Risk assessment, a process that involves the systematic collection and interpretation of information relating to an individual to predict the likelihood that he/she will perform the behavior of concern in the future (Herrington & Roberts, 2012), has become one of the most important practices in prison management of violent extremism. In the context of prisons, risk assessment may help provide early warning signs of radicalization among prisoners, classify prisoners according to their level of dangerousness, assign them to different types of disengagement interventions, and manage prison release and probation (Monahan, 2012). Given the relevance of these tasks, different tools have been developed for risk assessment in an attempt to minimize bias (Cook, 2014; Lloyd & Dean, 2015; Meloy & Gill, 2016).

The first, and probably best-known, violent extremism risk assessment tool is the VERA—Violent Extremism Risk Assessment (Pressman et al., 2016). Since its appearance, new tools with different characteristics have emerged to overcome some of its potential limitations. A useful strategy to improve the tools already existing, but also to help in the development of new tools, is to make a comparison between them (Fernandez & de Lasala, 2021; Lloyd, 2019; Lobato & García-Coll, 2022; Scarcella et al., 2016; van der Heide et al., 2019). This strategy provides insights into the advantages and limitations of each tool as compared to others, what allows to improve them and to understand in which situations it is more appropriated to use one tool over another. Thus, in order to raise awareness and facilitate the selection of such tools in the prison context for first-line practitioners, this research aims to compare the most recent version of the VERA, as it is the VERA-2R (Pressman et al., 2016), with the DRAVY-3 (González-Álvarez et al., 2022), a recent instrument to assess the risk of violent jihadist extremism in prisons that has undergone an exhaustive process of revision and updating in its short history.

Therefore, after introducing the main characteristics of the VERA-2R and the DRAVY-3, the objectives of this investigation are: 1) to compare their structure, the differences, and the possible overlap of their indicators; 2) to examine their reliability and validity; and 3) to point out their limitations and areas for improvement.

The VERA was developed in 2009 as a specific assessment tool for violent extremists and terrorists under the format of a structured professional judgement (Pressman, 2009). Initially, it was originated to be used by forensic psychologists and clinical experts in a high-risk correctional terrorism unit in Australia (Pressman & Flockton, 2012). It was developed from a review of the literature and discussions with security and intelligence professionals with experience in violent criminal extremists. At the time of its creation, the VERA was the first instrument of its kind (Pressman, 2009). In 2010, the protocol was updated with the release of its second version, the VERA-2 (Pressman & Flockton, 2010). This update was made based on feedback from evaluators who tested the tool in a high-security prison in Australia. Feedback was received from several groups of experts, such as psychologists and psychiatrists in the justice system, intelligence and security analysts, professionals working with radicalized individuals in prison settings, users from local and national law enforcement agencies, and specialists in risk assessment and terrorism (Pressman, 2016). Finally, after an additional review of the literature, the latest new version, the VERA-2-Revised (VERA-2R), appeared in 2015 (RAN, 2021). In addition, in recent years, a shorter version has been created, the Violent Extremism Screening Analysis (VESA) approach (Pressman & Davis, 2022), although there is still no publicly available data on its performance.

The DRAVY (Detection of Violent Radicalization of Jihadist Etiology) was originated in 2018 in Spain (see Fernández, 2019; Nistal-Burón, 2019; Secretaría General de Instituciones Penitenciarias, 2018). Spain is distinguished by a large number of Islamist terrorist arrests, being one of the European countries with the highest levels of Islamist radicalization, and the site of some of Europe’s worst terrorist attacks (e.g., the 2004 Madrid train bombings and the 2017 van and knife attacks in and around Barcelona). By Order PCI/179/2019, on February 22, 2019, the National Strategy against Terrorism (Ministerio del Interior, 2019), approved by the National Security Council, was published. In this plan, special references were made to Penitentiary Centers, urging the Penitentiary Authorities to carry out a follow-up and assessment of convicted and detained persons linked to jihadist oriented terrorist acts, as well as of those individuals involved during their stay in prison in violent extremist recruitment or indoctrination. The first version of the DRAVY was developed from a review of existing instruments, such as the TRAP-18 (Meloy & Gill, 2016), the VERA-2 (Pressman and Flockton, 2010), the ERG 22+ (Lloyd & Dean, 2015), and the Multi-Level Guidelines (MLG; Cook, 2014), and it was tested three times over a period of six months between each application (Loinaz, 2019). To overcome some of its limitations (e.g., poor predictive capacity and problems linked to the definition of risk factors), and based on previous analyses and a review of the literature, the indicators were reformulated and some others were included (González-Álvarez et al., 2021). In this second version, with the aim of reducing subjectivity, the DRAVY-2 became a more actuarial instrument (addition of weighted indicators and establishment of cut-off points) than a clinical judgement instrument. Finally, in 2022, the third version, the DRAVY-3, appeared based on the inclusion of new indicators from research carried out in prisons (Gómez et al., 2021; Gómez, Atran, et al., 2022), the suggestions of former radicals who now help combat violent Islamic radicalization, and a detailed analysis of the results of previous applications (González-Álvarez et al., 2022).

