Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Mental Illness Doesn't Predict Violent Behavior - Even when combined with substance abuse, psychiatric woes rank low as risk factor, study finds

Mental illness alone is not a predictor of future violent behavior, but mental illness combined with substance abuse or dependence does increase the risk, according to U.S. researchers who analyzed data collected from nearly 35,000 people.

People who have a severe mental illness but no substance abuse or a history of violence weren't any more likely than any other person in the general population to be violent over a period of three years, the study found. But the risk for future violence reached the level of statistical significance when mental illness was combined with substance abuse.

Still, the mental illness/substance abuse combination only ranked ninth on the study's list of the top 10 predictors of future violence. The predictors, listed from first to tenth, were: age (younger people are more likely to commit violence); history of violence; gender (males are more prone to violence); history of juvenile detention; divorce or separation in the past year; history of physical abuse; parental criminal history; unemployment in the past year; mental illness with substance abuse; and victimization in the past year.

RERAD MORE @ U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT