For my research essay, I will be discussing how childhood trauma paved the way for a lot of widely known serial killers to begin their murder sprees. Researchers have noted that a lot of the most known serial killers came from childhood trauma. FBI profiler Robert Ressler had interviewed 36 convicted murderers, in the interviews he conducted he found out about the murderers’ histories, motives, as well as their psychological and behavioral characteristics. He found that 40% of the murderers he interviewed were physically beaten or abused, while the other 70% had witnessed abuse growing up.

Psychopathic serial killers differ a lot from serial killers that came from specific traumas, psychopathic murderers have something different in their brain than other ‘normal’ human beings. Their brains have become an interest to neurologists, psychologists and criminologists. And although these types of murders stem mainly from a possible chemical imbalance, what sets them off is childhood trauma. Showing that some of the most notorious people to walk the Earth, became the way they are because they were not given enough care in the most vital years of their life.

Source one: Serial Killers And Childhood Abuse: Is There A Link? | Crime Traveller

Background: This article discusses how serial killers and childhood abuse correlate heavily with one another. In most cases, they go hand in hand. This article discusses different types of trauma, statistics with trauma and murders, and even some information about books written and how the authors got the information needed to write the books through interviews with murderers or heavy research.

How I intend to use it: I intend to use this article to back up my hypothesis and how that a lot of serial killers become serial killers because of their childhood trauma. Although this is not always the only reason or a reason at all, a lot of the time it is a factor that does heavily influence their actions. I will use the statistics to help show the audience that there is a difference between the general population and the serial killer population when it comes to psychological abuse. The normal population shows 2% and the serial killer population shows 50%.

Source two: The Mind of a Psychopath: The Psychopathic Killer | Crime Traveller

Background: This article goes more in depth about what a psychopath really is, characteristics of a psychopath and also some examples of well known murderers who are classified as psychopaths. It includes paragraphs about childhood abuse, genetics, brain scans, and a little bit about nature vs. nurture.

How I intend to use it: I am going to use this article to help describe and go more in depth about the difference about psychopathic murderers and their childhood trauma vs regular murderers and their childhood trauma. This helps me prove my hypothesis, which states that almost all murderers have stemmed from childhood trauma, even if their actions also had to do with mental illness and genetics.

Source three: From Abused Child to Serial Killer: Investigating Nature vs Nurture in Methods of Murder – Psychiatry Advisor

Background: This article shows that not all abused children become serial killers, and not all serial killers are victims of childhood abuse. However, the connection between the two cannot be dismissed as just coincidence. It also decodes the criminal mind and gives little statistics.

How I intend to use it: I intend to use this article to describe how nature vs nurture can influence how a child grows up, even if they become a murderer or not. I obviously will use it more to help me explain how nature and nurture can influence a child to commit this horrible crime, but I will also show that not ALL children of abuse grow up to be murderers.

Source four: Manson, Wuornos, Ramirez: 3 Famous Killers with Exceptionally Screwed-Up Childhoods – A&E True Crime (aetv.com)

Background: This article points out 3 known murderers and each of their childhood traumas. It describes specifically how each one of them grew up and the abuse they endured at a young age.

How I intend to use it: I will use this source to show some real examples of serial killers and their sad pasts to again, prove my hypothesis. I also think it is also interesting to hear some real stories of murderers and their childhood rather than all statistics and articles talking about how they correlate and not showing real experiences.

Source five: The Dark Psychology of Serial Killers: Unpacking the Factors Behind their Brutal Behaviour | Psychreg

Background: This article touches on child abuse but also the other things that go hand in hand with child abuse that are other influences for murderers to do what they do. This can include something psychologically wrong with them like stated above, social and environmental factors, and also some health studies.

How I intend to use it: I will use this article to help break up all of the child abuse talk and also include some other factors that can enhance the PTSD from the child abuse, so I am steering off track just enough to talk about something else, but it still all ties back to abuse in the home. Reading further into the article I discovered that it also contains mental disorders that can be caused by abuse encountered at a young age, I will go into detail about the different mental disorders, how they affect an individual and how it will higher the probability of one becoming a serial killer.

