Causal Claim – Water

Posted on March 22, 2023 by Water

You got it wrong

It’s the year 2023 and the idea of people coming out or wanting to be identified as something else other than a man or woman to even transition has increased. It is said that about 5 percent of young adults ages ranging from 18-29 are either transgender or of a different sexual orientation. This means that with changes being made around society, different parties are being created and communities continue to grow in the sex/gender party, but with these changes you have to be careful when identifying one. You don’t want to offend someone by getting either gender wrong or sexual orientation, that’s why facial recognition and the advancement of this tool can not only be threatening towards one identity but it could change a life for the worse.

In Wenying Wu, Pavlos Protopapas and Zheng Yang’s “Gender Classification and Bias Mitigation in Facial Images” study, they thoroughly explain the experiment conducted in 2017 where deep neural networks would be used to detect white male sexuality.This controversial research implied that the facial images of the LGBTQ population had distinct characteristics when compared to the heterosexual groups. They pushed the idea that by misgendering/misidentifying one can increase one’s perception of being socially marginalized. To be misidentified by something like facial recognition or programs of AGRS (Automated Gender Recognition System) not only follows the stigma of there only being two genders, overall reinforcing the gender/sexuality standards.

They saw the programs were faulty and having issues they decided to train a biased binary gender classifier baseline doing so they used sets of different datasets along with ensembling a transfer learning model using logistic regressions and adaboost. The results were shocking, the algorithm has mitigated algorithmic biases from the baseline and the ensemble model achieved a selection rate of 98.46%. The program proved that facial recognition can’t be 100% accurate and will have limitations when trying to guess one’s orientation but it could be worked on and if more can be fed into the database then they would be able to get stronger results.

The most common scenario where facial recognition can be tested to see whether it can be accurate and find someone based on their face/photo would be at a crime scene. Cops use the software and go through surveillance cameras and scan their database of mugshots to pinpoint a prime suspect. Even though that’s an option that could cut down hours of going through evidence it can create more problems by matching the wrong person just because of the lighting of the crime scene or the quality of the picture captured by the surveillance camera. Something like this can put one through trauma when police officers show up at their doorstep and they were innocent the whole time. Misidentification can cause trauma just because the robot assumed the facial features of the suspect.

When you look at facial recognition you have two common errors, false positive and false negative. according to Brian E. Finch’s “Addressing Legitimate ConcernsAbout Government Use of FacialRecognition Technologies” stating “A false negative occurs when an algorithm fails to return a matching image despite being in the defined set…. The rate of false negatives varies greatly among proprietary algorithms.” imagine this happening where officials rely on programs as such and make terrible calls based on what the computer said, this not only opens windows to miscarriages of justice. The other error is known as a false positive, “A “false positive” occurs when the image of one individual is matched to the biometric characteristics of an entirely different person, resulting in a misidentification. The consequences of a false positive in a one-to-many system can be especially serious, including leading to the mistaken arrest of an innocent person based largely, if not entirely, on the misidentification.” What needs to be done so we cant have the same problems when using advanced technology ?

Could the errors of faulty facial recognition softwares be all technological issues or is there a deeper meaning? Halley Sutton did a background check on Police officers in NYC that would tamper with facial recognition to get their criminal. In the paper Halley explains, “The report found that the department was editing photographs and uploading photographs of celebrity look-alikes into the software in order to find suspects.” The case further revealed that “The report also found that police officers edited photographs to make them appear more like a mugshot by replacing facial features with those of a model found during a Google search.” Not only is this unethical but it’s also unlawful to do something like this. imagine being photoshopped to look like a criminal and to also find out the officers used unreliable references to make the search more accurate. The worst part is yet to come, even if you get misidentified by facial recognition and you get in trouble, there is no possible way to be helped.

In a text from Kaitlin Jackson from the NACDL it is said, “The police could rely on a psychic, take tips from unreliable informants, or pull photos out of mug shot books at random. All of those methods would pass constitutional muster because a defendant has no legal right to keep his likeness out of an identification procedure.” If you were to go to court due to a misidentification then you would simply start off. with a disadvantage because according to the law anything the officers conclude are weighed more than your word.

The procedure to testify against this is would be much of a hassle for not only the person’s sake but for the case of the crime. The procedure goes along the lines of, “the court would need to test the scientific validity of FRS at a hearing. At the end of the hearing, if the court found FRS to be scientifically reliable, then the eyewitness identification should be admitted…. the outcome of the hearing might be that FRS is unreliable. If FRS frequently selects look-alikes instead of the true perpetrator, then a real danger of misidentification exists in presenting those look-alikes to human eyewitnesses for identification. In that scenario, the remedy the defense should seek is suppression of the eyewitness identification because the risk of misidentification is so great.” there’s so many thing to follow up when put in this situation, first you get misidentified by faulty technology with lack of data, then you get wrongful put in jail, get sent to court to appeal and regain innocence, but doing so you have to comply with all the procedures to prove you weren’t there at the crime scene. We should not rely on technology that’s recently been introduced to the fields, and if they are being added then they should be filled with information and not just picture of the same people with similar features and to have a category identifying different orientations. 

References

Wu W, Protopapas P, Yang Z, Michalatos P. | Gender Classification and Bias Mitigation in Facial Recognition | Published online July 06, 2020

Brian E.Finch | Addressing Legitimate ConcernsAbout Government Use of FacialRecognition Technologies | Published October 30, 2020 | Via The Heritage Foundation

Halley Sutton | Report finds department abused facial recognition software | published 2019 | Wiley Periodicals, Inc., A Wiley Company

Kaitlin Jackson | Challenging Facial Recognition Software in Criminal Court | July 2019 | provided by NACDL

Posted in Causal Argument, Portfolio WaterDrop, Waterdrop | Leave a comment

Causal Rewrite – Oatmealvibes

Posted on March 21, 2023 by oatmealvibes

Violent Video Games Do Not Equal Aggression and Violence

It’s a common misconception that violent video games such as Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto cause aggressive, sociopathic, or violent kids based on misleading and poorly done studies. There are many reasons why a child may be aggressive or become violent that do not link violent video games as the main perpetrator or have any causation at all. Mental health and social factors are key aspects when it comes to violence that would help explain why children who have aggression problems may be more attracted to games that contain violence.

