Fernando Jiménez Gómez

Mmpi-2 based psychological profile of Mexican inmates

To be able to understand problems faced in Mexico’s prisons, some data must be taken into account. Statistical data collected by the Secretariat of the Interior (January, 2013) show that there are 420 correctional facilities with a total of 242,754 inmates. These facilities are designed to house 195,278 inmates, so this indicates that capacity is up to 124.3%, with overcrowding in 220 of the 420 total correctional facilities. 95% of inmates are male and 5% female. In fact, the penal system has abused convictions (96.4%) by setting jail time as sentence enforcement with imprisonment. Only for 3.6% of criminal punishments did alternative punishments were considered, such as fines and compensations.1 Overcrowding is causing, in turn, many other issues: organized gangs, failure to control prisons, ungovernability, lack of basic amenities, misclassification of inmates, poor integration of employees’ responsibilities, and, naturally, the lack of real opportunities for access to means guaranteeing effective social reintegration. This overcrowding in correctional facilities has been repeatedly denounced by many representatives of the National Human Rights Commission,2 who have expressed the need for a comprehensive solution and different strategies, policies, programs, and interventions by the branches of government to attend to this issue.3

¿Qué Puede Contribuir el MMPI - 2 al Diagnóstico Dual de los Dependientes de Sustancias?

espanolEl objetivo de este estudio es contrastar las diferencias de trastornos de la personalidad que muestra un grupo Clinico y otro Dependiente de sustancias, mediante el MMPI - 2. Con un metodo descriptivo se analizan los resultados de tres grupos ya establecido s con un mismo numero de participantes (113), genero y edades: grupo Normal (sin evidencia de patologia) grupo Clinico (con trastornos psicologicos que necesitan los servicios de un Centro de Salud) y Dependiente de sustancias (con problemas de adiccion a sustancias e internas en una comunidad terapeutica). Se utilizaron los analisis con los estadisticos descriptivos, la d de Cohen y la Curva ROC. Los resultados mostraron la precision diagnostica y el poder predictivo de las principales variables del MMPI - 2 . El MMPI - 2 confirma que, entre los grupos Dependiente y Clinico, no existen diferencias significativas en la tetrada psicotica y que si existen caracteristicas muy significativas del grupo Dependiente. EnglishThe objective of this study is to compare the differences of personality disorders that shows a group of clinical and other substances, using the MMPI - 2 dependent. With a descriptive method are analyzed the results of three groups already set up with the same number of participants (113), gender and age: Normal Group (no evidence of disease) clinical group (with psychological disorders who need the services of a Health Centre) and dependent on substances (with problems of addiction to substances and internal in a therapeutic community). The analyses were used with descriptive statistics, d Cohen and the ROC curve . The results showed the diagnostic accuracy and predictive power of the main var iables of the MMPI - 2. The MMPI - 2 confirms that, between dependent and clinical groups, there are no significant differences in psychotic Tetrad and that there are very significant characteristics of the dependent group.