Possible topic for smaller papers:

Definition/Classification argument: Discuss how psychopathic murderers and murderers that stem from childhood trauma are similar to one another, despite heavy differences

Cause/Effect argument: The cause would be genetics or child abuse; the effect would be how both of those things lead up to those people becoming serial killers. More specifically, how genetics and abuse go hand in hand to create a murderer.

Rebuttal: Statistics and research from the article proving that although psychopathic murders are different than murderers who just stem from childhood trauma, they all led up to the same point, and there is one similar underlying factor that got them there, and that is trauma. 

Current state of research paper:

I really like where I am with this hypothesis and this research paper compared to my first one. I am a lot more interested in this topic and I think it would be more interesting to read. I just need to get approval that this is a good hypothesis to use in a research paper! I think that this is a little bit less repetitive than my first hypothesis because there are different murderers I can look into specifically, I can also research more statistics because this also involves some information pertaining to the medical field. Overall, I think I like this hypothesis better than the first!

Source six: These Are The 4 Types Of Serial Killers (grunge.com)

Background: This article describes the basics of the four different types of serial killers, and what drives them to murder other human beings. This article also gives examples of murderers and what drove them to commit the murders they did. This article is short but it is a good jump start to the base of what I want my definition argument to be about, I intent to find more articles that go into more depth about the different types.

How I intend to use it: I will use this when re-writing my definition argument to describe “the perfect childhood on raising a serial killer.”I will start off with describing the different types of serial killers with examples, then follow up with what could have caused them to fall into one of the four categories of murderer.

Source seven: Visionary Serial Killers Are Driven by Inner Demons | Psychology Today

Background: This article goes a little bit more into depth about what goes on in the mind of a visionary serial killer, and what drove them mentally to become this kind of serial killer. One sentence caught my attention when first skimming the article over: Such individuals are often suffering from either psychoses or some other form of mental illness.” and it reminded me to make sure to include to research what kind of mental illness can lead one to become a visionary murderer.

How I intend to use it: One sentence caught my attention when first skimming the article over: Such individuals are often suffering from either psychoses or some other form of mental illness.” and it reminded me to make sure to include to research what kind of mental illness can lead one to become a visionary murderer. I will use this for one of my paragraphs that goes more in depth about visionary murderers and their past. I will also find another example of a visionary killer to compare it to, just to show the readers an example.

Source eight: Hedonist Lust Killers Must Feed Their Insatiable Hunger | Psychology Today

Background: This article is the same author as the one above discussing visionary serial killers, I like this website because it gets to the point and tells me the perfect amount of information, I need to know to give the audience of my paper a good idea of what to know about the four different types of murders. This article again goes more in depth about the hedonist type of murderer and tells us what drives the murderers to do what they do when they fall under the category of the hedonist lust murderer.

How I intend to use it: This article discusses a lot about fantasy kills and how a lot of the murders were driven by the want for sexual impulse or desire for the perfect lover. They give a lot of detail about how the murderer Jeffery Dahmer was strongly known for this type of murder, and they also give background about specific actions Dahmer and other murders did that got them addicted to this type of murder. This type of murderer is very disturbing.

Source nine: Understanding Pragmatic Mission Killers | Psychology Today

Background: Again, this article delves deeper into pragmatic killers, also known as murderers with a mission. These murderers often believe that when they murder a specific group of people, they will make the world a better place.

How I intend to use it: I again will use this article to help describe 1 out of the 4 different types of murderers. Among these four paragraphs I also intend to include how these specific murderers were raised and to see if different murderers that fall under the same category have the same underlying mental illnesses.

Source ten: Serial Homicide for Power and Control | Psychology Today

Background: The last kind of serial killer that I intend on bringing attention to in my article. This type of killer, murders for a sense of control over their victim or greed/thrill seeking needs. This is the most common type of serial killer, and an example of this would be John Wayne Gacy, one of the other murderers (who will be mentioned in the essay) also committed murders because it made him feel like a “God.”