To elaborate, aggression is a subset state of being of a more prominent emotion such as depression that is usually caused by an event the child considers negatively significant. Social factors such as poverty, family instability, and deficient education are some of the factors that can cause depressive, anxiety-inducing states within a child that can be communicated through aggressive and violent tendencies if not addressed. In the article Mental Disorder and Violence: Personality Dimensions and Clinical Features, Paul G. Nestor states, “The risk for violence may therefore be dynamic, varying as a function of the extent to which certain personality dimensions are present and the degree to which environmental events moderate or exacerbate their expression.” As while there is not simply one cause for mental illness or aggression, social/environmental events can either help improve or unfortunately decrease a child’s well-being, therefore, increasing the risks of aggression and violence from a child.

To piggy-back off of my last point, In the article by Sarah M. Coyne and Laura Stockdale called Growing Up with Grand Theft Auto: A 10-Year Study of Longitudinal Growth of Violent Video Game Play in Adolescents, they share that their high initial violence group who consumed the most violent video games during adolescence had a dramatic decrease during mid-adolescence before a very slight increase around adulthood. However, the initial level of high violent video gameplay never went back to its peak. Coyne and Stockdale play with the idea that perhaps the parents did an intervention for the high violence group, therefore causing a drop in violent video game play but with no clear evidence of a control group and this being an observational study, it’s all just speculation on their end. Although, they did measure the children’s depressive and anxiety levels, stating that “this group displayed higher depressive symptoms during early adolescence but decreased anxiety.” This puts into consideration that the high-violence group was using the violent video games as a coping mechanism for their daily life with Coyne and Stockdale mentioning, “This group also displayed lower levels of anxiety than the other two groups, suggesting perhaps a desensitization or numbing effect.” Consuming so much virtual violence such as stabbing an NPC or blowing up a characters in-game car would cause anybody, let alone a child to become used to seeing violence of all sorts but that doesn’t prove a link to violence or aggression of any kind.

Moving forward, there’s evidence of children playing violent video games where their empathy levels did not change after playing those games. In Long Term Exposure to Violent Video Games Does Not Show Desensitization on Empathy for Pain: An Fmri Study, authors Xuemei Gao, et al. did a study on players who were exposed to violent video games and those who were not. Players were screened before and after playing those games for differences in their brain receptors regarding empathy for the pain of others. Gao states, “The results showed that the perception of others’ pain were not significantly different in brain regions between groups, from which we could infer that the desensitization effect of VVGs was overrated.” Empathy is the ability to understand and share another person’s feelings, with there being no significant evidence showing increased aggression with a decrease in other emotions that combat aggression such as empathy, there’s no clear indication of turning children violent. We often mistake a correlation between what we feel and the actions we do when it comes to violence. Most of us have gone to the movies and seen the Halloween series where Michael Myers goes on a killing spree and for fanatics who have seen those movies hundreds of times, seeing Michael kill doesn’t necessarily phase them anymore but that doesn’t mean those people are going to go on a killing spree just because they’re used to seeing Michael do it on a tv screen. It’s the same for children who play violent video games. Children understand that what they’re playing is make-believe and if they were to witness the same events in real life, they’d most likely be horrified just like you and I would.

Furthermore, there is not one single particular cause for why children become aggressive or violent. It could be because of family problems at home, maybe they’re being bullied, perhaps they are a naturally aggressive kid, or it could just be the life they grew into. Whatever the reason, there has not been a single study that accurately or appropriately concluded that violent video games will turn a child aggressive or violent. However, there are studies showing reasons why a child may become violent that do not include violent video game consumption by a child. Not once have I come across a study that wasn’t sloppily designed, littered with data that doesn’t necessarily equal aggression or violence. Once a study takes 300 plus kids and separates them into a group that plays violent video games at least 4 or more times a week, a group that plays non-violent video games 4 or more times a week, and a group that doesn’t play games at all and measures their violent tendencies such as threatening or verbally and physically assaulting others before their study starts and monitoring their aggression levels over at least a 10-year long period and it’s able to prove a significant spike in violent children, only then can we safely assume that violent video games do cause violent kids. Until then it’s just theories, speculation, and misinterpretation of the data that is put out for others’ consumption.

References

Gao, X., Pan, W., Li, C., Weng, L., Yao, M., & Chen, A. (2017, April 11). Long-time exposure to violent video games does not show desensitization on empathy for pain: An fmri study. Frontiers. Retrieved March 29, 2023

Nestor, P. G. (n.d.). Mental Disorder and Violence: Personality Dimensions and Clinical Features. Retrieved March 30, 2023

Sarah M. Coyne and Laura Stockdale.
Growing Up with Grand Theft Auto: A 10-Year Study of Longitudinal Growth of Violent Video Game Play in Adolescents.
Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking.Jan 2021.11-16.

Posted in Causal Rewrite, OatmealVibes, Portfolio OatmealVibes | 8 Comments

Causal Claim – Oatmealvibes

Posted on March 21, 2023 by oatmealvibes

Violent Video Games Do Not Equal Aggression and Violence

It’s a common misconception that violent video games such as Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto cause aggressive, sociopathic, or violent kids based on misleading and poorly done studies. There are many reasons why a child may be aggressive or become violent that do not link violent video games as the main perpetrator or have any causation at all. Mental health and social factors are key aspects when it comes to violence that would help explain why children who have aggression problems may be more attracted to games that contain violence.

To elaborate, aggression is a subset state of being of a more prominent emotion such as depression that is usually caused by an event the child considers negatively significant. Social factors such as poverty, family instability, and deficient education are some of the factors that can cause depressive, anxiety-inducing states within a child that can be communicated through aggressive and violent tendencies if not addressed. In the article Mental Disorder and Violence: Personality Dimensions and Clinical Features, Paul G. Nestor states, “The risk for violence may therefore be dynamic, varying as a function of the extent to which certain personality dimensions are present and the degree to which environmental events moderate or exacerbate their expression.” As while there is not simply one cause for mental illness or aggression, social/environmental events can either help improve or unfortunately decrease a child’s well-being, therefore, increasing the risks of aggression and violence from a child.

To piggy-back off of my last point, In the article by Sarah M. Coyne and Laura Stockdale called Growing Up with Grand Theft Auto: A 10-Year Study of Longitudinal Growth of Violent Video Game Play in Adolescents, they share that their high initial violence group who consumed the most violent video games during adolescence had a dramatic decrease during mid-adolescence before a very slight increase around adulthood. However, the initial level of high violent video gameplay never went back to its peak. Coyne and Stockdale play with the idea that perhaps the parents did an intervention for the high violence group, therefore causing a drop in violent video game play but with no clear evidence of a control group and this being an observational study, it’s all just speculation on their end. Although, they did measure the children’s depressive and anxiety levels, stating that “this group displayed higher depressive symptoms during early adolescence but decreased anxiety.” This puts into consideration that the high-violence group was using the violent video games as a coping mechanism for their daily life with Coyne and Stockdale mentioning, “This group also displayed lower levels of anxiety than the other two groups, suggesting perhaps a desensitization or numbing effect.” Consuming so much virtual violence such as stabbing an NPC or blowing up a characters in-game car would cause anybody, let alone a child to become used to seeing violence of all sorts but that doesn’t prove a link to violence or aggression of any kind.

Moving forward, there’s evidence of children playing violent video games where their empathy levels did not change after playing those games. In Long Term Exposure to Violent Video Games Does Not Show Desensitization on Empathy for Pain: An Fmri Study, authors Xuemei Gao, et al. did a study on players who were exposed to violent video games and those who were not. Players were screened before and after playing those games for differences in their brain receptors regarding empathy for the pain of others. Gao states, “The results showed that the perception of others’ pain were not significantly different in brain regions between groups, from which we could infer that the desensitization effect of VVGs was overrated.” Empathy is the ability to understand and share another person’s feelings, with there being no significant evidence showing increased aggression with a decrease in other emotions that combat aggression such as empathy, there’s no clear indication of turning children violent. We often mistake a correlation between what we feel and the actions we do when it comes to violence. Most of us have gone to the movies and seen the Halloween series where Michael Myers goes on a killing spree and for fanatics who have seen those movies hundreds of times, seeing Michael kill doesn’t necessarily phase them anymore but that doesn’t mean those people are going to go on a killing spree just because they’re used to seeing Michael do it on a tv screen. It’s the same for children who play violent video games. Children understand that what they’re playing is make-believe and if they were to witness the same events in real life, they’d most likely be horrified just like you and I would.

Furthermore, there is not one single particular cause for why children become aggressive or violent. It could be because of family problems at home, maybe they’re being bullied, perhaps they are a naturally aggressive kid, or it could just be the life they grew into. Whatever the reason, there has not been a single study that accurately or appropriately concluded that violent video games will turn a child aggressive or violent. However, there are studies showing reasons why a child may become violent that do not include violent video game consumption by a child. Not once have I come across a study that wasn’t sloppily designed, littered with data that doesn’t necessarily equal aggression or violence. Once a study takes 300 plus kids and separates them into a group that plays violent video games at least 4 or more times a week, a group that plays non-violent video games 4 or more times a week, and a group that doesn’t play games at all and measures their violent tendencies such as threatening or verbally and physically assaulting others before their study starts and monitoring their aggression levels over at least a 10-year long period and it’s able to prove a significant spike in violent children, only then can we safely assume that violent video games do cause violent kids. Until then it’s just theories, speculation, and misinterpretation of the data that is put out for others’ consumption.

References

Gao, X., Pan, W., Li, C., Weng, L., Yao, M., & Chen, A. (2017, April 11). Long-time exposure to violent video games does not show desensitization on empathy for pain: An fmri study. Frontiers. Retrieved March 29, 2023

Nestor, P. G. (n.d.). Mental Disorder and Violence: Personality Dimensions and Clinical Features. Retrieved March 30, 2023

Sarah M. Coyne and Laura Stockdale.
Growing Up with Grand Theft Auto: A 10-Year Study of Longitudinal Growth of Violent Video Game Play in Adolescents.
Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking.Jan 2021.11-16.

Posted in Causal Argument, OatmealVibes | Leave a comment

Causal rewrite-pinkheart84

Posted on March 21, 2023 by pinkheart84

I could use some help getting started, Professor.

Posted in Causal Argument, PinkHeart | 4 Comments

Causal—pinkheart84

Posted on March 21, 2023 by pinkheart84
Posted in Causal Argument, PinkHeart | Leave a comment

Causal Rewrite – TristanB50

Posted on March 21, 2023 by tristanb50

The Car Crash

After the first highways were built, the idea of being able to walk to place to place became forgotten. Infrastructure matched the new roads, building superstores with large parking lots bigger than football fields. American families reflect the need for cars in their ownership, as we see families owning more cars now than ever. Looking at data from the past 60 years, Jean-Paul Rodrigue, author of The Geography of Transport Systems, found single-car household switched from being the majority to the minority, as 59% of households owning two or more cars. It’s not a surprise that by giving cars this much power, it eventually sacrifices the ability to walk places. However, losing the baseline mode of transportation and putting it in the hands of a product can be risky. The everly increasing unwalkbality of communities combined with the increased cost of car ownership may bring on a mass transportation crisis.

As anyone in New Jersey can tell you, developers often choose to build communities alongside large highway projects as a way to connect them by car. Rather than building communities with built in places of work, they are solely meant to house people, relying on highways for the extra amenities. To achieve this, these communities often utilize large wide streets and large multi-car driveways for their residents. Areas like these are very difficult to traverse without a car due to the massive gaps between buildings, much of which designed to better accommodate cars than their residents. Not only are singular communities built to be dispersed internally, but developments are often separated from other communities, as a result of being planned separately by different developers. The negative effects of using this unplanned development strategy become amplified on a larger scale, as the residential communities in the same region are left isolated from each other, and from their goods and services. As a result, the residents living in these communities become extremely dependant on cars, and can only walk to other houses within their neighborhood (given that their neighborhood has walking space at all.)

 Living in areas like these, it is a lot more common for families to have multiple cars, as they are really given no other options for necessities like groceries. On a larger scale, this significantly increases the car activity in the areas highways and neighborhoods. The two choices the government generally provides are keeping it as is, or constructing more lanes to free up traffic. Unbeknownst to the government employees, this approach has proven to be ineffective at decreasing congestion in the long term, and has actually proven to increase commuting times. effectively restarts the cycle, cursing future developments to be constructed even further apart. Road services become the backbone of peoples livelihoods, requiring cars as an entry requirement. But when access to cars are jeopardized, the absence of alternatives really stands out.