Because both tools have several versions, to evaluate and compare the dimensions and indicators we focus on the most recent versions: VERA-2R (Pressman et al., 2016) and DRAVY-3 (González-Álvarez et al., 2022). On the one hand, the dimensions are the theoretical constructs into which the indicators are grouped, which are the descriptions of the characteristics to be evaluated. On the other hand, the indicators are the specific factors that increase or decrease the risk and whose presence must be evaluated to determine the overall risk.

The VERA-2R has 34 indicators organized in five dimensions (Pressman et al., 2016; Pressman & Flockton, 2014). The first dimension, with seven indicators, refers to beliefs, attitudes, and ideology; perceived grievances and injustices; identification of causes or persons responsible for grievances; moral emotions; alienation; the individual’s relationship with the laws and norms of the state; and affiliation with an extremist group (Pressman et al., 2016). The second dimension is focused on social context and intentions and presents seven indicators related to the conscious objective for using violence to support an ideology, and to the cultural and social contexts, such as preferences, personal contacts, family, and friends, which may serve to encourage the actual use of violence to achieve ideological objectives (Pressman et al., 2016). The third dimension is dedicated to history, action, and capacity, and contains six indicators. It is focused on individual’s ability to plan and carry out a violent extremist attack. These include a criminal or violent past, the training that an individual has received, access to the people, resources, and materials needed to commit an attack (Pressman et al., 2016). The fourth dimension corresponds to different commitment and motivations at the individual level and includes eight indicators (Pressman et al., 2016). The fifth dimension includes six protective and risk-mitigating indicators. Furthermore, the VERA-2R includes 31 additional indicators organized in five dimensions: criminal history, personal history, radicalization, personality traits, and psychiatric characteristics (Pressman et al., 2016).

The DRAVY-3 is made up of 63 indicators organized in three dimensions (González-Álvarez et al., 2022). The first dimension refers to violence and includes 20 indicators for assessing the tendency toward violence and ease with which the move to action occurs at a given time. This dimension can be subdivided into two subdimensions: general violence, including 13 indicators about the use of violence, insults, threats, self-harm, and non-compliance with rules; and ideological violence, which encompasses 6 indicators that reflect organizational capacity, connections to violent extremism, and manifestations of the use of violence for ideological purposes. These indicators are directly related to violent behavior and underlying intentionality (Nistal-Burón, 2019). The second dimension is focused on personal radicalization and proselytization and includes 34 indicators that reflect the risk of recruiting or coercive behaviors and the risk of personal radicalization. It includes indicators such as lack of tolerance towards non-believers, the tendency to organize collective religious acts, the need for greater personal status, the tendency to isolate, or feelings of indifference towards victims. These indicators are related to recruitment behavior and/or individual radicalization processes (Nistal-Burón, 2019). The third dimension includes 9 indicators of changes in daily routines that constitute dynamic factors to monitor changes in behavior, the latter being absent in the VERA-2R.

After conducting a systematic review of the tools aimed at assessing extremism and radicalization, Scarcella et al. (2016) concluded that the psychometric properties of the instruments were weak and had room for improvement. They also highlighted the lack of validity assessment of the instruments themselves. Since the evaluation made by Scarcella et al. (2016), new instruments have been developed, and more studies have been conducted to validate these tools. However, some of the problems identified are still present, in part due to the limited number of terrorists assessed, the difficulty in accessing to this population, and for obtaining information about the validity of the instruments (Hart et al., 2017). This section summarizes and compares the evidence of reliability and validity that previous studies have found in the different versions of the VERA and the DRAVY.

In this section, we analyze the main limitations and potential areas of improvement identified when comparing the two tools. These limitations are stated in terms of the type of tools they constitute, their generalizability, their starting points in their development, the nature of their indicators and their overlap, and their validity (for a summary see Table 1).

First, the VERA-2R is a structured professional judgment tool and it has some limitations inherent to this type of instruments, such as the amount of time and resources required for its implementation, the need for adequate training, or the subjective part of the final decision (Logan, 2017; Muñoz-Vicente & López-Ossorio, 2016). For instance, probation officers in the Netherlands stopped using the VERA-2R because of capacity problems and lack of information (Sumpter, 2020). The DRAVY-3 is constituted as an actuarial tool, which also has limitations, such as those related to individualization and flexibility, and the sample dependency with which the algorithms are constructed—the so-called “shrinkage” (Hart et al., 2016). In fact, no evidence has been reported regarding the use of the algorithm to predict the risk posed by new users, the weightings of the various indicators are not specified, and it remains unclear how the final score is constructed. As a result, final decisions fall to the evaluators or decision-makers, thereby incorporating the inherent biases of structured professional judgement. An area of improvement relies on an option that seems to be followed by the DRAVY-3, although this is not made explicit. This would consist of using the tool in an actuarial manner to obtain a single score, but relying on expert judgment alongside that score when making a final decision.

Second, the VERA-2R is a standard tool aimed at assessing all cases of radicalization, regardless of ideology, while DRAVY-3 focuses explicitly on the radicalization of jihadist ideology. As a standard tool for all ideologies and contexts, the VERA-2R does not seem to work in some contexts because of their particularities. In this regard, the VERA-2 was attempted to be implemented in Indonesia, but over time, the project began to disintegrate. The instrument, supposedly adapted, was not considered suitable for the context, given its complexity (Sumpter, 2020). Therefore, the DRAVY-3 has the advantage of being created for a specific context with its legal particularities. However, it remains to be seen whether it could be exported to other contexts. First, many of the indicators are specific to jihadist terrorism, making their use for assessing cases involving other ideologies related to terrorism unfeasible. Second, the tool is designed to assess the risk posed by individuals convicted of terrorism-related offenses, potential proselytizers, and vulnerable individuals, based on the needs of the Spanish prison system. Consequently, its use in other countries would only be feasible in prison systems with similar management structures—specifically, those that manage terrorist inmates using a segregation-dispersion model in which inmates are concentrated in a few facilities but are not mixed with the general prison population due to the level of isolation (Lobato & García-Coll, 2022)—and in which both proselytism and vulnerable individuals are considered relevant targets for intervention (Marrero & Berdún-Carrión, 2021). Moreover, the DRAVY-3 not only seeks to assess the risk of individuals involved in terrorism, such as the VERA-2R, but also to assess cases of proselytizing and individuals vulnerable to radicalization. This breadth of vision generates a problem related to the definition of the hazard (Herrington & Roberts, 2012; Roberts & Horgan, 2008). It is not clear which hazard is to be assessed, whether it is recidivism (using dangerousness as a proxy), the beginning of a radicalization process, or vulnerability to recruitment. Moreover, these dimensions do not conform to these hazard classifications.

Third, although it does not conform to a specific theory, the VERA-2R’s dimensions are based on a more theoretical conception (Monahan, 2012). Herzog-Evans (2018) emphasized that the VERA’s dimensions resemble engagement, intent, and capability, which fits the theory of reasoned action explaining the relationship between attitudes and behaviors (Ajzen & Fishbein, 2005). Therefore, we can say that its dimensions are theory-driven. In contrast, the DRAVY-3’s dimensions appear to arise from the legal and prison system that distinguishes between prisoners of terrorist offenses, proselytizers, and individuals vulnerable to radicalization. Although some indicators are supported by research and align with certain theories (e.g., the identity fusion theory; Gómez, Atran, et al., 2022), the dimensions do not conform to any single theoretical framework a priori. Instead, they appear to combine indicators from different theories. Therefore, we can say that the dimensions are legally-driven. This distinction ties with what was previously mentioned regarding the difficulty of using a standard or theory-driven tool in a specific context, and the difficulty of exporting a contextual or legally-driven tool.

