| |
| author |
Jamie Smith
| | title |
"A taste for killing" versus "Abusive, traumatic childhoods":
People's beliefs about the influence of nature and nurture in heinous, violent crimes
| | abstract |
The purpose of this study was to examine people's beliefs about whether nature, nurture,
or an interaction of both influence someone to commit heinous, violent crimes such as serial
killing and mass shootings. Scientific data suggest nature and nurture interactively influence
whether someone becomes a violent criminal. I hypothesized that nature would be more
prevalent than nurture in people's beliefs in what influences someone to become a violent
criminal, and that this would be consistent for both serial killers and mass shooters. Participants
(N=233) answered an online questionnaire that included both open-ended and closed-ended
questions measuring their beliefs about the influences on violent criminals. Results indicated that
in the open-ended responses, participants mentioned nature-related explanations more than
nurture-related explanations. However, in the close-ended questions, the opposite pattern was
observed as participants endorsed nurture-related explanations more than nature-related
explanations. In sum, people's beliefs about what influences a violent criminal is more one-sided
than an interaction between nature and nurture. Thus, this finding contradicts what has been
found through scientific data and the literature that nature and nurture affect each other to
produce someone's behavior.
| | school |
The College of Liberal Arts, Drew University
| | degree |
B.A. (2024)
|
| advisor |
Scott Morgan
|
| full text | JSmith.pdf |
| |
