Scientific American Psychopath Analysis

Mass murder is defined by the FBI as the killing of three or more people in a single event or in the same day (Petersen & Farrington, 2007). Mass murderers are complex and can be examined by the many factors that regularly appear among them, such as violence precipitating events, weapon of choice, and mental illnesses. The motivations and methods for committing mass murder are easily broken down into specific groups, and through the examination of these definitions and specific cases there is much to learn about the mind of a mass murderer.

In our readings, we Define Visionary serial killers as someone who commits incomprehensible active serial fatal victimization. We described the crime scene as chaotic.

According to studies led by King’s College researchers, it has been confirmed that “psychopathy is a distinct subgroup of antisocial personality disorder (ASPD)” (Gregory et. al n.p) and similarly to psychopathy, the more severe ASPD behavioral patterns are, the symptoms can be referred to as sociopathic or psychopathic. Furthermore, according to Nigel Blackwood, Ma, MD.MRCPsych, “MRI scans...found that psychopaths had structural brain abnormalities in key areas of their ‘social brains’” (Gregory et. al n.p). The areas of the brain, in which are deficient in psychopaths, are important when comprehending an individual emotions’, intentions, and moral

Homicide always will be an aspect of life, whether it is in the 16th century, 21st century or in the future. At times of extreme stress, people may turn to murder as an outlet of a greater problem they cannot fix or control. Presently, homicide has a greater value in society due to popular culture references through the media such as television, film and writing; society constantly has homicide and murder in the subconscious. In David M. Buss’ findings in The Murderer Next Door: Why the Mind is Designed to Kill,

Mass murderers are a diverse group of people. They are a danger to society and it is important to understand the wide variability among these people. The kinds of mass murderers revolve around two central types that branch off to several subtypes. The profile of a mass murderer generally contains a specific set of traits. These people are often driven by one of a series of different motives. In order to achieve their goals, mass murderers have plenty of different methods and weapons at their disposal. Inevitably, the discussion of punishment always ensues when the subject of dangerously destructive killers arises. The study of mass murderers is one that requires analyzing and profiling all of the components that make up a killer, from

Serial murder crime though rare, is not a a new phenomenon. This crime has been committed for centuries and will continue to be a crime that is committed throughout the world. It is unfortunate and scary that this is probably one of the most serious of crimes that cannot be prevented. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, serial murderers commit their crimes because they want to. Rehabilitation is not obtainable for serial killers due to their inability for remorse and empathy, or to see people as people and not objects(Knight 2006). This research paper will focus primarily on serial murder within the U.S. First and foremost, a legal definition provided by the U.S. Department of Justice will be presented to set forth the discussion of this research paper. As follows will be a detailed discussion explaining serial killer typologies with the use of examples of known serial killers in the U.S. Types of serial killers are: power oriented, mission oriented, visionary, and hedonistic, each typology will be clearly defined and explained. Some serial killers can have a mixture of each typology’s characteristic. Serial killers that will be discussed and used as examples to represent the content of this research paper will be, John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy, Robert Berdella, Jeffery Dahmer, and lastly the most prolific serial killer in American history, Gary Ridgeway. Problems with studying serial killing, are that because of rarity and access. Most of what we think

A serial killer is traditional defined as the separate killings of three or more people by an individual over a certain period of time, usually with breaks between the murders. (Angela Pilson, p. 2, 2011) This definition has been accepted by both the police and academics and therefore provides a useful frame of reference (Kevin Haggerty, p.1, 2009). The paper will seek to provide the readers with an explanation of how serial killers came to be and how they are portrayed in the media.

Throughout history, serial killers and murderers have received a significant number of news articles dedicated to them and have attracted audiences all around the world; however, the question that nobody can seem to answer is, “Why?” What causes people to grow up with the desire to kill and what can we do to prevent others from becoming serial killers in the future? “All serial killers are murderers, but not all murderers are serial killers,” as stated on The Undergraduate Times. A serial murder is defined by Encyclopedia Britannica as “the unlawful homicide of at least two people, carried out in a series over a period of time,” while mass murder is the

Psychopathy and Sociopathy have become interchangeable, even though the diction of each can greatly affect a sense of concern to a person. The word psychopath is normally pared with the word killer, making it seem more serious than sociopath.The definition of sociopath is “a person with a personality disorder manifesting itself in extreme antisocial attitudes and behavior and a lack of conscience.’ where the definition of a psychopath is a person with a psychopathic personality, which manifests as a moral and antisocial behavior, lack of ability to love or establish meaningful personal relationships, extreme egocentricity, failure to learn from experience, etc.” These kinds of people are normally viewed as extremely violent and are mostly in prison, but “Roughly one in 25 Americans is a sociopath,” according to Harvard psychologist Dr. Martha Stout, author of The Sociopath Next Door. The thought that someone you see every single day, could be a sociopath is staggering, and once learning more about it, and why it is caused, you can them know how to react in an appropriate manner.