Fourth, a shared limitation lies in the combination of dynamic and static risk indicators. Although static indicators can be useful in assessing the vulnerability of individuals to radicalization, they will not undergo variations, so their usefulness in detecting changes or the effect of an intervention will be limited (Douglas & Skeem, 2005). Both tools include both types of risk indicators. In the case of the VERA-2R, static indicators are grouped mainly in the dimension of history, action, and capacity. In the case of the DRAVY-3, they are found in the dimension of violence, although they are mixed with dynamic indicators and not restricted to a single subdimension. While static indicators are easier to assess and require fewer inferences, dynamic indicators are more useful for prediction. However, they typically require ongoing assessments over time and demand greater inferential judgment from evaluators, thereby increasing the risk of error (Muñoz-Vicente & López-Ossorio, 2016). A useful approach for both tools is to explicitly distinguish between these static and dynamic indicators, establish different dimensions for them, and evaluate their usefulness in terms of classification and prediction. In this regard, the DRAVY-3 incorporates daily routine indicators that could be added to the VERA-2R, although no evidence is provided on their validity, and their relationship with the other dimensions is not clear.

Fifth, the analyses revealed that, broadly, half of the indicators of both tools overlapped. A priori, such overlap may appear desirable as it provides convergent validity and could suggest that these indicators are essential for assessing risk regardless of the context. However, the overlap could also be seen as problematic given that the DRAVY was developed with reference to the VERA-2, among other tools, and adopted some of its indicators (Loinaz, 2019). In this regard, the predictive validity analysis of the DRAVY-3 showed that many of the overlapping indicators with the VERA-2R were of limited utility, particularly those located within the tendency toward violence dimension (González-Álvarez et al., 2022). Therefore, while referencing other tools during the development of an assessment tool can be useful, it is advisable—over time and based on empirical evidence—to revisit the initial assumptions made about certain indicators and eliminating those that are not useful. From an opposing perspective, considering the indicators that do not overlap, they offer the possibility of including new indicators in both tools to improve them. The VERA-2R would benefit from the inclusion of indicators related to specific behaviors within the prison. Likewise, it would be advisable to integrate some dimensions with specific indicators of behavior associated with the ideology related to terrorism; for this, some of the DRAVY-3 indicators would be useful in the case of jihadism. An update with indicators from the latest research could also improve this tool (e.g., Gómez, Atran, et al., 2022). In turn, the DRAVY-3 could include more indicators regarding past use of violence and weapons training, although this would have an impact on the increase in static risk factors. Further-more, the greatest contribution would be in the motivational aspect, that is, the inclusion of new indicators to assess different motivations related to radicalization. Finally, a major shortcoming is the lack of protection indicators. Although the VERA-2R includes some, it is desirable to create better evidence-based indicators that are not just reverse indicators (e.g., Wolfowicz et al., 2021). This shortcoming may lead to an overestimation of risk which, combined with the predominance of static indicators, could hinder the detection of progress in users.

Sixth, although several investigations have evaluated the psychometric properties of both tools, there is room for improvement (Lloyd, 2019). The indicators need to be refined to improve internal reliability. Regarding construct and convergent validity, one of the main criticisms focuses on the fact that neither the credentials nor the number of experts involved in such a process is detailed (Herzog-Evans, 2018). Therefore, a more transparent validation procedure is required, at least in the case of the VERA-2R. Similarly, although both tools indicate that they can and have been applied to women, they are not adapted in either case (Loinaz, 2016). Neither tool has identified the specific underlying processes that explain female radicalization (Gómez, Chiclana, et al., 2022), so they probably lack content validity in this respect. In addition, in the case of the DRAVY-3, dimensionality has been analyzed with the dimensions separately, so it would be interesting to analyze them as a whole. Moreover, although our investigation provides some evidence of convergent validity, more studies using other tools are needed. The same is true for divergent validity, which, in the case of the DRAVY-3, has no evidence. In terms of predictive validity, the VERA-2R needs new studies to explore this type of validity, the DRAVY-3 requires new studies using other samples to test whether the indicators intended for this purpose still maintain sensitivity and specificity (van der Heide et al., 2019), and both need to demonstrate that changes in the indicators are associated with changes in risk (Wilson et al., 2013). Additionally, the case of DRAVY presents other issues related to the dependent variable of dangerousness. On the one hand, dangerousness and recidivism are not the same, so it could be argued that the predictive validity of the tool concerning recidivism has not been tested, leaving it unclear whether this is an intended objective of the tool (Teijón-Alcalá, 2023). On the other hand, the fact that the same prison experts who created the dangerousness classification were also the ones using the tool to assess the same individuals increases the likelihood of good predictive validity, suggesting that a significant bias may underlie these results (Teijón-Alcalá, 2023). These issues with predictive validity are critical, as inaccurate risk classification may lead to false positives, resulting in the stigmatisation of inmates, and false negatives, which may underestimate the actual risk (see, for instance, the case of Usman Khan; Weeks, 2021).

Last, unlike other tools created from criminology (e.g., Andrews & Bonta, 2016), the VERA-2R and the DRAVY-3 are not linked to a treatment plan (Herzog-Evans, 2018; Logan & Sellers, 2021). In other words, there are no specific measures or programs recommended depending on the level of risk, which could affect penitentiary decisions regarding these inmates, as such decisions may be influenced by biases with limited grounding in empirical evidence. This would be a costly but critical step that would provide a quantum leap for these tools.

The VERA-2R and the DRAVY-3 are tools for assessing violent extremism in the prison context. In the present study, we conducted a systematic evaluation comparing their development, characteristics, structure, overlap of their indicators, reliability, and validity. This comparison highlighted that both tools, despite being intended for use in the prison context, present severe differences. On the one hand, the VERA-2R is a structured professional judgment designed to assess the risk of violent acts by individuals involved in terrorist activities regardless of their ideology. On the other hand, the DRAVY-3 is an actuarial tool aimed at assessing and predicting the risk of violence, proselytizing, and vulnerability to being recruited, and therefore its target population are individuals who have engaged in terrorist activities, who proselytize, and who are vulnerable to recruitment inside the jihadist spectrum.

Regarding their structure and indicators, the VERA-2R maintains theory-driven dimensions and its indicators differ from the DRAVY-3 in that they include aspects of early exposure to violence and training, and different motivations. For its part, the DRAVY-3’s dimensions are legally-driven (in compliance with prison regulations) and include indicators not present in the VERA-2R related to behavior inside the prison, acts of proselytization, and behaviors related to jihadist ideology. With respect to the evidence of reliability and validity, both present acceptable reliability and content and construct validity. However, there is no evidence of convergent and divergent validity for the DRAVY-3, while there is in the VERA-2R; and the DRAVY-3 does present predictive validity (with some concerns) unlike the VERA-2R.

In addition, we outlined some of the main limitations of both tools. Broadly, the VERA-2R presents limitations when using it in a specific context when trying to evaluate different ideologies, while the DRAVY-3 is a contextual tool that would present problems if it were used in another context. Likewise, both tools combine static and dynamic indicators, so they are limited in detecting changes and effects of possible interventions.

Among the contributions of this investigation, we highlight the keys provided that can be useful when updating these tools or developing new ones. First, it is necessary to establish clear objectives and, in the case of multiple objectives, to make it clear which dimensions or indicators evaluate each of the objectives and in which specific population. Second, in order to improve the assessment, it is necessary to adapt the tools to the context. The tools should integrate indicators of specific behaviors in the context, in this case the prison, and related to the ideology. Third, the differences between static and dynamic indicators should be made explicit and determine how each type of indicator influences the final evaluation or in which cases each is more useful. Fourth, the gender perspective must be taken into account. Both tools indicate that they are valid for use with women, but they do not include specific indicators or validity to prove their usefulness in this population. Fifth, the tools should be subjected to more validity tests, preferably with different populations, including control groups, and being conducted by personnel not involved in their development. Also, given that we are talking about a dynamic and contextual phenomenon, the tools should be updated based on these investigations. Sixth, one of the major limitations is the lack of management guidelines or treatments associated with risk. These tools should aim to associate possible interventions or ways of managing risk associated with the results of their application.