The impact of adaptive functioning on juveniles' competence to stand trial and competence to waive Miranda rights

A study was conducted to examine the relation between a youth's level of adaptive functioning and his or her level of competency to stand trial (CST) and competence to waive Miranda rights (CWM). Competence-related abilities were assessed among 39 youth and adolescents between the ages of 8-16. Participants from the local community were administered Grisso's Instruments for Assessing Understanding and Appreciation of Miranda Rights (Miranda Instruments) as a measure of CWM and the MacArthur Competence Assessment Tool - Criminal Adjudication (MacCAT-CA) as a measure of CST. A parent or guardian completed the Adaptive Behavior Assessment Scale-II (ABAS-II) as a measure of adaptive functioning. No significant relations were found between any of the adaptive functioning variables and the CST abilities. For the Miranda abilities, a number of relations were found for Understanding, including the overall composite scores, the Conceptual domain, and three individual skill areas (i.e., Community-Use, Functional Academics, and Health and Safety). For Appreciation, only the Conceptual domain and two individual skill areas (i.e., Community-Use and Functional Academics) were found to have significance. No skill areas were related to the scales on the MacCAT-CA. ANOVAs conducted to evaluate age group differences indicated that youth ages 14-16 years old performed significantly better than younger participants (8-10, 11-13) for all competence abilities except CST Understanding. Although limited by the small number of participants, this study provides some evidence for relations between a youth's adaptive functioning and his or her level of CWM. Adaptive functioning, however, does not appear to be important to CST.