Comparison of Two Short Screening Tools to Help Assess Violence Risk in Youth Aged 12–18 Acutely Admitted to Child Welfare: The V-RISK-Y and the V-RISK-YP

Due to the lack of short violence risk assessment instruments for youth, the Violence Risk Assessment Checklist for Youth Aged 12–18 (V-RISK-Y) was developed and tested in four acute adolescent psychiatric departments and four acute child welfare institutions in a multicenter project in Norway. Results for V-RISK-Y were good for adolescent psychiatry but insufficient for child welfare. The aims were to develop the Violence Risk Assessment Checklist – Youth Protection, Aged 12–18 (V-RISK-YP) for child welfare institutions, to explore the feasibility of V-RISK-YP, and to compare predictive properties of V-RISK-YP and V-RISK-Y in child welfare. The target group was all youths acutely placed in four child welfare institutions during a one-year period. All placements were decided by the local municipality child welfare team. Final study population consisted of 162 youths. Data for child welfare from the V-RISK-Y multicenter project was re-analysed resulting in the V-RISK-YP. V-RISK-YP and V-RISK-Y scores at admission were compared with registered violent episodes during institutional stay. The design was a prospective observational study in a naturalistic setting. Main findings were significantly better predictive results for V-RISK-YP compared to V-RISK-Y, and that V-RISK-YP significantly added predictive validity to the control variables in the study. The results indicate that V-RISK-YP can be a useful violence risk screening instrument and fill a shortage of this type of instruments in child welfare institutions, but more studies are needed in other settings or cultures with higher power to confirm validity and usability.