At a time like right now, the paywall behind vehicle ownership is getting a stronger hold on our access to transportation. Whether buying new or used, cars are generally running unproportionally higher than they were going back a few years. NPR‘s Camila Domonoske, a writer who focuses on transport and energy, found that used cars are averaging $28,000 on the market, an unprecedented price similar to the cost of a new car a few years ago. New cars follow the same pattern, sitting around $48,000 on average, nearly double the price of a used car. This is due partly to supply chain issues, but can also be attributed to the increased quality and longevity modern cars have garnered in the past 20 years. People often don’t buy new cars as often anymore, and as a result there are less cars on the market. Many people don’t buy new cars until they absolutely need to. Combined with the increased costs of repairs due to better labor wages, car ownership could become a much larger factor in the average cost of living than before. The same NPR article addresses the relationship between repairs and new cars, arguing, “Faced with high repair costs a few years ago, drivers might have looked for a replacement vehicle instead. But now cheap rides are extremely hard to find in the used car market.” The car market has changed so rapidly that the strategy the industry staked itself on no longers works, which over time could spell disaster for it’s customers. Depending on how much the cost of car ownership hikes, it possible that many drivers would be off the road entirely, unable to afford to get back on.

While this issue seems like it could have the positive side effect of getting drivers off the road, ultimately it would uphold highways as a mode of transportation only for those who can afford, limiting the “freedom” that cars aim to guarantee. This foreseeable outcome could lead to a potential transportation crisis in the aforementioned unwalkable communities. To many Americans, car ownership is the sole Jenga brick supporting the tower. As 2018 Pew Research study on American demographic shifts found, rural and suburban communities house 46 million and 175 million Americans respectively, combining to make up ⅔ of the population. Many of these areas lack public transportation and walkability, making them at the mercy of any issues in the car supply chain. People who cannot afford to purchase or fix their vehicles might find themselves losing their jobs, ultimately leaving them stranded without hope of fixing the issue. 

While a transportation crisis would certainly be disastrous, the United States is in prime position to implement dramatic change to it’s infrastructure.With the climate crisis constantly looming over the countries head, many lawmakers are opting to stop selling gasoline cars in X amount of years. The subsidies, infrastructure, and political energy necessary to pull off a plan like this could be reallocated to invest in public transport, which could both reduce emissions on a large scale and challenge the inequality in personal transport. In addition to this, it would still follow the same tenants as highway widening, freeing up roads while providing people with an alternative to driving.

References:

Domonoske, C. (2022, November 4). It’s not just buying a car – owning one is getting pricier, too. NPR. Retrieved March 26, 2023, from https://www.npr.org/2022/11/04/1133678811/used-cars-new-prices-price-costs-maintenance-inflation-expensive 

Mitchell, T. (2020, May 30). 1. demographic and economic trends in urban, suburban and rural communities. Pew Research Center’s Social & Demographic Trends Project. Retrieved March 31, 2023, from https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2018/05/22/demographic-and-economic-trends-in-urban-suburban-and-rural-communities/ 

Rodrigue, J.P. (2020) Percentage of households by number of vehicles, 1960-2020: The Geography of Transport Systems. The Geography of Transport Systems | The spatial organization of transportation and mobility. (2022, November 9). Retrieved April 1, 2023, from https://transportgeography.org/contents/chapter8/urban-transport-challenges/household-vehicles-united-states/ 

Sparre-Enger, H. (2020, May 13). Expanding road capacity in urban areas resulted in urban sprawl, more traffic and more motorists. Nordic Road and Transport Research. Retrieved March 29, 2023, from https://nordicroads.com/expanding-road-capacity-urban-areas-resulted-urban-sprawl-traffic-motorists/

Posted in Causal Rewrite, Portfolio TristanB, TristanB | 6 Comments

Causal Rewrite – InspireAngels

Posted on March 21, 2023 by inspireangels

Crosswords Puzzles Breaks Off
Bad Eating Habits of Eating Disorders

Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a way that victims of eating disorders could lessen the severeness of binge urges that creep up on them? You may be surprised to learn the potential a simple crossword puzzle can have on that.

Crosswords puzzles have been use to aid with learning to develop skills like reasoning, evaluating choices and drawing conclusions. While not all individuals who use crossword use it as a study method, it is also a fun stress relieving activity that promotes motivation for the individual. People use multiple coping strategies when struggling to deal with their eating disorder however depending on the personality type that they acquire determines which mechanism works more in their favor. There are 5 personality types associated with eating disorders which are high-functioning, behaviorally dysregulated, emotional dysregulated, avoidant insecure, and lastly obsessional sensitive. To determine which personality types could highly benefit from crossword puzzles, individuals needs to understand how their dysfunctional habits operate.

As mention before there are 5 type of personalities associate with the eating disorders of bulimia and anorexia. The ones that are the high functioning type tend to have minimal personality pathology. This indicating that these types have the least negative patterns among the other types that affect the person’s adaption. Seeing that high functionable types have more positive outcomes than negative ones, these individuals may be able to adapt to new effective strategies more easily than the other personality types.

However since most often these kinds of people seem to be calm exteriorly but excessively anxious internally, determining which form of eating disorders symptoms they are likely to have is more complex.

The following personality subtype is behaviorally dysregulated. For these types of individuals, they are characterized to be impulsive, have self-damaging behavior, crave affection and acceptance, have tendencies of antisocial behavior, social anxiety and prone to suicidal gestures. They display more of binge or purging symptoms that are associate with ANBP known as Anorexia Nervosa Binging/Purging or BN also called Bulimia Nervosa. This can be expected from their impulsivity and binging and purging symptoms.

The next type is emotional dysregulated where these individuals have a desire for affection and acceptance, have histrionic tendencies, tend to be irrational at times and have angry outbursts on account of their lack of control in anger. These group of lively people have a habit of overreacting to minor events that they constantly need reassurance from others and have a dynamic mood that shifts from a normal calm state to a depressive, irritable or anxious mood fairly quickly. These types also display binging and purging symptoms when it comes to eating habits that related to ANBP and BN.

The following personality type are the avoidant insecure types that will have low self esteem that can range from devaluing their achievements or being overly dismay by their own personal shortcomings. This makes them have an inability to relax or be hypersensitive to criticism. With all of this being said, they more prone to have anorexic features related to ANR also known as anorexia nervosa restrict than binging or purging ones.

Finally, obsessional sensitive types are perfectionists. Their perfectionism tends to interfere with their ability to see the “big picture” of a situation that they may overreact to any minor events that don’t go their way. These perfectionists may also exaggerate the difficulties of a situation leading them to be indecisive of choices that they will either postponed or avoid in fear of making a mistake. Just like avoidant insecure types, they display more anorexic characteristics, restricting the amount of food they eat.

Although these personality types have different approaches in handling stress, a lot of them have overlapping characteristics that are similar. Some possible coping strategies that are used by these folks with an eating disorder are self regulation, distraction, emotional regulation, self denial, rumination, and negotiation.

