DP Tool Club 12/CD_ASCQ_12_0294.iso/vrac/leb94jan.zip/94JAN003.TXT

Text File | 1994-01-19 | 21KB | 453 lines

                     THE CAUSES OF VIOLENCE

                               By

                       John Monahan, Ph.D.
                   Psychologist and Professor
                          School of Law
                     University of Virginia
                    Charlottesville, Virginia


     I have been asked to summarize everything that we really
know about the biological, sociological, and psychological causes
of violence--in 20 minutes or less. Unfortunately, I think I can
do it.

     But, I warn you in advance what I cannot do--what no one can
honestly do--and that is to offer a neat, simple story that
explains why so many Americans are afraid to walk home alone at
night. Only people on the extremes of the political spectrum have
that luxury and that conceit.

     The political right believes that the root cause of violent
crime is bad genes or bad morals. Not so, says the left. The root
cause of violent crime is bad housing or dead-end jobs. And, I
tell you that while doing something about the causes of violence
surely requires a political ideology, the only way we can
determine what those causes are in the first place is to check
our ideologies at the door and to try to keep our minds open as
wide, and for as long, as we can bear.

     I realize that this is not easily done. But, if you give it
a try, which I urge you to do, I think that you will find that
violence does not have one root cause. Rather, violence has many
tangled roots. Some grow toward the left and some grow toward the
right. We have to find the largest ones, whichever way they grow,
and only then can we debate how to cut them off.

BIOLOGICAL CAUSES

     First, the biological causes. These are the easiest to talk
about, because there is not much to say.

     Many biological factors have been nominated as candidates
for causes of violence. Hormones like testosterone, transmitters
in the brain like serotonin, and blood abnormalities like
hypoglycemia are only a few that have been mentioned.

     Biological factors do not have to be hereditary. They could
be caused by a head injury, poor nutrition, or environmental
events, such as exposure to lead paint.

     Fortunately, the National Academy of Sciences just reviewed
hundreds of studies on the relationship between biology and
violence, and it came to one clear bottom-line conclusion: "No
patterns precise enough to be considered reliable biological
markers for violent behavior have yet been identified." (1) The
National Academy of Sciences found many promising leads that
should be vigorously pursued by researchers, but so far, it could
point to nothing as a proven, or even close to proven, biological
risk factor for future violence.

SOCIOLOGICAL CAUSES

     Next come the sociological causes. We know the most about
social factors and violence, because social factors, such as
demography, are relatively easy to measure and because people
have been measuring them for a long time. What do we know? We
know a great deal about a relatively small number of things.

     We know that to live in America is to live in the land of
the brave, as well as in the home of the free. We are all
familiar with depressing statistics about the U.S. trade deficit
with Japan. But more depressing is this Nation's crime surplus.
Compared with Japan, a nation of roughly comparable
industrialization, with cities much more crowded than ours, the
U.S. homicide rate is over 5 times higher, the rape rate is 22
times higher, and the armed robbery rate is an astounding 114
times higher. (2)

     We also know that within America, violence is subject to
great regional variation. The murder rate, for example, is almost
twice as high in the South as it is in the Northeast, but the
robbery rate is almost twice as high in the Northeast as it is in
the South. (3)

     We know that communities within all regions of America
differ drastically among themselves in how violent they are. In
general, the smaller the community, the lower the rate of
violence. Within the same city, some neighborhoods have rates of
violent crime 300 times higher than other neighborhoods. (4)

     We know that people who commit violence on the street are
disproportionately poor and unemployed. Prior to their arrest,
jail inmates had, on the average, an annual income at the Federal
Government's official "poverty level," and about one-half were
unemployed at the time they committed a violent crime. (5)

     We know that the overwhelming majority--close to 90
percent--of the people arrested for crimes of violence are men
and that despite enormous changes in gender roles in recent
decades, this figure has not budged for as long as criminal
records have been kept. (6) Indeed, there is no place in the
world where men make up less than 80 percent of the people
arrested for violence, now or at any time in history. (7)

     We know that violence is primarily the work of the young.
People in their late teens and twenties are much more likely to
be arrested for violence than younger or older people. (8)

     We know that the arrest rate--and the victimization rate--
for violent crime for African-Americans is now about six times
higher than for whites. (9)

     Finally, we know that official violent crime rates, as high
as they are, drastically underestimate the actual rate of
violence in America, particularly violence within the family.
(10)

     After this, what we know about the sociological correlates
of violence falls off rapidly. Note that I said "correlates," not
"causes."

     Two problems keep us from knowing which factor really
matters as a cause of violence and which is irrelevant. One
problem is that each factor relates not only to violence but to
other sociological factors as well. Call this the "ball of wax"
problem. Poverty and race, for example, are related not just to
violence but also to each other. If poverty is taken into
account, the effect of race on violence decreases drastically,
and in some studies, disappears entirely.

     The second problem is that it is sometimes hard to tell
which came first, the sociological factor or the violence. Call
this the "cause and effect" problem.

     It is true, of course, that violence does not cause people
to be male or to be young. But it is not clear whether
unemployment leads people to commit violent acts or whether, for
at least some people, their violent acts lead employers to not
want to hire them. It is also possible that, at least for some
people, a third factor--like an "impulsive" temperament--causes
them both to be violent and to be unlikely to keep a steady job.
(11)

PSYCHOLOGICAL CAUSES

     Finally, the psychological causes. If research on violence
were like stock on Wall Street, then I would put my money right
now on psychology. By this, I most emphatically do not mean
mental disorder. The best epidemiological evidence indicates that
major mental disorder accounts for, at most, 3 percent of the
violence in American society. (12)

     What I mean, instead, are the developmental processes that
we all go through, most of us more or less successfully, but some
of us with great difficulty. I mean particularly the family
(13)--the filter through which most of the sociological factors,
such as a parent's being unemployed, and many of the biological
factors, like poor nutrition, seem to have their effect on a
child growing up.

     There is a risk, of course, that whenever someone talks
about families and children, that person invokes images that may
never have existed, except perhaps on 1950's television. And,
even if these images did once exist, they surely no longer
reflect the great variety of relationships in contemporary
America.

     But, whether we prefer Ozzie and Harriet Nelson or Murphy
Brown, there is one important thing we should not forget. That
is, all types of families share something in common. Whether they
are married or cohabitating, biological or adoptive or foster,
single or dual, gay or straight, and whatever their ethnicity,
virtually all parents try to raise their children to be neither
the victims nor the perpetrators of violence.

     Fortunately, most families, whatever their type, succeed.
Unfortunately, some fail.

FAMILY, CHILDREN, AND VIOLENCE

     What do we know about families and children and violence?

     We know that while many aggressive children go on to be
law-abiding adults, aggression at age 8 significantly predicts
violent convictions well into the thirties, in every culture in
which it has been studied. (14)

     We know that most children who have been physically abused
by their parents go on to be perfectly normal adults. Yet,
physical abuse doubles the risk that a boy will have convictions
for violent crime as an adult. (15)

     We know that failure of a child in school is one of the most
enduring correlates of later violence. Four out of five violent
offenders in prison never finished high school. (16)

     We know that stability matters. The more changes of
placement a foster child experiences while growing up, the more
likely that child will later be arrested for a violent crime.
(17)

     We know that lack of parental supervision has been
consistently related to delinquency, including violent
delinquency. One study, for example, found that 10 percent of
nondelinquents were poorly supervised by their parents, one-third
of one- and two-time delinquents were poorly supervised, and over
three-quarters of repeat offenders were poorly supervised. (18)
Another study found that for children growing up in very
disadvantaged and violent neighborhoods, who look like they have
everything going against them, the one factor that seems to
protect that child from growing up to be violent is having a
parent--overwhelmingly, a mother--who supervises her child very
strictly and who nips misbehavior in the bud, rather than waiting
for the principal to call or the police officer to knock on the
door. (19)

     Finally, we know much about the relationship between illegal
drugs and violence. But it is important to remember that the
connection between one legal drug--alcohol--and violence is
beyond dispute. About one-third of all violent offenders are
alcoholic, and the earlier an adolescent starts to drink, the
more likely that teen will be violent as an adult. (20)

     These findings are not immune from either "ball of wax" or
"cause and effect" problems. Failure in school, for example, is
associated not only with violence but also with poor parental
supervision. And, it is not obvious whether frequent changes of
placement for a foster child leads to violence, or whether a
child's violence at home leads foster parents to give the child
back to the agency. But surely, the accumulated findings provide
reason to believe that families have an enormous influence, for
better or worse, on how children develop.

     None of these findings in any way negates the influence of
social conditions in giving rise to violence. Poor people, for
example, without adequate child care, may have a much more
difficult time monitoring their children's behavior than affluent
people with live-in help.

     Nor do the findings necessarily negate the possible
influence of biological factors. Nutrition, to give another
example, is something that parents literally put on the table for
the child to eat. But it is through the family that these things
have their effects and through the family that those effects
might best be redirected.

     We know some important things about violence, particularly
about the home environment and violence. But, we do not know
nearly enough about how to prevent violence in the first place or
how to stop it from happening again once it begins. How can we
learn more, so that 10 years from now, it will take a bit longer
to summarize the field?

LEARNING ABOUT VIOLENCE

     We can learn more if we do four things. We need to 1) make a
long-term national investment in research and development, 2)
have a coherent and coordinated Federal strategy for studying
violence, 3) implement a comprehensive and inclusive violence
research agenda, and 4) institute a program of rigorously
evaluated interventions to reduce violence.

     LONG-TERM NATIONAL INVESTMENT IN RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT
FOR A SAFER AMERICA--It takes resources to isolate the
biological, sociological, and psychological factors that are
associated with violence, to untangle the ball of wax in which
they are found, and to determine which are the causes of violence
and which are its effects. The National Academy of Sciences just
did an audit and concluded that the Federal Government spends a
total of $20 million a year on violence research, which works out
to about $3 per violent victimization. (21)

     Researchers always say that more money is needed for
research. But let me point out that the Nation's budget for
research on violence is considerably less than one-half what the
Federal Government will spend this year on mohair price
subsidies. (22) Nothing against goats, but a shortage of fuzzy
sweaters is not what is keeping people behind locked doors at
night.

     A COHERENT AND COORDINATED FEDERAL STRATEGY FOR STUDYING
VIOLENCE--Organizational responsibility for research on violence
is spread across a number of Federal agencies- the National
Institute of Justice, the National Institute of Mental Health,
the National Science Foundation, the Centers for Disease Control,
and several smaller programs. (23) Surely, we do not need a
"violence czar" to provide central management of the Nation's
research on violence. But we do need to be sure that all bases
are covered and that there is a forum where innovative ideas can
be shared and followed up quickly.

     Partnerships with private foundations may be particularly
cost-effective. The collaborations between the MacArthur
Foundation and the National Institute of Justice in funding the
Program on Human Development and Criminal Behavior and between
the MacArthur Foundation and the National Institute of Mental
Health in funding the MacArthur Risk Assessment Study are
exciting examples of strategic leveraging of public and private
resources. (24)

     A COMPREHENSIVE AND INCLUSIVE VIOLENCE RESEARCH AGENDA--The
agenda needs to promote the three kinds of research I mentioned--
biology, sociology, and psychology. It has to study them not in
isolation from one another but together as different pieces of
the same puzzle.

     The time is ripe to give some priority to studying
developmental influences and the effect of the family environment
on violence. But this has to include health-related and
biological factors that are mediated through the family, as well
as social and psychological influences. You cannot paint a full,
life-like picture of the causes of violence if you mark a corner
of the canvas ideologically off limits before you start painting.

     A PROGRAM OF RIGOROUSLY EVALUATED INTERVENTIONS TO REDUCE
VIOLENCE--This goes to the top of the agenda. We will finally
understand the causes of violence when we can take a group of
children at high risk of becoming violent and ethically offer
them opportunities and services to defy our predictions.

     The interventions should be intensive and broadly based in
practice, but initially, small-scale in scope. We simply do not
know enough to mount major national programs to attack the causes
of violence, even if we had the money to do so. But we certainly
do know enough to start trying many things in a completely
voluntary way, without unnecessarily labeling anyone, and see
what works. (25)

ONE APPROACH

     One modest idea is derived from the research on child
rearing that finds parental supervision so important in
preventing crime and violence. Taking a cue from studies like
this, we could offer an intensive, long-term, state-of-the-art
education program to a random group of parents whose children are
enrolled in Federal child care programs. (26) This program would
teach parents how to effectively monitor their children's
behavior, how to recognize potentially serious misbehavior when
it occurs, and how to consistently, but fairly, discipline their
children in response to misbehavior. (27)

     If this worked, if children whose parents received the
program had lower levels of aggression and other social problems
when compared to a control group, we could gradually expand the
program, rigorously evaluating its effects each step of the way.
If it did not work, we would go back to the drawing board, roll
up our sleeves, and try something different.

