Friday, December 26, 2014

Knowing what you do about trends and patterns in crime, how would you counteract the assertion that people who commit crime are physically or mentally abnormal? For example, how would you explain the fact that crime is more likely to occur in western and urban areas than in eastern or rural areas? Aside from becoming a criminal, what other career paths are open to psychopaths?

There is a misconception among the public regarding the origins of criminal thought. In previous decades, the general population believed that crimes were committed by those with sociopathic or psychopathic tendencies, whether officially diagnosed by a clinician or not.
However, multiple studies in criminalistics, sociology, and forensic psychology have shown that there are various factors that contribute to criminal acts and trends. For instance, the state of the economy is a major factor in criminal activities. The perpetrators of a crime may not have any mental or physical abnormalities, but rather may be simply desperate for money in order to survive.
The only effective way to combat stereotypes and misconceptions about crime is to educate the public via internet articles, videos, fact-checked blogs, and social media campaigns. Over the past few years, there has been a trend on social media to proliferate education on mental health. If health officials treated criminology as a subgroup of mental health, new avenues to educate the public about the causes of crime could be available.
While studies regarding the trend of crimes more likely occurring in western and urban areas than in eastern or rural areas is still up for debate, urban studies scholars believe that dense populations contribute to the rise of crime. Urban settings themselves aren't a major factor in contributing to crime, but a simple fact of probability: more people means more chances that a larger portion of the population are criminals. Additionally, criminals would be more likely to target high-population areas, like a city, rather than a sparsely populated rural regions. More people means more available victims.
There is a stereotype that all psychopaths are criminals and serial killers. This misconception is due to film, television, and general ignorance. There are many functioning psychopaths who have never committed a crime, nor do they have violent tendencies. While a very small portion of those diagnosed with psychopathy and other mental illnesses do commit crimes, it would be statistically false to generalize all psychopaths as prone to criminal acts. Psychopaths can work in many professions just like anyone else.
http://www.jneuropsychiatry.org/peer-review/misconceptions-regarding-psychopathic-personality-implications-for-clinical-practice-and-research-neuropsychiatry.pdf

https://res.mdpi.com/genealogy/genealogy-01-00008/article_deploy/genealogy-01-00008-v2.pdf?filename=&attachment=1

https://www.vrc.crim.cam.ac.uk/vrcresearch/paperdownload/manuel-eisner-historical-trends-in-violence.pdf

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