In self-regulation, a person has the ability to control their behavior, emotions, and thoughts. A self regulator may try to set up goals for themselves or self talk to get tasks done as this can help self regulators in completing their daily routine and keep a consistent pattern of good habits. However these practices are easier said than done. Self regulators might enjoy such a structure routine because this give them a sense of control over their life. Self regulators can incorporate crosswords puzzles into their routine that during times they need to relieve stress during the week.

The following coping strategy is distraction. For distractors, they will find any method that will help avoid, confront or relieve them from the problem they are facing. This can either be a positive or negative effect on the distractor.

The next strategy is emotional regulation, where it tends to influence people by exerting to the experience and expression of their emotions. As a result of this, it can corresponds with changes in an individual’s eating behavior. This can affect an emotional regulator who constantly restrict their eating habits to cause them to intake more food when experiencing any negative emotions.

The upcoming strategy is self denial. Now for individuals who use self denial as a coping strategy they might look at a situation on the brighter side of things or will try to persuade themselves that they are okay even if that’s not the case. They have a tendency of avoid thinking anything negative in their life or will refrain from revealing one’s problem.

Another coping strategy that are often use is rumination. Ruminators will repetitively analyze their problems, concerns, or any type of feelings of distress. Most of the time rumination can become a maladaptive strategy however it can be beneficial when it’s use for self reflecting. If ruminators get too stuck in their thoughts then it will cause them to dwell too much on the situation than necessary.

Lastly a different coping strategy is self negotiation. Negotiators will try to talk themselves out of doing a certain task or problem. They have the habit of bargaining with themselves about a situation that they might be avoiding or resolving. Self negotiation can become a sabotage tactic for some negotiators if they don’t have set goals for themselves and understand the results of their choices. Otherwise self negotiation can be very important for individuals as it prevent or resolve conflicts and have them carefully analyze the situation they are in to come to best possible solution they can think of.

Each coping strategy can either be beneficial or detrimental for relieving these victims eating disorder according to their personality types. For high functioning types, they can benefit from self regulation. Since high functioning types tend to still complete their daily tasks while still struggling with their eating disorder, they might have a routine that they follow to keep themselves in check. Considering that these types create a routine that help them, they lean more towards problem-focused coping. With problem-focused coping, it’s direct towards them actively changing in their environment. What they can do is include a set time to use crossword puzzle to ease one’s distress by creating relaxing environment. Most time high functioning types will overwork themselves without taking multiple breaks so by doing a crossword puzzle it can hopefully reduce that stress that might cause then to binge, purge or restrict their eating.

For behavior dysregulated, the best coping strategy are rumination and self negotiation. The reason for this is that they are quite impulsive individuals so being able to self reflect and self negotiation about a situation or problem can truly help them better improve their destructive eating habits. Seeing as how crossword puzzles can be use as a learning tool for individuals, if adaptive coping mechanisms are listed in the crosswords puzzles, these types will have to think of effective strategies to use under stress. This can help these types because when the urge to binge or purge occurs, they can remember the coping mechanisms they learn in the crossword puzzle using self negotiation to choose which strategy can work best for them at the moment.

For emotional dysregulated can gain improvement of their eating pattern through emotional regulation and distraction. Since emotional regulation tends to effect individuals by using the experience and expression of their emotion, through the use of crossword puzzle these emotional regulators alter their mood to a more positive one. Crosswords puzzle can provide motivation for the person and the person can even gain the satisfaction of completing the puzzle changing their overall mood to a more determined state. This will have these types less likely to binge or purge since they will be in a more hopeful state.

This is technically also consider as a distraction since the individuals replace their negative emotions that they are feeling by turning to crossword puzzles as a way to relieve their distress. In particular self regulation and rumination would help avoidant insecure. This would be of use to these types because they are likely to avoid situations therefore having them ruminate and self regulate their current condition can have them face their problems head on. For self regulation having them install an effective strategy in their routine can aid their poor eating patterns.

Crosswords puzzle can be a possible method that could be use for these types however not for long period time as they might start to devalue themselves and leave the puzzle if they are not able to complete it quickly. This is due to their low self esteem. Nevertheless if they are able to have the satisfaction of completing the crossword puzzle, that can boost their self esteem and possibly have them self award themselves with a snack since these individuals are likely to display more anorexic features rather than purging ones.

Lastly self negotiation and self denial assist in in improving bad eating disorder habits for the obsessional sensitive types. Self denial would be favorable to them as they can reinterpret one’s situation to a more positive one and selectively ignore the negative aspects of the situation. This might be difficult to these perfectionists as they tend to dwell on a situation longer than it needs to be. This is were self negotiation can be beneficial to them as well because it’s important they practice negotiation with themselves especially if they have a hard time making decisions.

Crossword puzzles might not be the best strategy for these individuals as they might be too focus on the puzzle that it’s possible they forget to eat or forget their other tasks around them in order to have the satisfaction of completing the puzzle for themselves.

References

Fleishman, J. A. (1984). Personality Characteristics and Coping Patterns. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 25(2), 229–244. https://doi.org/10.2307/2136671

Martinez Serna, I., & Francisco Parra Azor , J. (2011, July). (C-189) active learning: Creating interactive crossword puzzles – UPCT. Retrieved April 4, 2023, from https://repositorio.upct.es/bitstream/handle/10317/2237/c189.pdf?sequence=1

Oosterwaal, S. A. M. (1970, January 1). Desire to eat and its relationship with emotion regulation, what does rumination has to do with it? Masterthesis Sofie. Utrecht University Student Theses Repository Home. Retrieved April 4, 2023, from https://studenttheses.uu.nl/handle/20.500.12932/35866

Thompson-Brenner, H., Eddy, K. T., Franko, D. L., Dorer, D. J., Vashchenko, M., Kass, A. E., & Herzog, D. B. (2008). A personality classification system for eating disorders: A longitudinal study. Comprehensive Psychiatry, 49(6), 551–560. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.comppsych.2008.04.002

Vann, A., Strodl, E., & Anderson, E. (2013). Thinking about internal states, a qualitative investigation into metacognitions in women with eating disorders. Journal of Eating Disorders, 1(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/2050-2974-1-22

Posted in Causal Rewrite, InspireAngels | 7 Comments

Causal—InspireAngels

Posted on March 21, 2023 by inspireangels

Crosswords Puzzles Breaks Off Bad Eating Habits of Eating Disorders

Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a way that victims of eating disorders could lessen the severeness of binge urges that creep up on them, well you be surprise the potential a simple crossword puzzle can have on that. Crosswords puzzles have been use to aid with learning to develop skills like reasoning, evaluating choices and drawing conclusions. While not all individuals who use crossword use it as a study method, it is also a fun stress relieving activity that promotes motivation for the individual. People use multiple coping strategies when struggling to deal with their eating disorder however depending on the personality type that they acquire determines which mechanism works more in their favor. There are 5 personality types associated with eating disorders which are high-functioning, behaviorally dysregulated, emotional dysregulated, avoidant insecure, and lastly obsessional sensitive. To determine which personality types could highly benefit from crossword puzzles, individuals needs to understand how their dysfunctional habits operate.