     A dozen ideas like this--none of them panaceas--could be
derived from research on children and families and tried
simultaneously in different parts of the country. If even a few
of them worked, we would have taken a giant leap forward in
violence prevention.

CONCLUSION

     The short of it is that first, we need to make a national
scientific commitment to understand the causes of violence. Once
this happens, we need to make a national political commitment to
do something about them.


ENDNOTES

     (1)  A. Reiss and J. Roth, eds., Understanding and
Preventing Violence (Washington, DC:  National Academy Press,
1993), 116.

     (2)  T. Westermann and J. Burfeind, Crime and Justice in Two
Societies: Japan and the United States (Pacific Grove, CA:
Brooks/Cole, 1991).

     (3)  R. Nisbett, "Violence and U.S. Regional Culture,"
American Psychologist, 48, 1993, 441-449.

     (4)  Supra note 1, p. 88.

     (5)  Bureau of Justice Statistics, Report to the Nation on
Crime and Justice, 2d ed. (Washington, DC: U.S. Department of
Justice, 1988), 49.

     (6)  Supra note 1, p. 72.

     (7) J. Wilson and R. Herrnstein, Crime and Human Nature (New
York:  Simon and Schuster, 1985).

     (8)  A. Blumstein, J. Cohen, J. Roth, and C. Visher,
Criminal Careers and "Career Criminals" (Washington, DC: National
Academy Press, 1986).

     (9)  Supra note 1, p. 71.

     (10)  J.Weis, "Family violence research methodology and
design," in Family Violence, L. Ohlin and M. Tonry, eds.
(Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1989), 117-162.

     (11)  See J. Monahan and L. Walker, Social Science in Law:
Cases and Materials, 3d ed. (Westbury, NY: Foundation Press,
1994).

     (12)  J. Monahan, "Mental disorder and violent behavior:
Perceptions and evidence," American Psychologist, 47, 1992,
511-521.

     (13)  R. Loeber and M. Stouthamer-Loeber, "Family factors as
correlates and predictors of juvenile conduct problems and
delinquency," in Crime and Justice: An Annual Review of Research,
vol. 7, M. Tonry and N. Morris, eds. (Chicago, IL: University of
Chicago Press, 1986), 29-149.

     (14)  D. Farrington, "Childhood aggression and adult
violence:  Early precursors and later-life outcomes," in The
Development and Treatment of Childhood Aggression, D. Pepler and
K. Rubin, eds. (Hillsdale, NJ:  Erlbaum, 1991), 5-29.

     (15)  C. Widom, "The Cycle of Violence," Science, 244, 1989,
160-166.

     (16)  Supra note 5, p. 48.

     (17)  Supra note 1, p. 243.

     (18)  G. Patterson and M. Stouthamer-Loeber, "The
correlation of family management practices and delinquency,"
Child Development, 55, 1984, 1299-1307.

     (19)  H. Wilson, "Parenting in Poverty," Journal of Social
Work, 4, 1974, 241-254.

     (20)  Supra note 1, p. 185.

     (21)  Supra note 1, p. 345.

     (22)  Budget of the United States Government-Fiscal Year
1993 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1992), Appendix
One-349.

     (23)  Supra note 1, p. 349.

     (24)  Ibid.

     (25)  E. Mulvey, M. Arthur, and N. Reppucci, "The prevention
and treatment of juvenile delinquency: A review of the research,"
Clinical Psychology Review, 13, 1993, 133-167.

     (26)  E. Zigler and S. Styfco, eds., Head Start and Beyond:
A National Plan for Extended Childhood Intervention (New Haven,
CT: Yale University Press, 1993).

     (27)  M. Gottfredson and T. Hirschi, A General Theory of
Crime (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1990).