Law and Mental Health Program

Section Head

Dr. Ray Blanchard

Contact

Dr. Ray Blanchard
Law and Mental Health Program
Centre for Addiction and Mental Health
250 College Street
Toronto, Ontario M5T 1R8
ray_blanchard@camh.net

Research Objective

The research focuses on discovering the causes, refining the diagnoses, and improving the treatment and rehabilitation approaches for those disorders, or combinations of disorders, that bring clients into contact with both the mental health and criminal justice systems.

Summary of Activities

Research in the Law and Mental Health Program (LAMHP) has influenced, and continues to influence, decision-making regarding the clients’ release into the community, choice of psychological-behavioural vs. pharmacological therapies, and clinical conceptualizations of the clients’ antisocial and paraphilic behaviours. Most of the recent and on-going research can be captured under the following four headings:

Biological factors in the etiology of sexual interests

A series of studies have shown that pedophiles have lower IQ scores, higher rates of failure at school, higher rates of left-handedness, and higher rates of head injuries in childhood. The findings of this research program suggest that pedophilia is associated with neurodevelopment problems during prenatal life or early childhood.

Along with the investigation of neuropsychological variables, researchers have recently completed a structural MRI study comparing pedophiles with men convicted of nonsexual offences. This study was performed in collaboration with colleagues in the Schizophrenia Research Program.

Diagnosis of paraphilias

Investigations are being carried out on the sensitivity and specificity of phallometric testing, the measurement of male erectile responses, as a method of diagnosing pedophilia and other erotic pathologies. Research has already shown that possession of child pornography is as good an indicator as a hands-on offence against a child.

Prediction of recidivism in sexual offenders

Recent empirical work on this topic challenges the widespread belief that the risk of reoffending continues unabated into the later decades of life. Such a finding has significant implications for release decisions concerning sexual offenders who have been incarcerated.

Best practice in forensic mental health

This line of investigation, which is closely related to the core mandate of the LAMHP, has been implemented by the staff based at the Queen Street site and will remain a focus in the future.

 

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