As mention before there are 5 type of personalities associate with the eating disorders of bulimia and anorexia. The ones that are the high functioning type tend to have minimal personality pathology. This indicating that these types have the least negative patterns among the other types that affect the person’s adaption. Seeing that high functionable types have more positive outcomes than negative ones, these individuals may be able to adapt to new effective strategies more easily than the other personality types. However since most often these kinds of people seem to be calm exteriorly but excessively anxious internally, determining which form of eating disorders symptoms they are likely to have is more complex. The following personality subtype is behaviorally dysregulated. For these types of individuals, they are characterized to be impulsive, have self-damaging behavior, crave affection and acceptance, have tendencies of antisocial behavior, social anxiety and prone to suicidal gestures. They display more of binge or purging symptoms that are associate with ANBP known as Anorexia Nervosa Binging/Purging or BN also called Bulimia Nervosa. This can be expected from their impulsivity and binging and purging symptoms. The next type is emotional dysregulated where these individuals have a desire for affection and acceptance, have histrionic tendencies, tend to be irrational at times and have angry outbursts on account of their lack of control in anger. These group of lively people have a habit of overreacting to minor events that they constantly need reassurance from others and have a dynamic mood that shifts from a normal calm state to a depressive, irritable or anxious mood fairly quickly. These types also display binging and purging symptoms when it comes to eating habits that related to ANBP and BN. The following personality type are the avoidant insecure types that will have low self esteem that can range from devaluing their achievements or being overly dismay by their own personal shortcomings. This makes them have an inability to relax or be hypersensitive to criticism. With all of this being said, they more prone to have anorexic features related to ANR also known as anorexia nervosa restrict than binging or purging ones. Finally, obsessional sensitive types are perfectionists. Their perfectionism tends to interfere with their ability to see the “big picture” of a situation that they may overreact to any minor events that don’t go their way. These perfectionists may also exaggerate the difficulties of a situation leading them to be indecisive of choices that they will either postponed or avoid in fear of making a mistake. Just like avoidant insecure types, they display more anorexic characteristics, restricting the amount of food they eat.

Although these personality types have different approaches in handling stress, a lot of them have overlapping characteristics that are similar. Some possible coping strategies that are used by these folks with an eating disorder are self regulation, distraction, emotional regulation, self denial, rumination, and negotiation. In self-regulation, a person has the ability to control their behavior, emotions, and thoughts. A self regulator may try to set up goals for themselves or self talk to get tasks done as this can help self regulators in completing their daily routine and keep a consistent pattern of good habits. However these practices are easier said than done. Self regulators might enjoy such a structure routine because this give them a sense of control over their life. Self regulators can incorporate crosswords puzzles into their routine that during times they need to relieve stress during the week. The following coping strategy is distraction. For distractors, they will find any method that will help avoid, confront or relieve them from the problem they are facing. This can either be a positive or negative effect on the distractor. The next strategy is emotional regulation, where it tends to influence people by exerting to the experience and expression of their emotions. As a result of this, it can corresponds with changes in an individual’s eating behavior. This can affect an emotional regulator who constantly restrict their eating habits to cause them to intake more food when experiencing any negative emotions. The upcoming strategy is self denial. Now for individuals who use self denial as a coping strategy they might look at a situation on the brighter side of things or will try to persuade themselves that they are okay even if that’s not the case. They have a tendency of avoid thinking anything negative in their life or will refrain from revealing one’s problem. Another coping strategy that are often use is rumination. Ruminators will repetitively analyze their problems, concerns, or any type of feelings of distress. Most of the time rumination can become a maladaptive strategy however it can be beneficial when it’s use for self reflecting. If ruminators get too stuck in their thoughts then it will cause them to dwell too much on the situation than necessary. Lastly a different coping strategy is self negotiation. Negotiators will try to talk themselves out of doing a certain task or problem. They have the habit of bargaining with themselves about a situation that they might be avoiding or resolving. Self negotiation can become a sabotage tactic for some negotiators if they don’t have set goals for themselves and understand the results of their choices. Otherwise self negotiation can be very important for individuals as it prevent or resolve conflicts and have them carefully analyze the situation they are in to come to best possible solution they can think of.

Each coping strategy can either be beneficial or detrimental for relieving these victims eating disorder according to their personality types. For high functioning types, they can benefit from self regulation. Since high functioning types tend to still complete their daily tasks while still struggling with their eating disorder, they might have a routine that they follow to keep themselves in check. Considering that these types create a routine that help them, they lean more towards problem-focused coping. With problem-focused coping, it’s direct towards them actively changing in their environment. What they can do is include a set time to use crossword puzzle to ease one’s distress by creating relaxing environment. Most time high functioning types will overwork themselves without taking multiple breaks so by doing a crossword puzzle it can hopefully reduce that stress that might cause then to binge, purge or restrict their eating. For behavior dysregulated, the best coping strategy are rumination and self negotiation. The reason for this is that they are quite impulsive individuals so being able to self reflect and self negotiation about a situation or problem can truly help them better improve their destructive eating habits. Seeing as how crossword puzzles can be use as a learning tool for individuals, if adaptive coping mechanisms are listed in the crosswords puzzles, these types will have to think of effective strategies to use under stress. This can help these types because when the urge to binge or purge occurs, they can remember the coping mechanisms they learn in the crossword puzzle using self negotiation to choose which strategy can work best for them at the moment. For emotional dysregulated can gain improvement of their eating pattern through emotional regulation and distraction. Since emotional regulation tends to effect individuals by using the experience and expression of their emotion, through the use of crossword puzzle these emotional regulators alter their mood to a more positive one. Crosswords puzzle can provide motivation for the person and the person can even gain the satisfaction of completing the puzzle changing their overall mood to a more determined state. This will have these types less likely to binge or purge since they will be in a more hopeful state. This is technically also consider as a distraction since the individuals replace their negative emotions that they are feeling by turning to crossword puzzles as a way to relieve their distress. In particular self regulation and rumination would help avoidant insecure. This would be of use to these types because they are likely to avoid situations therefore having them ruminate and self regulate their current condition can have them face their problems head on. For self regulation having them install an effective strategy in their routine can aid their poor eating patterns. Crosswords puzzle can be a possible method that could be use for these types however not for long period time as they might start to devalue themselves and leave the puzzle if they are not able to complete it quickly. This is due to their low self esteem. Nevertheless if they are able to have the satisfaction of completing the crossword puzzle, that can boost their self esteem and possibly have them self award themselves with a snack since these individuals are likely to display more anorexic features rather than purging ones. Lastly self negotiation and self denial assist in in improving bad eating disorder habits for the obsessional sensitive types. Self denial would be favorable to them as they can reinterpret one’s situation to a more positive one and selectively ignore the negative aspects of the situation. This might be difficult to these perfectionists as they tend to dwell on a situation longer than it needs to be. This is were self negotiation can be beneficial to them as well because it’s important they practice negotiation with themselves especially if they have a hard time making decisions. Crossword puzzles might not be the best strategy for these individuals as they might be too focus on the puzzle that it’s possible they forget to eat or forget their other tasks around them in order to have the satisfaction of completing the puzzle for themselves.

