La Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) est l’outil le plus communément utilisé et recommandé pour mesurer la psychopathie. Cette étude met en évidence qu’avec une population médico-légale souffrant de schizophrénie, l’applicabilité des items PCL-R ne semble pas transposable. Nous proposons une réflexion tant sur le plan psychométrique que psychopathologique de la mesure de la psychopathie lorsqu’elle va de pair avec la schizophrénie.

The Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) is the most studied and validated instrument to measure psychopathy. We aimed to explore its items content invariance to forensic schizophrenic subjects.

We examined the PCL-R protocol of 15 male forensic schizophrenic subjects and attributed a score of sensitivity to psychotic symptomatology to each item score.

Results suggest that the applicability of the PCL-R items to a forensic schizophrenic sample is not to be blindly warranted. Some items more systematically positively influenced by psychotic symptoms (e.g. Shallow Affect, Lack of Remorse or Guilt), while others were negatively influenced (e.g. Promiscuous Sexual Behavior, Glib and Superficial Charm), or not influenced at all (e.g. Criminal Versatility).

The current study suggest that the applicability of the PCL-R items to a forensic schizophrenic sample is not to be blindly warranted. We discuss both psychometric and conceptual implications for the measurement of psychopathy when a diagnosis of schizophrenia has been established.