The idea of serial killers and the role they play in our lives has fascinated people since the cases of Jack the Ripper and H.H. Holmes, although serial murderers existed before them. The infamous and mysterious complexities of these cases have puzzled and terrified people for over a century. Perhaps due to the deviant and taboo nature of serial killings, people in our society and others have tried to attribute many reasons for why they occur. In this search for answers, one major scope has been widely left out of the research: the sociological imagination. It is through this method of understanding that I will attempt to explain the development of serial killers and apply theories that explain the frequency of serial killings in our society.

The concept of psychopathy originated in the 1800s to describe individuals that consistently failed to conform to societal norms and exhibited antisocial behavior that did not fit the concept of mental illness of the time period. While, psychopathy was a common term used to describe individuals suffering from this disorder other descriptions were coined such as “Pinel’s term “manie sans delvie” meaning mania without delirium in the 1700s, to describe patents whose ‘affective faculties were disordered’” or Pritchard’s term “moral insanity” (Ogloff 520). In the 1930’s Partridge argued that psychopathy was a social rather than a mental disorder and proposed that the concept of sociopathy be introduced as a more accurate description. The American Psychological Association adopted Partridge’s term for their Diagnostic and Statistical Manuel in 1952. However, in 1968 the American Psychological Association changed the diagnostic label from sociopath to “personality disorder, antisocial” for the Diagnostic and Statistical Manuel – II that continued through to the DSM - III in 1980 and the DSM - III-R in 1987 and the DSM - IV in 1994. Today the Diagnostic and Statistical Manuel categorizes antisocial personality disorder as a personality disorder and it is named as such. Unfortunately, not much research has been conducted

Of all the psychiatric disorders, none are more chilling to the world then the psychopaths and sociopaths. These two disorders, categorized as antisocial personality disorders, bring about the absolute worse people and killers that the world has ever known. The infamous serial killers, the people who do the unimaginable, were all psychopaths. The ability of these people to do what they do and know that what they are doing is wrong, is perhaps one of the most chilling and shocking characteristic of these people. Psychopaths and sociopaths are very often thought by most to be the same disorder, yet they are different when classified by many psychiatric researchers. The people classified as psychopaths and sociopaths are separated by one main difference, and that is if they were born with a lack of the ability to empathize or if they were affected as children in a traumatic environment. Although both of these horrible disorders derive from a different area, the reality is that they are unpredictable, undetectable and most importantly, they can be very dangerous.

The following typology of mass murderers was presented by Turvey (2008:510). The types were grouped according to the variables of motivation, crime scene types, and victim selection by Fox and Levin (2005), who used the five categories of power, revenge, loyalty, terror, and profit.

The legal definition of a serial murder, as defined by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)(Morton & Hilts, Eds., 2006), in 2005 is, “[t]he unlawful killing of two or more victims by the same offender(s), in separate events" (p. 9). However, numerous people debate over the definition, including this researcher, because it lacks a cool-down period in between murders, which numerous professionals believe is necessary for serial killer status. The cool-down period is a short to extended amount of time between murders. This is what differentiates them from other killers such as mass murderers and spree killers. Despite this disagreement, serial killers remain a rare phenomenon. The FBI (2006) states, serial murder accounts for under one percent of the killings a year. Nevertheless, throughout the years, countless people have

When you hear the words sociopath or psychopath you usually know right away that the person with that disorder is a killer and needs to be put away in jail. But have you ever wondered where that disorder comes from. Research shows that psychopath tends to be the result of genetics. Studies have shown that a psychopath usually has an underdeveloped brain that is responsible for impulse control and emotions. Sociopathy tends to come from a childhood trauma or some type of physical, emotional abuse, which is why sociopath is more of an environment disorder. When a sociopath commits a murder, it is usually a disorganized event or its rather spontaneous than planned. A sociopath can be really attached to a group or an individual which makes them dangerous because they have no regard for society or its rules. When it comes to the crimes of a psychopath they tend to be planned and they always have a contingency plan in place. Another major difference between a sociopath and a psychopath is that a psychopath is always cool and calm unlike a sociopath. This allows a psychopath to leave few clues when it comes to authorities investigating the crimes. When it comes to society psychopaths are more dangerous than sociopath. The reason for that is that psychopaths have no guilt when it comes to them committing their crimes. When committing a crime, they suffer no emotional repercussions and that allows them to continue with murdering people.