References

Fleishman, J. A. (1984). Personality Characteristics and Coping Patterns. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 25(2), 229–244. https://doi.org/10.2307/2136671

Martinez Serna, I., & Francisco Parra Azor , J. (2011, July). (C-189) active learning: Creating interactive crossword puzzles – UPCT. Retrieved April 4, 2023, from https://repositorio.upct.es/bitstream/handle/10317/2237/c189.pdf?sequence=1

Oosterwaal, S. A. M. (1970, January 1). Desire to eat and its relationship with emotion regulation, what does rumination has to do with it? Masterthesis Sofie. Utrecht University Student Theses Repository Home. Retrieved April 4, 2023, from https://studenttheses.uu.nl/handle/20.500.12932/35866

Thompson-Brenner, H., Eddy, K. T., Franko, D. L., Dorer, D. J., Vashchenko, M., Kass, A. E., & Herzog, D. B. (2008). A personality classification system for eating disorders: A longitudinal study. Comprehensive Psychiatry, 49(6), 551–560. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.comppsych.2008.04.002

Vann, A., Strodl, E., & Anderson, E. (2013). Thinking about internal states, a qualitative investigation into metacognitions in women with eating disorders. Journal of Eating Disorders, 1(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/2050-2974-1-22

Posted in Causal Argument, InspireAngels | Leave a comment

Definition- Mellowtacos

Posted on March 21, 2023 by mellowtacos

Mental health can be affected in many different ways. More recently people have found the pandemic left some people with issues such as depression, anxiety or high stress levels. In order to cope with this, millions of dogs were adopted to provide comfort in hard times. However, people did not take into consideration the amount of money and time Dogs consume, especially puppies. Dogs were given back to the shelters at an alarming rate for multiple reasons. Those who could afford the cost of the dogs could not provide the care needed when they went back to work after the pandemic. Those who could not afford dogs gave them up to shelters when the pandemic hit.  

Researchers have shown that there is a strong correlation between not only your physical but your mental health as well. The connection between your pet and your mental health has been shown to positively affect people with poor mental health which spiked 25% during covid to the The World Health Organization. An online survey was conducted on Amazon Mechanical Turk, where they found that those who have pets are more satisfied in life than those who do not. They broke the data down and found that dog owners scored higher showing that they have better overall wellbeing. This would explain why millions of dogs were adopted. Research also showed that There has yet to be many studies proving that there’s a positive impact on those with good mental health. This could explain why many people returned their dogs to the shelter after the pandemic because they no longer felt they needed that comfort they once needed. 

Many people have looked to dogs for comfort for many years and this has been deeply researched by Gabrielle Marie McKeon who works with therapy dogs. In her article “Health and Happiness: Dogs and Their Therapeutic Value” she shares with us all the benefits that therapy dogs provide us with. Sigmon Freud, a credible psychotherapist, believed that dogs had the ability to sense tension, which they then respond to. During the pandemic households were flooded with tensions and could benefit from a dog according to Freud’s study. Therapy dogs work in many different places such as homes, schools, and hospitals. Liz Cleaves, owner and operator of Auntie Dog Training Studio, says she feels that training these dogs gives her “ a deeper and better relationship”(McKeon, 9). These dogs can range from all different types of sizes and breeds. A member from a TDI Certified Therapy Team said that one of the dogs was able to connect to a patient who was very self abusive and got her to stop hitting herself. Kathryn Kircher and her dog who is TDI certified stopped by a hospital and visited an older gentleman who was not commutative and depressed for a week. That man’s daughter thanked Kircher for bringing her dog to visit because they connected so much it made him “alert and upbeat”(McKeon, 28). Dr. Stuart Markowitz, the president of Hartford hospital says that ‘“the companionship that animals bring is vital to all of us

Although covid negatively impacted humans, dogs benefited tremendously. Shelters were being whipped clean due to the sudden increase in families and home owners wanting a furry companion during this time In the article “Human–dog relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic: booming dog adoption during social isolation” by Liat Morgan she discussed how covid had affected us and how dogs have helped. During Covid-19 there people were suffering from all sorts of health issues while being locked away in their house. Dogs and cats have shown to positively increase mental health. In stress-full positions such as the pandemic these pets have shown tremendous help with anxiety and depressions. Those who also deal with social anxiety whether the pandemic caused it or not will show lots of progress with a therapy animal. During the isolation there was a larger population adopting dogs. Studies have shown that humans and dogs are more alike due to the fact that we are both “social animals” where we can both benefit from one another. However the relationship between the two is bidirectional because we have shown to have negative effects on animals. There is a strong correlation between negative health and well being of the owner and the negative health and well being of the pet.   

With all the information we have found throughout the years that prove therapy animals are beneficial, why wouldn’t someone adopt in an attempt to help themselves during the pandemic. It’s a win-win situation, until it wasn’t. Some people coped by getting pets and others found them to be more stressful during this crazy time. People found themselves unable to take care of their pets so they gave them up. This happened twice, once right when the pandemic hit and people couldn’t afford them which wasn’t as bad because there were people out there who wanted to adopt because the pandemic hit. However, the real issue happened after those same people went back to work and that cute puppy they got became another thing on the checklist you had to worry about. The further Morgan looked into this, she noted that there was an obvious difference between an “individual’s quality of life and their perceptions of their dog’s quality of life”. 312 people were asked why they had decided to get a dog in the beginning of the pandemic. 38.5% said they had been thinking about it for a while and thought this was the perfect opportunity. 37.8% said they were going to get a dog no matter what. 8.0% adopted in an effort to not feel lonely and 9.3% said they felt obligated after hearing about how others were returning their dogs. 

