222
Authors’ Note: This study was conducted with financial support from the Research and Documentation
Center of the Dutch Ministry of Justice.
International Journal of
Offender Therapy and
Comparative Criminology
Volume 52 Number 2
April 2008 222-233
© 2008 Sage Publications
10.1177/0306624X07303876
http://ijo.sagepub.com
hosted at
http://online.sagepub.com
Aggression Control Therapy
for Violent Forensic Psychiatric
Patients
Method and Clinical Practice
Ruud H. J. Hornsveld
Henk L. I. Nijman
Radboud University Nijmegen, Netherlands
Clive R. Hollin
University of Leicester, United Kingdom
Floor W. Kraaimaat
Radboud University Nijmegen, Netherlands
Aggression control therapy is based on Goldstein, Gibbs, and Glick’s aggression replace-
ment training and was developed for violent forensic psychiatric in- and outpatients (ado-
lescents and adults) with a (oppositional–defiant) conduct disorder or an antisocial
personality disorder. First, the conditions for promoting “treatment integrity” are exam-
ined. Then, target groups, framework, and procedure are described in detail, followed by
the most important clinical findings during the period 2002 to 2006. Finally, new pro-
gramme developments are mentioned, with aggression control therapy as a starting point.
Keywords: aggression; cognitive–behavioral programme; treatment integrity
B
ecause there was no treatment programme for Dutch violent forensic psychiatric
patients, a start was made with the development of the aggression control ther-
apy in 2000 (Hornsveld, 2004a). The therapy was founded on the aggression replace-
ment training (ART) of Goldstein, Glick, and Gibbs (1998). In the Netherlands,
forensic psychiatric patients are offenders for whom, based on examination by a psy-
chiatrist and/or a psychologist, a judge has established a connection between a “defi-
cient mental development or mental disorder” and a committed offence. The
aggression control therapy was initially meant for adult inpatients “detained under
hospital order,” but after some time it was also applied to violent adolescent and
adult outpatients.