The Role of Mental Illness in Mass Shooting Incidents

Mass shooting has been an old vice of our social system. It is believed that these tragedies take place primarily due to the mental illness or some trauma faced during the early life of the shooter. The shooter gets pleasure killing so many people at one time. He feels powerful and authoritative. It is often found that mass shooters have a history of psychiatric illness (Leonard et al., 2014). Psychologists are of the opinion that these gunmen might have faced some trauma in their early childhood that has left a deep impact in them. Thus, they feel that society should get back what they had felt before. This essay argues that mental illness paves the way for mass shooting and the people having mental illness have more chances of committing acts of crime.

This essay states that child hood abuse or that of drug addiction can cause an individual to face mental disorder that can propel an individual towards violence. Often history of childhood abuse, drug addiction, loss of near and dear ones, encountering violence can lead to severe psychological disorder. It has been observed that majority of the mentally ill people are never diagnosed in their lifetime (Rogers & Pilgrim, 2014). Gunmen and shooters are mostly diagnosed with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. People with mental illness are also vulnerable in taking their own life. However, some psychologists are often of opinion that not all mentally ill people are engaged in mass killings as they have their own struggles and vulnerabilities. It is wrong to say that only mentally ill people are shooters. Many believe that criminals are made and not born criminals. The recent happening of Orlando massacre in Orlando, Florida is one of the popular massacres in history (Zambelich & Hurt, 2018). A gunman aged twenty-nine, open fired at a night club killing forty nine people and injuring at least fifty. Another massacre that shook the entire world was the Paris attack on November 15, 2015 (BBC.com, 2018). It is considered as one of the deadliest attacks in the history of France. Several places were attacked including a concert, nightclubs and restaurants.  One hundred and thirty innocent people were brutally killed. The brutality of such attacks are ingrained on the minds of the victims who survived the attacks.

However, it is illogical and partial to state the relationship between mental illness and mass shooting incidents or gun violence committed by individuals as mentioned above. Even though some of these happenings that have occurred in the past have been proved to be the deadly work of people who were suffering from serious mental illness. However, no concrete evidence have been established behind the motive or the factors that may trigger the convict to engage in such violent act. In fact, it has been observed that people with serious mental illness committing the tragic act of mass shooting is less than 1% of all yearly gun-related homicides (Leonard et al., 2014). Furthermore, it has been observed that only 3% of individuals suffering from serious mental illness are engaged or associated with the violent crimes such as mass shooting, gun violence and so on (Jones, 2013).

Childhood Trauma and Mental Disorder

This essay points out that media plays an important role in linking mental disorder with that of the gun violence. According to McGinty, Webster & Barry (2013), the media is heavily responsible behind this stereotypical assumption of establishing the link between mental disorder and gun violence incidents. Although there have been certain researches conducted upon the factors that may have triggered such mass shooting incidents. The findings of the researches are not valid enough to find out the concrete evidence to establish a relationship between mental illness and mass shooting incidents. On the other hand, a study conducted upon approximately 185 mass shooting incidents, criminologist Grant Duwe found out that approximately 59% of people that have committed a crime of mass shooting or similar from the period of 1900 to 2017 have been suffering from mental illness or has shown signs of such illness before committing such criminal act (Llorente, 2018).

This essay states that mental illness often goes unrecognized that causes an individual to inflict violent acts. In addition to this, it has been also observed that majority of times the convict may show signs of such mental disorder before committing the crime. However, these signs go unrecognized or undiagnosed by the general public eye. Henceforth, there have been many health advisory messages issued by the government that raises the issue of mental illness and its awareness among the general public. In addition to this, the link between mental illness and mass shooting have been publicized by the media heavily. It has been also observed that the intensity of mental illness significantly influences an individual’s self-control (Flannery, Modzeleski & Kretschmar, 2013). Since the diagnosis of mental illness goes unrecognized most of the time, the untreated medical condition as such puts a greater risk of individuals increased level of mental illness. The severe level of mental illness is considered to be linked with unpredictable actions of the individual and lack of self-control as well. According to Fox & DeLateur (2014), individuals suffering from untreated mental disorder are likely to trigger unpredictable act which often lead to committing such violent actions such as mass shooting. The ability to control the different emotions is majorly diminished in such individuals and as a result of them triggers violence streak in them.

This essay states that abusive childhood causes the children to suffer from mental disorder that makes an individual commit the aberrant acts. It has also been observed that individuals suffering from a troubled childhood or abusive early childhood may develop the signs of mental disorder which ultimately contributes in committing such serious violent activities (Stein, 2013). According to Stuber et al., (2014) the early childhood period is extremely crucial for any individual to develop social behaviorism. Henceforth, people suffering from abusive childhood or troubled childhood seem to develop certain emotions that triggers them to engage or associate themselves in violent activities in future or in their youth. These triggers in future may contribute them to commit in such violent activities.

Henceforth, from the above discussion it can be said that the link between mental illness and violent activities such as massacre shooting incidents does not specifically establish any concrete evidence. The studies conducted upon between the two shows certain factors that link the two with each other. However, it can be also said from the above discussion that mental illness cannot always be related to be the cause of committing such violent criminal act. The signs of mental illness being undiagnosed and untreated may however lead to trigger an individual to commit or engage in such criminal activities.

References

BBC.com, (2018), Paris attacks: What happened on the night. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34818994

Flannery, D. J., Modzeleski, W., & Kretschmar, J. M. (2013). Violence and school shootings. Current psychiatry reports, 15(1), 331.

Fox, J. A., & DeLateur, M. J. (2014). Mass shootings in America: moving beyond Newtown. Homicide studies, 18(1), 125-145.

Jones, P. B. (2013). Adult mental health disorders and their age at onset. The British Journal of Psychiatry, 202(s54), s5-s10.

Leonard, C. H., Annas, G. D., Knoll IV, J. L., & Tørrissen, T. (2014). The case of Anders Behring Breivik–Language of a lone terrorist. Behavioral sciences & the law, 32(3), 408-422.

Llorente, E. (2018). How prevalent is mental illness in mass shootings?. Retrieved from https://www.foxnews.com/us/how-prevalent-is-mental-illness-in-mass-shootings

McGinty, E. E., Webster, D. W., & Barry, C. L. (2013). Effects of news media messages about mass shootings on attitudes toward persons with serious mental illness and public support for gun control policies. American Journal of Psychiatry, 170(5), 494-501.

Rogers, A., & Pilgrim, D. (2014). A sociology of mental health and illness. McGraw-Hill Education (UK). 268-273.

Stein, A. (2013). Prologue to violence: Child abuse, dissociation, and crime. Routledge. 161-178.

Stuber, J. P., Rocha, A., Christian, A., & Link, B. G. (2014). Conceptions of mental illness: Attitudes of mental health professionals and the general public. Psychiatric services, 65(4), 490-497.

Zambelich, A. and Hurt, A. (2018). NPR Choice page. [online] Npr.org. Available at: https://www.npr.org/2016/06/16/482322488/orlando-shooting-what-happened-update [Accessed 10 Nov. 2018].