Back on the subject of rex...

 Originally Posted By: the G-man of Zur-En-Arrh
Evaluating a psychological profile of a serial killer
  • To discover what makes a serial killer function, it is necessary to look back into their past, particularly their adolescent life...Many traits that seem to be universal in all these serial killers, though in varied amounts, include disorganised thinking, bipolar mode disorders, a feeling of resentment towards society brought on by their own failings, sexual frustrations, an inability to be social or socially accepted, over bearing parents and a wild imagination that tends to drag them into a fantasy world. In a chart of serial killer - childhood development characteristics - created by Ressler, Burgers and Douglas (1990), the three most frequently reported behaviors included day dreaming, compulsive masturbation, and isolation.

    The daydreaming, which is brought on by an over productive imagination, tends to lead the way into the general fantasy world that the serial killer begins to live in to protect himself from any isolation he is faced with. At an early age, if a child is left alone, or forced to live in isolation whereby little attention is given to them for long periods of time, their minds become the object of their company, and thus begin the daydreams and the fantasy world (Ressler, Douglas and Burgess, 1990).

    This kind of isolation tends to breed feelings of inadequacy in some way or other in all serial killers. These feelings maybe masked by numerous artificial successes, but these feelings run deeper than the normal neurotic feelings of not being good enough. Essentially, these early life attachments which are known as ‘bonding’, set up a map by which the child will in later life react to others. In such cases, the children do not learn how to interact properly within their society, and at best, turn into mirror images of their isolators. A prime example of this can be seen in the case of Ed Kemper, whose mother condemned him to the basement of their home at the tender age of ten in fear that he would molest his younger sister (though he had not given his mother any reason to think this). Confused and angry as to why he was suffering this punishment, he turned to his fantasies, which may have started out as ‘normal’, but with the continued isolation they quickly became his dominant world.

    Traits that should be looked at when trying to decide if a person is a potential killer include:
    • Social withdrawal,
    • abnormal dependence’s on ones mother or ulcerated relations with ones parents,
    • hypochondria or other attention seeking behavior,
    • delusional mind as to grandeur,
    • severe depression, a general feeling of emptiness as to the future,
    • inability to take criticisms,
    • a general feeling of being mistreated, inability to assert ones self,
    • parental taunts as to ones inability to be sufficient (or as I prefer to call it - the Hitchcock ‘Psycho’ syndrome),
    • mood disorders, and
    • a general failing in attempts to succeed.