Understanding and Preventing Violence, Volume 2: Biobehavioral Influences (1994)
Chapter: Violent Offenders - Nonsex Crimes
Violence as the Independent Variable—Is There a Brain Disorder in Such Patients?
In the work reviewed in this section, the primary focus of the study was on the symptom of violence per se, rather than as a component or additional symptom of some other disorder (i.e., schizophrenia, alcoholism, epilepsy). Two subgroups of investigations are presented: in one, violent sexual offenders were the focus of the study (Table 8); the other dealt with non-sex offenders (Table 7). In all of those studies, however, the intent of the investigators was to determine whether available neurodiagnostic tests could detect a consistent pattern of brain disorder or disorders that could account for the symptom(s). A particular interest has to do with whether or not limbic system pathology or dysfunction can be identified.
Violent Offenders—Nonsex Crimes
There were seven studies or literature reviews related to this topic during our selected reporting period (ca. 1974–1989) (Table 7). In six of these, it was concluded that there was an association between aggressive/violent behavior and brain abnormalities (Bach-Y-Rita et al., 1971; Lewis et al., 1986; Volkow and Tancredi, 1987; Hendricks et al., 1988; Andrew, 1980; Brickman et al., 1984). The studies ranged from comparisons of left-handed juvenile delinquents (less violent) with right-handed juvenile delinquents (more violent) (Andrew, 1980), through neuropsychologic assessment of felonious delinquents (Brickman et al., 1984), to studies of episodically violent patients (Bach-Y-Rita et al., 1971; Volkow and Tancredi, 1987) and persons sentenced to death for violent crimes (Lewis et al., 1986). The studies by Volkow and Tancredi (1987) and by Hendricks et al. (1988) are of special interest because they employed, respectively, positron emission tomography and regional cerebral blood flow measurements to assess brain abnormalities. Both of these "high-tech" biomedical studies reported positive findings. Langevin et al. (1987) found impairment on the Reitan neuropsychologic battery (presumably reflecting brain damage or dysfunction) in one-third of 18 males facing murder or manslaughter charges. However, as noted above in the discussion of violent acts among men with a diagnosis of schizophrenia (Table 3), the high prevalence of alcohol and drug abuse in these accused murderers prevents an unequivocal interpretation of the results. Only the study by Mungas (1983) (Table 7), on the basis of comparisons among various subgroups of patients differing in the degree or
