Oh my, that was a lot of stuff over night. Let me just some points pick out that triggered my attention (and because it's long, I take the freedom to split it in several posts):
- Hickey's Trauma Control Model
Hickey is like MacDonald an attempt to explain and at that, rather a theory. I am always very careful with such things because, as most theories in that field, they have three little glitches:
a.) They are based on statistics and individual interviews. Which don't put in consideration that the statistical studies are all focused on sexual predators and ignored any other motivations from the scratch. But even more, the individual interview part is prone to failure. We have seen that with the MacDonald Triad. Profilers handed caught SKs a questionnaire which also included the question for bed wetting beyond the age of 12. And the brighter ones said yes, preparing their insanity defenses, while the dumber ones said no because they wouldn't admit to it due to self-esteem reasons. It took 25 years to figure out, that most of the answers were intentionally wrong, which makes 1/3 of the triad worthless, but still a lot of people read about, don't know the backgrounds and go for it. Hickey on the other hand, starts with the assumption, that the in numbers not big enough base set of statistics would be complete and thus implemented involuntary in his work the LE's focus on sex as main driving source for all SKs, which, as we know today, is an incomplete picture. Hickey also made no difference between traumata during the development and permanent traumatic situations over phases of the development.
b.) Most of such models (not only Hickey) rely on a simplified use of words which has sneaked into the amateur area as well. Due to that, there is usually the term "control" or "urge to control" mentioned in SK cases. Nobody uses the nice word "power" anymore. But there is a fundamental difference between "power-assurance" behavior and "control-assurance behavior". Many SKs swing, depending on their outer life circumstances forth and back. Ted Bundy delivered a nice example. In times, his outer life was okay for him, he strangled and took a lot of time for control-assurance. In times, his outer life was a little harder, he beat his victims to death and the time he kept them to play for control was shorter (in fact, he abducted at least one victim in a situation, it was clear from the start, he couldn't keep her long, which indicates, his urge for power was primary in that phase).
Another simplified word use is "psychopath" and "sociopath". Mostly, both words, nowadays are, driven by popular literature and TV shows, used alternatively. But in fact, there are some differences. What MacDonald would identify would be, at best, a psychopath in the making. A sociopath is merely anti-social-personality disorder without the connected rage (which doesn't mean, a sociopath is a nice picture if you give him other reasons to kill). The difficult part is, if you go for casual behavioral markers, psychopath and sociopath in daily life have some similar traits. But if you got yourself a real psychopath, you got a killer, if you got a sociopath, it is highly likely, you got someone with a lack of emotional social understanding but no killer. For profiling, a mere sociopath would need an additional outer pressure to become a killer, only the psychopath comes as full package.
c.) Hickey puts in the middle of his theory the principles of acknowledgement and approval in the social environment a child grows up in. This means often family. While I freely admit, there is something in it, it doesn't appear as complete. There are millions of people, who had a not so lucky childhood (Hickey focuses on childhood traumata, he leaves later adult time traumata out of the equation anyway). I admitted it in other places, but my dad had no problem with alcohol, only without. And I assure you, it wasn't a nice sight, including some degree of violence. Fine, I grew up, and so did my brothers. None of us ever murdered someone (military action doesn't count here). And there are millions world wide. Most of them don't become killers, only a handful does. And Hickey ignores that numeric relationship of millions to one and claims, basically people who were negelcted and rejected in childhood, people who were confronted with violence, are basically all prone to become killers. So, personally I like to send some of those popular theories back to the drawing board.
