech Republic, Egypt, England, Iran, Ireland, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden, were examined to determine what they can potentially tell us about the reliability, factor structure, concurrent correlates, predictive correlates, and change status of the PICTS in correctional clients from countries other than the United States. Several cross-national comparisons of the PICTS thinking style scales were also performed. The results of this review indicate that the reliability of the PICTS, its factor structure, and its pattern of correlation with prior offending and concurrent personality measures are reasonably comparable across U.S. and non-U.S. studies. More research is required, however, to determine whether the PICTS is capable of predicting recidivism or whether it can serve as an indicator of change in response to incarceration and intervention in non-U.S. samples.