Firesetting Dangerousness: A Comparison
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Firesetting Dangerousness: Comparing the views of mentally disordered firesetters and clinicians.
IRAS ID
157809
Contact name
Becky Wyatt
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Kent
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 1 months, 2 days
Research summary
This research aims to look at the views of male mentally disordered firesetters and compare these views with the views of clinicians, particularly in areas pertaining to the dangerousness of firesetting and the dynamic variables associated with firesetting behaviours. This research is particularly pertinent as there is no structured professional judgement risk assessment designed specifically to focus on firesetting. This research would provide a scientific evidence base for a future risk assessment tool; increasing user confidence. With the addition of a risk tool; it is anticipated that the assessment and management of firesetting individuals will become a more transparent, fluid process.
This study is divided into five sub studies:
Patient Study
I intend to interview 50 male mentally disordered firesetters detained within secure settings. It is anticipated that patients will initially be identified and approached by their Multi-Disciplinary Team. In order to be included in this study, the patient must have a history of firesetting and must be willing to discuss this with the research team. Patients must be deemed to be able to give full informed consent by their clinical teams in order to participate in the research. Patients who are deemed to have lost capacity to consent before or during the interview process, will no longer be included in the study. Patients will be invited to take part in a face-to-face interview with myself, which will be audio recorded and transcribed at a later stage. Personal/historical information provided during interview will be further corroborated against their personal files; information found within their files will be used to fill in any gaps of information the patient cannot provide. Patients will be informed during the consent seeking stage that researchers intend to access their personal files and the reasons for this. The patient interviews can be divided into three further sections, however only one interview will take place with the patient.a. Patient Study- Dynamic Risk Variable Interview
Patients will be asked to participate in a clinical interview, specifically looking to identify the dynamic risk variables that were present leading up to the patient’s incident of firesetting. The researchers aim to obtain this information using a clinical interview style of approach. Using a series of open ended questions pertaining to their firesetting history we will attempt to elicit specific information relating to their motive, any materials used to set the fire, any antecedents and consequences of the firesetting behaviour, whilst also looking at the feelings, thoughts and intentions when setting the fire. The research team has experience in clinical interviewing and these skills will be drawn upon during the patient interview, in order for the interview to feel non accusatory and sensitive in nature. I have devised an interview schedule that details certain topics in order to ensure that all areas of concern are consistently covered with each patient. Please see Appendix G for further details. The interview will be transcribed by the researcher afterwards. The ‘Patient Study Risk Factor Checklist’ (See Appendix Q); will act as a coding checklist in order to ascertain the presence or absence of dynamic risk variables. Participants will also be administered the ‘Five Factor Fire Scale’ (See Appendix A; Ó Ciardha et al, 2013), which combines items from three related measures. (Identification with Fire Questionnaire, IFQ; Gannon, Ó Ciardha & Barnoux, 2011; Fire Attitude Scale, FAS; Muckley, 1997; Fire Interest Scale, FIRS; Murphy & Clare, 1996) These measures will examine five subscales of serious fire interest, identification with fire, perceived fire safety awareness, everyday fire interest and attitudes towards fire. These four factors that have been shown to be highly unique to firesetting (Gannon et al. 2013; Gannon et al. 2014), and therefore highly likely to be a dynamic risk factor of firesetting behaviours. Psychometric scores will be scored dichotomously as to whether they scored above or below the cut off, which indicates the point at which an individual is responding more like the average male imprisoned firesetter than the average non-firesetting offender based on previous research (Gannon et al., 2013).
b. Patient Study- Own Dangerousness
For this section of the research, the patient will then be asked to rate the fire that they talked about in their interview. In order to ensure that this is done in a sensitive manner, clinical interviewing techniques will be used. It is hoped that we will gain specific details of the incident e.g. details of any victims, method used to light fire, motive, did they attempt to extinguish the fire, was the fire premeditated, location, time of day, resultant harm/damage as a result of the fire. Please see Appendix G to see the full ‘Patient Interview Schedule’. After describing the fire, patients will then be asked to complete the ‘Incident Rating Activity’ which gets the rate the dangerousness of this incident of firesetting based upon a Likert scale ranging from 0 ‘Not dangerous at all’ to 4 ‘Extremely dangerous’. Patients will be asked to provide a rationale for this rating. (Please see Appendix H). Patients will be notified during the consent seeking stage; that their recollection of their firesetting incident will be transcribed, sanitized and anonymised and given to a professional (external to the institute that they currently reside), who will also rate it for dangerousness. Patients will be made aware that this process will not affect any aspects of their care/treatment pathway.
c. Patient Study- General Dangerousness
Finally, patients will then also be asked to complete a dangerousness rating scale, which involves a comprehensive list of variables, which they are asked to rate on a Likert scale (See Appendix I). The rating scale will provide the researcher with an overview of the patients’ own views on general firesetting dangerousness and the impact that such behaviour can elicit. The results from this study will be added to an existing study that is currently being undertaken outside of the NHS. This study aims to review ‘fire professionals’ views on firesetting dangerousness, and will also include the views of individuals from the fire brigade, police service and magistrates court judges. The patients’ view on firesetting will be compared to that of the ‘professionals’ to see if there are any differences.
Clinician Study
This study aims to look at the views of clinician participants. In order to participate in this study, the clinician must hold a substantive client facing clinical role. Clinicians will be recruited using opportunity sampling. Informed consent will be sought with this participant group.
d. Clinician Study-Fire Professionals Interview
A total of 20 clinicians will be invited to take part in the ‘Fire Professionals Study’. In order to take part in this study if they are currently working within a clinical secure environment in a role that is responsible for the risk management of firesetters. Clinicians will be recruited using opportunity sampling. Clinicians’ informed consent will be sought and they will be notified that their interviews will be audio recorded (See Appendix J). Clinicians will be asked a series of semi-structured questions, which aim to illicit their responses about the specific elements of fire dangerousness (See Appendix K); they will then be invited to complete the dangerousness rating scale (See Appendix I). Participants will be able to complete the interviews over the phone or face-to-face depending upon the individual preference. The completion of the ‘dangerousness rating scale’ can be done electronically using online questionnaire website ‘Qualitrics’, or can be completed in paper format
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e. Clinician Study- Court Report ReplicationOut of the 20 clinicians taking part in the ‘Fire Professionals Interviews’, 6 will also be approached to participate in an exercise which aims to replicate the basic principles of court report decision making process (See Appendix L). An incentive will be offered to participants wishing to take part in the additional study (A copy each of ‘Firesetting and Mental Health’ Edited by Dickens, Sugarman & Gannon, 2012). Each clinician will receive 25 patient profiles to individually rate. (See Appendix M). This will ensure that each patient profile will be rated three times by different clinicians. The patient profiles will contain an anonymised patient account of their firesetting, and the official account of the same incident as documented within their personal file. Within the profile, clinicians will also be provided with additional individual information that may be relevant to the assessment of dangerousness (e.g. current psychiatric diagnosis, number of previous hospital admissions, and any record of previous firesetting). For each patient profile, the clinicians will then be asked to complete the ‘Incident Rating Activity’ whereby they will provide a rating of the incident for levels of dangerousness on a Likert scale based upon a Likert scale ranging from 0 ‘Not dangerous at all’ to 4 ‘Extremely dangerous’. Clinicians will be asked to provide a rationale for this rating (See Appendix H). This process will be repeated for each of the 25 patient profiles.
The results of this study will be used to devise a structured professional judgement to be used with mentally disordered offenders who have a history of firesetting.REC name
London - Fulham Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
15/LO/0675
Date of REC Opinion
7 May 2015
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion