Jürgen L. Müller

Universitätsmedizin Göttingen · Forensische Psychiatrie und Psychotherapie

Aim To further investigate the neuroanatomical correlates of child sexual offending and disentangle them from the neural correlates of pedophilia, using a multivariate analytical approach in order to minimize loss of statistical power. Methods This study presents structural MRI data on gray matter in an incarcerated, male population of 22 pedophil...

Objective: This study examines whether occupation and level of experience have an impact on criteria-based assessment of criminal responsibility in paraphilic disorders. Methods: Two different sets of criteria were tested for predictive validity by three different professional groups (psychologists, psychiatrists and lawyers), each with differen...

In Germany every second offence occasioning bodily harm and every fourth sexual offence occur under the influence of alcohol or drugs. Untreated substance use disorders are a risk factor for further offences. The §64 of the German Penal Code (StGB) regulates the commitment of offenders to a Forensic addiction treatment unit as a result of an addict...

Sexueller Missbrauch hat für Kinder sowohl kurzfristig als auch langfristig starke negative Folgen. Eine Vielzahl von Behandlungsprogrammen in Deutschland hat daher die Prävention von Kindesmissbrauch zum Ziel. Ein Ansatzpunkt ist dabei die Tertiärprävention, d. h. Maßnahmen zur Verhinderung von Rückfälligkeit. Bisher wurde dies mit uneinheitlichen...

Background: There is a high demand for evidence-based and cost-effective treatment concepts for convicted individuals who sexually abused children (ISAC) and individuals who consumed child sexual exploitation material (ICCSEM) under community supervision (CS). The @myTabu-consortium developed a guided web-based intervention for convicted ISAC and I...

The prevention of sexual violence is a major goal of sexual health. In cases of accused sexual offenders, the assessment of diminished criminal responsibility of the accused is one of the most important procedures undertaken by experts in the German legal system. This assessment follows a two-stage method assessing first the severity of a paraphili...

For assessing psychopathy, the Psychopathy Checklist‐Revised (PCL‐R) Version has been found to be the gold standard for most researchers. It is important that different and heterogeneous syndromes have been incorporated into the 20 items of the PCL‐R. In addition to the sample description, there are more fundamental methodological issues concerning...

Zusammenfassung Virtuelle Realitäten (VR) werden in der Diagnose und Behandlung von Patienten im klinischen Feld bereits seit 20 Jahren erfolgreich eingesetzt und weiterentwickelt. Seit etwas mehr als 5 Jahren gibt es nun auch erste Beispiele über die Anwendung von VR in psychiatrisch-forensischen Kontexten. Für die forensische Psychiatrie ist die...

The amendment to the law of forced detention in psychiatric hospitals has strengthened the role of experts in criminal law proceedings. Experts have specific specialist knowledge and exert a guarantor function in relation to the court. These interdisciplinary processes hold risks that have to be encountered by critical interaction preserving bounda...

Background and objectiveElectroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is recommended in guidelines for the treatment of severe affective and psychotic disorders that also can be found in patients in forensic psychiatric commitment; however, there are no systematically collected data concerning the use of ECT in forensic psychiatry. The aim of this study was to i...

Background For the assessment of criminal responsibility in the context of sexual delinquency, the evaluation of the severity of a paraphilic disorder and the ability to be controlled are of particular importance. Established assessment criteria are insufficiently operationalized.Aim and methodsThe existing criteria were tested by experts of variou...

In Germany, access to outpatient treatment services devoted to the prevention of (further) sexual offenses against minors and child sexual exploitation material (CSEM) offenses is often limited. The therapy project “Prevention of Sexual Abuse” tries to fill this gap by providing treatment to patients with a self-reported sexual interest in children...

The use of biomarkers in medicine is a common and valuable approach in several clinical fields. Understanding the relationship between measurable biological processes and clinical outcomes not only is indispensable in the face of understanding physiological processes in healthy as well as in diseased organisms but also for understanding and evaluat...

Crime is omnipresent in our society. Every day we are confronted with fictional portrayals of crime and reports of real instances of crime, especially the violent type, in the media. However, crime is also being increasingly perceived as a significant problem in politics. This public debate, which is influenced by current moods and superficial obse...

Early exposure to negative environmental impact shapes individual behavior and potentially contributes to any mental disease. We reported previously that accumulated environmental risk markedly decreases age at schizophrenia onset. Follow-up of matched extreme group individuals (≤1 vs. ≥3 risks) unexpectedly revealed that high-risk subjects had >5...

