A descriptive model of the relapse process in disqualified drivers

Driving-while-disqualified (DWD) offenders represent a significant proporti on of the driving offender population, and contribute to a significant drai n on governmental and societal resources. The reoffence or relapse process of recidivist DWD offending has been somewhat neglected in the past, and th is paper represents a first attempt at developing an empirically generated model of this phenomenon. In this study, we undertook a grounded theory ana lysis of offence chain information obtained from 28 male recidivist DWD off enders. The grounded theory analysis resulted in the development of a 15-st age model of the relapse process of recidivist DWD offenders. The model ide ntifies and describes the sequence of psychological, behavioural, and envir onmental factors, including mediating variables that contribute to DWD reof fending. The model was then applied to 14 new offence chains to examine its level of saturation, content validity, and inter-rater reliability. The re sults suggest that the model has provisional validity and adequate inter-ra ter reliability, and achieved a high level of saturation. The strengths and value of the model are discussed, as are its clinical and research implica tions.