The Relationship Between Psychiatric and Cognitive Symptom Feigning Among Forensic Inpatients Adjudicated Incompetent to Stand Trial

The accurate assessment of feigning is an important component of forensic assessment. Two potential strategies of feigning include the fabrication/exaggeration of psychiatric impairments and the fabrication/exaggeration of cognitive deficits. The current study examined the relationship between psychiatric and cognitive feigning strategies using the Structured Interview of Reported Symptoms and Test of Memory Malingering among 150 forensic psychiatric inpatients adjudicated incompetent to stand trial. A greater number of participants scored within the feigning range on the Structured Interview of Reported Symptoms than on the Test of Memory Malingering. Relative risk ratios indicated that individuals shown to be feigning cognitive deficits were 1.68 times more likely to feign psychiatric symptoms than those not shown to be feigning cognitive deficits. Likewise, individuals shown to be feigning psychiatric deficits were 1.86 times more likely to feign cognitive deficits than those not shown to be feigning psychiatric symptoms. Overall, findings suggest that psychiatric feigning and cognitive feigning are related, but can be employed separately as feigning strategies. Therefore, clinicians should consider evaluating for both feigning strategies in forensic assessments where cognitive and psychiatric symptoms are being assessed.