Criminal Minds, the Mediterranean editions, is now, as I understand it, the only book E. Stanton Samenow available in Italian. It has a criminological theory that, to paraphrase the author's claims, is innovative and against the grain. According to that view "are not the poverty, divorce or violence in the media the causes of crime" but rather "a particular form mentis [criminals] - often evident in childhood - which differs from that of the alarming responsible citizens. "I bought the book Samenow making me high expectations, thinking that in one way or another would have dismantled piece by piece all my conviction, and revealing some kind of technical knowledge.
The first impact, immediately after the purchase, of course it was disappointing: I expected too much.
Where to suffrage of the thesis in question we would have to wait a number of experimental evidence instead I came across a countless series of interconnected stories at all, but by the incessant repetition starting the thesis which is at times punctuated with them. A few dozen pages were enough to convince me to have thrown my money for a bad book, but nevertheless I decided to stay the proceedings and continue reading the book until the end, hoping to get to the point of saying "I changed my mind" . It 'been so, but only in part.
For almost 200 pages the author only confirms the initial impression, while maintaining its style too colloquial and technical far. Feel free to say that although the author is presented on the back cover as a clinical psychologist who "has worked for thirty years as a researcher, physician, consultant and expert, specializing in criminal behavior, reading what I wrote made you more of a doubt. In particular, I had more than once in the sense that the definition of criminal Samenow tend to overlap with that of psychopath, with one peculiarity: that while the psychopath is usually perceived as a mental patient, and therefore as a person incapable of discernment, the criminal Samenow is in a healthy individual, extremely glossy, and therefore responsible for every mistake, first to last. But you only update on some recent research rather to realize that, in fact, the psychopath is not necessarily a symptomatic actual inability to imagine the reality.
I refer, by way of example, studies conducted by Amanda Lorenz and Joseph Newman , U niversity of Wisconsin , who deny the ' fairly entrenched idea of \u200b\u200bthe psychopath as a person unable to feel the slightest sympathy. Instead, their studies show that psychopaths are "very good record in what happens in the person they face, just do it without any sympathy or compassion." In the excerpt shown on the article No 220 of Contemporary Psychology , Entitled "A charm very dangerous. Psychopaths: exploiters born? , these two scholars speak openly of a" callous empathy "and" emotional paradox of psychopathy. " It 's just one of many steps that describe the psychopath, not as a mental patient who works in the throes of uncontrollable instincts, but as an individual who can well represent the world around him, although his "disturbing" genres obvious distortions than which is considered normal.
This is a view not necessarily in contrast with that on the criminals, Samenow, but points out that in reality the idea of \u200b\u200bthe author of Criminal Minds tent easily to confuse instinct and criminal psychopathy, so much so that sometimes goes so far as to use indiscriminately the terms "criminal" and "sociopathic" (synonym old enough for "psychopath", to be precise).
You can not say, however, that this confusion, as suspected if implemented, as in this case, by an expert psychologist, in itself contradicts the initial claim, a fact which in my opinion is affected when the concept of criminal comes to overlap with that of psychopath. It 'a fact that, up to a certain point, and without giving too much explanation, Samenow abstains totally from the question about the dynamics that lead an individual, criminal or psychopath, if you prefer to implement their practices "evil." The answer to this seemingly minor question comes to us only towards the end of the book, and it is precisely at this point that, almost magically, the quality of the text encounters a significant peak.
Samenow, like its predecessor Samuel Yochelson, believes that the criminal mindset can be transformed to provide the restraint of criminal tools that could help to rationalize their actions as a result of external events, how they might be violence in the family or frequenting bad company, and would, according Yochelson's thesis taken up by Samenow, the foreseeable effect of taking responsibility away from the crime, through to preserve the perception of himself as a victim of good dynamics can not be controlled by him as an individual. The "therapy" has instead signed Yochelson & Samenow the specific purpose of the criminal responsibility, and this is key that we must interpret the absence of the slightest attempt to understand the dynamics of the criminal mind that go beyond the pure concept of free will . In other words, come to the end of the book, you get to determine a suitable education modus operandi of the criminal without being in the least tried to explain why some people nascono o crescono con una mentalità irresponsabile.
Si va, così facendo, nella direzione opposta rispetto a quella percorsa dall'articolo citato pocanzi, il quale, contrariamente, non tocca nello specifico le modalità di trattamento dello psicopatico (alla cui definizione, a mio parere e come precedentemente detto, può essere ascritta quella di criminale delineata da Samenow), ma si concentra sulla comprensione delle cause scatenanti il fenomeno, ventilando la possibilità, desunta da alcuni studi, che la psicopatia avrebbe cause genetiche, o per esser più precisi si sarebbe sviluppata nel corso dell'evoluzione a ragione di un relativo vantaggio che lo psicopatico would against other individuals. It is not for me to determine whether this claim is true or not, but I can think about the educational method developed by Yochelson and refined by Samenow.
