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Research On Serial Killers Minds Serial Killers Are
They point out that one in six serial killers are female. This misconception, the psychologists warn, is a “deadly mistake”. Famous serial killers such as Ted Bundy. The serial killer, rather than being a creature of complete and unutterable evil, as Geberth (1992) wouldFurthermore, though serial killers like Charles Manson were abused and neglected as children, the list of serial killers with a normal childhood is long. By this time, there are no remaining internal forces that will stop the serial killer’s actions. All serial killers follow this pattern, increasing the - fre quency of their killings (US Congress, 1984).
The women had an average age of 32 at the time of their first killing, and poisoning was the most common method. Their victims are of both sexes, but disproportionately male. The researchers used the murderpedia.org website to identify these killers and they verified the cases they found using reputable news sources.The female serial killers had murdered between them at least 331 victims (making an average of 6 victims each).
Nonetheless, Harrison and her team highlight several noticeable patterns in the data: a greater proportion of the women, as compared with the general population, had: a history of having been physically or sexually abused drug or alcohol problems and a diagnosis or signs of mental illness.Quotes from some of the killers hint at their psychopathological thinking:“They bothered me, so I decided to kill them.”“I like to attend funerals. Apart from anything else, the historical records are incomplete and the absence of information does not mean that a given factor was not contributory. The next most common motive was “power-seeking”, which includes killing people in one’s care.The researchers urge caution regarding the factors that contributed to these women becoming serial killers. They tended to be above average in physical attractiveness, which may have helped to engender trust in their victims.As to motives, the most common was “hedonistic”, a category in forensic psychology that refers to killing for financial gain, lust or thrill, with nearly half the sample fitting this category.
However, it makes a valuable contribution to a neglected topic.The researchers concluded: “Increasing our understanding of serial killers may minimise the number of victims potentially lost in the future while maximising the effectiveness of interventions to prevent vulnerable individuals from taking a killing path.”Harrison, M., Murphy, E., Ho, L., Bowers, T., & Flaherty, C. This study has obvious limitations, most obviously the reliance on historical records and news reports, and its exclusive focus on US killers. “However,” they added, “although an evolutionary framework can offer understanding, we stress that these heinous acts are a vicious extension of unconscious drives and are not therefore ‘normal’ or ‘excused’ … “.The new analysis points to a worrying trend: a 150 per cent increase in the number of reported cases of female serial killers since 1975. This follows evolutionary theory, Harrison and her co-authors explained, in the sense that men are said to be motivated more by seeking multiple sexual opportunities, while women are motivated to find a committed partner with sufficient resources. But overall, the researchers highlighted how the women in their study primarily killed for resources, while their male counterparts kill for sex. Two exceptions were a female serial killer who was a rapist, and another who reportedly barked like a dog during sex.
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