The shelters were severely impacted by covid because of the amount of dogs going in and not as many going out. These shelters were ending up without supplies and room to house all the animals new and old. What happens with shelters that don’t have enough room is that they will have to refuse people who bring them in and those dogs end up on the street, in the wrong hands, or euthanized. Shelters are still recovering from the pandemic till this day. Unfortunately, way too many dogs weren’t able to find room in shelters. 

References

Health and happiness: Dogs and their therapeutic value. (n.d.). Retrieved March 6, 2023, from https://digitalrepository.salemstate.edu/bitstream/handle/20.500.13013/597/Thesis.pdf?sequence=2 

Pets and happiness: Examining the association between pet ownership and Wellbeing. Taylor & Francis. (n.d.). Retrieved March 6, 2023, from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08927936.2016.1152721

Morgan, L., Protopopova, A., Birkler, R. I. D., Itin-Shwartz, B., Sutton, G. A., Gamliel, A., Yakobson, B., & Raz, T. (2020, November 24). Human–dog relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic: Booming dog adoption during social isolation. Nature News. Retrieved March 6, 2023, from https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-020-00649-x 

World Health Organization. (n.d.). Covid-19 pandemic triggers 25% increase in prevalence of anxiety and depression worldwide. World Health Organization. Retrieved March 6, 2023, from https://www.who.int/news/item/02-03-2022-covid-19-pandemic-triggers-25-increase-in-prevalence-of-anxiety-and-depression-worldwide  

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Causal Rewrite – Rowanluver29

Posted on March 21, 2023 by rowanluver29

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, or a shaky home life. 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 all murderers he interviewed had a traumatic childhood involving specific types of abuse. 40% of the murderers he interviewed were physically beaten or abused, while the other 70% had witnessed abuse growing up. Proving 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.

Robert Ressler is a very prominent researcher and source in the article, “Serial Killers and Child Abuse: Is There A Link?” by Fiona Guy. The following quote Ressler stated sums up a lot of what fellow researchers and readers think about this counterintuitive topic: “Let me state unequivocally that there is no such thing as the person who at age thirty-five suddenly changes from being perfectly normal and erupts into totally evil, disruptive, murderous behavior. The behaviors that are precursors to murder have been present and developing in that person’s life for a long, long time – since childhood.” Along with Ressler, researchers from Radford University in Virginia, Mitchell and Aamodt, continued to further the studies in 2005 about the relation between an abusive childhood and a tendency of serial killing later in life. Mitchell and Aamodt focused their studies on the different types of abuse that these serial killers can encounter, and the probability that related their actions to their backgrounds. The groups consisted of physical abuse, sexual abuse, psychological abuse and neglect. After collecting data that compared the general population compared to the serial killers, it is found that serial killers are six times more reported physical abuse during childhood compared to the rest of the general population. The biggest difference between the general population and serial killer population fell underneath the psychological abuse category. When it came to the general population, the rates of psychological abuse were only 2%. But the serial killer group studied was 50%. This shows us that childhood abuse is strikingly more widespread amongst serial killers versus a normal population.

Although abuse can be the direct source (a retaliation against the encounters of their own violence), of serial killers committing their actions, it also can be the first step in a three-step process. This three-step process includes 1.) the inflicted abuse, 2.) the mental illness resulting from the abuse and 3.) the murder tendencies/actions. So not only can child abuse drive children to have violent tendencies and eventually reenact that abuse onto other people, they can also receive mental illnesses because of this abuse, which can cause their actions to be even more savage in the long run. All starting at the root, that being child abuse. In the article “The Dark Psychology of Serial Killers: Unpacking the Factors Behind their Brutal Behavior” by author Dennis Relojo-Howell, Howell states that child abuse can lead to mental disorders including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD), narcissistic personality disorder, and borderline personality disorder. All of these mental disorders increase the probability of a child becoming a serial killer. PTSD increases the violence in a child due to an uneasy and unsafe feeling depending upon different settings and/or situations. Personality disorders also play a role in a serial killer’s development. This includes ASPD, which is characterized by a severe lack of empathy, and an urge to get involved in illegal activities. Personality disorders often cause people to disengage from reality and connect with forms of violent behavior to cope. Sometimes, the abuse that children grow up with do not have to be personal to their physical or mental well-being. Social and environmental factors also can take a toll and encourage the psychological development of a killer. Growing up around violence, whether that be in the home or community, or even watching violent media such as tv shows, video games or movies have been linked to an increase in violent behaviors starting at very young ages. The exposure to violence at a young age makes children think that these actions are normal. Growing up with this sort of mental state that makes children believe it is okay to intentionally inflict pain on others on a day to day, can only get worse as they get older.

In psychology, there is an ongoing argument that discusses nature vs nurture, and which one has more of an influence in who we are as people. Nature is the genetic and hereditary factor that goes into one’s personality. While nurture are the external variables, that include childhood experience, family life, social surroundings, etc. When it comes to the mind of a serial killer, we need both 50% nature and 50% nurture to create a murderer. According to Dr. Adrian Raine in the article “From Abused Child to Serial Killer: Investigating Nature vs. Nurture in Methods of Murder” by author Nicole Davies, those with a specific variant of the enzyme monoamine-oxidase are more prone to displaying severely violent behavior if they have had an abusive upbringing. Or those who suffer from mentally illness in general may have more violent actions. But those who have this gene, or a mental illness does not mean they are born to be a criminal; it goes hand and hand with their personal environmental factors. Both of these works together to shape a violent person, or a murderer. For example, murderer Richard Ramirez suffered from adolescent deviant behavior. This mental disorder includes antisocial behaviors, anti-disciplinary tendencies, delinquent likelihood, and unlawful and self-harming/suicidal actions. Not only did he suffer with a mental disorder, but he also suffered severe personal traumas whilst growing up. He endured many beatings from his father, and also had a cousin who would murder women and show Ramirez pictures of deceased bodies. Both of these leading Ramirez to romanticize acts of violence and murder. Ramirez’s case only proves Dr. Adrian Raine’s theory that nature and nurture go hand and hand to create a serial killer.

Posted in Causal Rewrite, RowanLuver | 3 Comments