So what Yochelson Samenow trust in a somewhat rude treatment of the criminal : their idea is that the pity is only openly so that we have to exploit us and cheat us, and ultimately not to change their attitude. The only way to affect an individual's actions is to work on his mind, and that is why the work of two psychologists focuses primarily on a specific goal: to empower individuals that, for some reason, has never assumed its responsibilities. This takes place in a hard way in many respects in opposition to the "classic" is not criminal to tell their problems and track analysis and the psychologist attempts to resolve the inner conflicts of the patient, but the psychologist to talk, "hollowing out in all major defects ruthless analysis of the patient, informing it of the long-term effects of his actions and offering an alternative that takes the form of a very arduous process of education and self-education . The criminal, under this approach, you know that the alternatives to a life of crime are two: the suicide or a responsible life . Seizing on the break when a criminal conviction of his desire to pursue a life of crime, namely that when life does not offer that suffering and disappointment, this approach attempts to push the party to voluntarily accept to undergo a process accountability, which at this point it becomes the only solution palatable when compared to a life of failure and suicide. Samenow argues that its approach has been able to reintegrate offenders into society where other methods have almost always failed.
In my opinion, however, needs to be done for clarification. It 's true that it takes Samenow related only to the habitual criminals, or at least those subject to the "fallout", but despite all the anecdotes provided, however, seems to me that a force with which to assume that all these are repeat offenders according to their own mindset . If it is true that some people show a predisposition to crime already at a very early age, it is also true that criminals are born not only us, but we can become, in other words, that is, as a way of thinking that predisposes to crime can be shaped transform and irresponsible in a model citizen, so a normal person can develop under certain conditions, a criminal or antisocial attitudes. The same Samenow speaks of habitual criminals after the first sentence spontaneously become responsible persons, and reintegrated into society once led an exemplary life, so I would not be surprised if it were possible otherwise. Samenow not mince words excludes the idea that prisons can abbruttire people, but that a normal man, wrongly convicted, get out of prison changed, it seems plausible idea and in line with the same theory of mind followed by ' author of the book.
In this respect it seems to me also to understand that Samenow not take no account of ' effect of stigma that can impede the spontaneous reintegration of the offender into society. At times, reading the book, it seemed almost in a sense that the author was convinced to live in the best of all possible worlds, where the prison is only for criminals, and if parents beat their children is almost always the fault of the latter. I found it equally naive way to deal with the issue of terrorism, inevitably, talk of terrorism forces us even if a small extent to which evaluations are also political, and it seemed at least strange to see a fundamental inconsistency. A 151 page , Samenow says:
After talking with men and women who have committed almost every crime imaginable, I began to reflect on the applicability of what public figures che ho osservato, in particolare a capi di Stato che si sono resi responsabili di atrocità verso i loro concittadini, genocidio compreso, e alla mentalità di chi compie atti di terrorismo internazionale. [...]Con il pretesto di promuovere la propria causa, un criminale può nascondere le sue reali motivazioni che hanno più a che fare con l'affermazione della sua importanza, il rafforzamento della sua autorità e l'aumento del suo controllo che con la realizzazione di un vero e proprio sentito programma politico o sociale. Forse alcuni terroristi credono sinceramente in ciò che fanno, ma senza dubbio molti sembrano condividere le caratteristiche del criminale.
Stranamente, si discute con disinvoltura of September 11 and Taliban , but silence, as if to do a favor for someone, on many small inconsistencies in the behavior of our Heads of State .
In other passages of the book, on the occasion of the many anecdotes, Samenow described the criminal as an individual, being irresponsible, is to exploit the people, making life hell to members of his own family. Here, too, and imbues it with a certain naivety, Samenow silent on phenomena such as Mafia families, in which the crime is definitely a habit, but which are characterized by a remarkable group cohesion, often based just on family cohesion instead described in routine criminal psychologist seems to be lacking. However, it may well be that what seems like a close family, although around a criminal design, is actually a form very well prepared.
All these considerations do not detract, however, that the idea of \u200b\u200b"empowering therapy" is perfectly acceptable, but that should not be considered as the only viable strategy for the containment of crime. On the other hand, even if presented his method as something totally new, Samenow is not the only one who has examined the concept of responsibility as a step start of the fight against crime.
Although starting from different premises and people without considering the mindset described by Samenow, Philip Zimbardo, in the 70s, was working on theories, some of which reach the same conclusions but also extend the discussion to so-called normal people. Zimbardo, famous for the famous Stanford prison experiment , was one of the first psychologists to study empirically the deleterious effects that a given situation can have on individuals' cognitive abilities: the most striking result was to demonstrate how even a ordinary person, in particular conditions, is able to perform criminal acts while without changing the perception of himself as a decent man . Again, accountability becomes the key tool to respond diligently to the "evil" that resides in all of us.
In conclusion, although we can not deny that some people more than others are brought to the crime rather than for good conduct, the fact remains that anyone, either spontaneously or due to certain stimuli, we develop a criminal mindset, which apparently forms the basis of criminal conduct. E 'for This is why it seems to me misleading hesitate too dogmatic in part on distinctions like that between good and bad , for the simple fact that in both cases, the necessary condition for the "good" triumphs is always that of awareness and responsibility.
The same Zimbardo argues that psychology (in her case, social) is not a "scusologia", and that even if affected by a situation we are still responsible for our actions, as many psychologists modern (not to mention lawyers) seem to deny this assumption, probably, is with those who think Samenow scales; nevertheless, awareness and responsibility are constants, whether one wants to defend the temptations from the outside, is that our goal is to correct the distortions of our mentality.
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