Am J Psychiatry 1985; 142:464-468
Copyright © 1985 by American Psychiatric Association
Fire-setting behavior in the histories of a state hospital population
JL Geller and G Bertsch
Review of the records of 191 nongeriatric state hospital inpatients showed
that 50 (26%) of the patients had engaged in some form of fire- setting
behavior; half of this group had engaged in a single episode. As a group,
persons who had engaged in fire-setting behavior were significantly more
likely to have a history of nonlethal self-injurious behavior and had a
significantly greater number of admissions to the state hospital. The data
suggest that fire setting by any patient cannot be accurately predicted and
that fire-setting behavior may be an example of destructive operant
behavior.
