Into the Mind of a Criminal Using Criminal Psychology
When a bank is robbed, or a murder is committed, the first question people tend to ask is,
“Why?”. Tragic and unnerving events always come with questions. Luckily, there is a field of
study that specifically looks at the mind of a criminal: criminal psychology. Criminal
psychologists delve deeper into the understanding of why criminals do what they do, their
environment growing up, their biological factors, such as their brain and family history, and use
profiling to describe uncaught perpetrators.
Criminal psychology is defined as understanding the behavior of criminals through, “(a)
the ethical and humane application of systemic empirical methods of investigation, and (b) the
construction of rational explanatory systems,” (Andrews 4). Psychologists use assessments and
test to look deeper into the intentions and thought process of an individual who has committed a
crime, not only from a moral standing, but also a scientific standing.
One example of how science is used in criminal psychology is through brain scans, such
as an MRI, shows an image of soft tissue and bones, and fMRI, shows the brain while it is
functioning. A study was conducted in a medium-security prison in Wisconsin, conducted by
Professor Joseph Newman. In this study, the brains of 20 inmates who had been diagnosed with
psychopathy were compared with 20 other prisoners who also committed similar crimes, but
these inmates did not have the psychopathy diagnosis.
The results showed “less coordinated activity between [two particular parts of the brain],
the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and the amygdala,” (“Psychopaths’ Brains Show Differences
in Structure and Function.”). The ventromedial prefrontal cortex is responsible for emotional
response and decision making, and the amygdala process fear and anxiety. The study conducted
by the University of Wisconsin-Madison proves that the reasoning behind the activities of
criminals, in this case, psychopaths, goes far beyond childhood trauma and situational issues. It
goes into biology and the makeup of the human body.
In studying individuals with antisocial behavior (abnormal hostility, aggression, or
violence), a pattern was noticed among families. Those who had antisocial behaviors also tended
to have family members with the same abnormal antisocial behaviors. This connection led
researchers to believe that antisocial behavior might be genetically linked. Other studies were
conducted on children with a family history of antisocial behavior who were adopted by families
who did not have the history of antisocial behavior. The study determined that children with the
antisocial background were likely to form those behaviors, but it also showed that environment
played a major role (Morley et al).
