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Abstract
The purpose of this prospective study was to investigate the predictive capabilities of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Instrument - Adolescent version (Butcher, Williams, Graham, Archer, Tellegen, Ben-Porath, and Kaemmer, 1992) in determining whether adolescents will be successful in completing their court-mandated residential placements. After stringent screening procedures, 75 male delinquents housed in a short-term youth detention center participated in the study. Each participant was ordered by the courts to undergo a psychological evaluation prior to placement. As a part of these evaluations, each participant took the MMPI-A. Juvenile offense histories and number and types of offenses were examined. Number of days in detention and offense information were tracked via the Juvenile Tracking System. Results indicated participant age and two new Content Component Scales on the MMPI-A (Low Achievement Orientation, A-las1; Shyness, A-sod2) successfully predicted group membership in the successful (83%) and the unsuccessful (57.1%) placement completion groups. Differences in the two groups, implications, and suggestions for future research are discussed.