How I intend to use it: Lastly, I intend to use this article just like the other three, to describe in simple yet detailed terms kind of murderer this is and to give examples of how they fall under that category, what childhood circumstances caused them to end up there and an example of a murderer as well as their actions.

Source eleven: Ted Bundy | Biography, Crimes, Death, & Facts | Britannica

Background: This article states a lot about Ted Bundy’s murder cases as well as a little bit of information about his childhood and how he was as a person.

How I intend to use it: I intend to use this just to add on to the examples used in other articles for more backup information and to add in some more facts and details about Bundy and his history as a child.

Source twelve: David Berkowitz – Wikipedia

Background: This article talks a lot about Berkowitz and his family life, how he was adopted and how he found out the reasoning of why he was put up for adoption and what it did to him mentally that causes people to think that is the start of why he started to commit murders.
How I intend to use it: I intend to use this just to add on to the examples used in other articles for more backup information and to add in some more facts and details about Berkowitz and his history as a child.

Source thirteen: Jeffrey Dahmer’s Childhood: A Pail of Animal Bones Was His Toy Rattle – A&E True Crime (aetv.com)

Background: This article discusses a lot about what Dahmer did as a child when it came to dissecting road kill and finding an uneasy interest in the organs of humans as well as animals. It also discusses how he himself used to think from a young age and how most of it was about killing living things.Mainly a lot about his childhood and mental state.

How I intend to use it: I intend to use this just to add on to the examples used in other articles for more backup information and to add in some more facts and details about Dahmer and his history as a child.

Source fourteen: Did Jeffrey Dahmer Have Seizures? Did Jeffrey Dahmer Have AIDS? (thecinemaholic.com)

Background: I am focusing mainly on one paragraph in this article that focuses on his behavior in school and why he acted the way he did. It also focus’s a little bit on his experiences with being bullied.

How I intend to use it: I intend to use this to elaborate on the trouble in Dahmer’s childhood.

Source fifteen: The Truth About the Serial Killer Gene – SQ Online (ucsd.edu)

Background: This article talks a lot about certain chemical imbalances and how they lead to shy and awkward tendencies or serial killer tendencies, whichcan either save or take a life depending on which way it leans. This article also tries to say that childhood abuse does not

How I intend to use it: I personally really loved this article and thought that the opening was funny and intriguing, making me feel bad to completely take out the authors knees when using it in my rebuttal. This article talks a lot about the genetic aspect that makes serial killers, well serial killers. But they also mention the fact that childhood trauma plays a part but does not at all justify behavior. And I intend to prove that wrong.

Source sixteen: Did an Abusive Childhood Turn Albert DeSalvo Into the ‘Boston Strangler’ Serial Killer? – A&E True Crime (aetv.com)

Background: This article discusses murderer Albert DeSalvo and his story as a murderer and about his childhood. It discusses if an abusive childhood turned him into the person who is known to be the Boston Strangler.

How I intend to use it: In the article it says that child abuse cannot be the only thing that drives one to become a serial killer, the article states there has to be neurological damage done by injury or drugs to lead allow a murderer to stem from an abusive childhood, which I believe I can prove wrong in my rebuttal.

Source seventeen: Carl Panzram – Wikipedia

Background: This website gives insight about Carl Panzram, his childhood, and his murders.

How I intend to use it: I intend to use this murderer and his childhood and proof of no drug use to respectfully, take out my opponents’ knees when it comes to proving that in order for childhood abuse to have an effect on a serial killer, there does not have to be neurological damage done by drugs or lead exposure.

Source eighteen: The Tragic Story of a Boy who was Abused and Became a Monster | by Sam H Arnold | CrimeBeat | Medium

Background: This website gives insight about Carl Panzram, his childhood, and his murders.

How I intend to use it: I intend to use this murderer and his childhood and proof of no drug use to respectfully, take out my opponents’ knees when it comes to proving that in order for childhood abuse to have an effect on a serial killer, there does not have to be neurological damage done by drugs or lead exposure. But mainly I will be using this article to expand on the kind of childhood Carl Panzram had.