Nach Reformen des Rechts der Sicherungsverwahrung (2013) und der Unterbringung in einem psychiatrischen Krankenhaus (2016) steht jetzt auch die Maßregel der Unterbringung in einer Entziehungsanstalt vor einem tiefgreifenden Veränderungsprozess. Die Zahl der Patienten, die in einer Entziehungsanstalt auf Grundlage des § 64 StGB untergebracht wurden,...

In recent years, web-based health services for a variety of mental disorders have been developed and evaluated. Evidence suggests that guided internet-based therapy can be as effective as conventional face-to-face therapy. In forensic psychiatric practice, few web-based treatments have been implemented up to now. However, to our knowledge, there do...

Objective This study aimed to assess adults’ subjective perception of infants with a unilateral cleft lip and palate (UCLP) with and without a nasoalveolar molding (NAM) appliance compared to those of controls concerning (1) adult gaze patterns and (2) emotional valence. Methods This interdisciplinary study was performed by (1) the Department of O...

Zusammenfassung Menschen, die infolge einer schwerwiegenden psychischen Störung straffällig geworden sind und infolge dieser Störung weiterhin gefährlich sind, können zur Besserung und Sicherung in den Maßregelvollzug nach §§ 63 und 64 des Strafgesetzbuches (StGB) untergebracht werden. In Deutschland werden gegenwärtig etwa 9000 Patienten in Klinik...

Despite the successful application of virtual reality (VR) in a wide variety of mental disorders and the obvious potentials that VR provides, the use of VR in the context of criminology and forensic psychology is sparse. For forensic mental health professionals, VR provides some advantages that outrun general advantages of VR, e.g., ecological vali...

The decision about unsupervised privileges for sexual offenders against children (SOC) is one of the most difficult decisions for practitioners in forensic high-security hospitals. Facing the possible consequences of the decision for the society, a valid and reliable risk management of SOCs is essential. Some risk management approaches provide fram...

Neurofunctional correlates of sexual arousal are of interest in basic research as well as in clinical science. In forensic psychiatry, it is important to use designs which are potentially robust against susceptibility to manipulation or deception. We tested a new design to measure neurofunctional correlates of sexual preference. Twenty-two healthy...

The first edition of Minimum Requirements for Assessing Criminal Responsibility and Prognosis in Germany from 2005 established standards for expert opinions. Ten years on, the question arises whether a revision is required - and with it the challenges associated with a revision. The authors consider challenges and reasons for revision and propose c...

see: https://www.univerlag.uni-goettingen.de/handle/3/isbn-978-3-86395-328-7

Sexual child abuse is one of the most destructive events for child development. One possible approach to avert it is the preventive treatment of individuals with a sexual interest in children. The aim of the current eye tracking study was to compare people with a self-reported sexual interest in children who participate in the outpatient preventive...

Menschen, die infolge einer schwerwiegenden psychischen Störung straffällig geworden sind und infolge dieser Störung weiterhin gefährlich sind, können zur Besserung und Sicherung in den Maßregelvollzug nach §§ 63 und 64 des Strafgesetzbuches (StGB) untergebracht werden. In Deutschland werden gegenwärtig etwa 9000 Patienten in Kliniken für forensisc...

Die Pädophilie ist als eine anhaltende oder dominierende sexuelle Präferenz für präpubertäre Kinder definiert. Weniger als die Hälfte aller Kindesmissbrauchstäter erfüllt die diagnostischen Kriterien der Pädophilie und ein noch geringerer Anteil ist ausschließlich sexuell auf Kinder ausgerichtet. Die Behandlungen von Pädosexuellen erfolgen ambulant...

Im vorliegenden Artikel wird die Behandlung von Sexualstraftätern im Maßregelvollzug (MRV) nach § 63 StGB und von Personen mit einem selbstberichteten sexuellen Interesse an Kindern, die in der Ambulanz „Prävention sexueller Missbrauch“ (PsM) in Göttingen vorstellig, diagnostisch untersucht und behandelt wurden, verglichen. Diagnostische und therap...

Background: A testosterone-lowering medication is relatively commonly used as a form of treatment for sexual offenders with severe paraphilic disorders in German forensic psychiatric hospitals; however, a double-blind, controlled and randomized study, which investigates the efficacy of this medication, is still lacking. Aim: This article describ...

In the context of forensic psychiatry, it is crucial that diagnoses of deviant sexual interests are resistant to manipulation. In a first attempt to promote the development of such tools, the current fMRI study focusses on the examination of hemodynamic responses to preferred, in contrast to non-preferred, sexual stimuli with and without explicit s...

Results of several studies point to an increase in reported child sexual abuse offences in Germany and an even higher number of undetected cases are assumed. In addition, even more cases regarding the distribution of child pornography have been reported. On behalf of victims of child sexual abuse and for the general public, a preventive treatment a...