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Crime and Mental Health

I want to do a Criminology and Psychology degree, it would be next to impossible but I would love to interview serial killers and understand why they do what they do, I'm just interested in understanding the Criminal mind.

Advice?

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Reply 1
????
Reply 2
Stop watching CSI and Dexter?
Do some research to know what you're getting yourself into and maybe work experience? To get a better idea of what it is
Original post by Sop.Hia
I want to do a Criminology and Psychology degree, it would be next to impossible but I would love to interview serial killers and understand why they do what they do, I'm just interested in understanding the Criminal mind.

Advice?


A lot of things in Criminology are next to impossible. There are far too many people reading psychology and criminology relative to the number of jobs the field can sustain - and not by a little bit. It's oversupply far in excess of almost anything else. Relative to something like law, there are a comparably large number of jobs in legal practise. There are very few jobs in criminology and tens of thousands of graduates every year. I've said this before - but more people graduate every single year with Psych and Crim degrees than actually currently practise.

This might be mitigated a little bit in coming years - isn't it 2020 when new police officers are going to be required to be graduates? I can see a hybrid law/criminology/policing degree becoming a thing at that point.

On point - people research serial killers for two purposes - general psychological/scientific research and for psychological profiling.

There are problems with this. First, serial killers are very rare. This makes them a tiny population to try and draw any conclusions from.

Second - psychological profiling isn't in any way proven and has a lot of serious problems. A lot of the media about serial killers is basically a cash cow for a small number of ex-FBI people looking to earn big money producing TV shows.

If you end up doing Criminology, I would think a fair proportion of it would be about just how wrong we are on just about everything. The FBI scrapped their Behavioural Science Unit for a reason. Pretty much everyone with any credit has given up on Psychological Profiling - because it's unscientific and it sucks.

Criminology is something you can do if you really like the subject, but in terms of career prospects, I wouldn't be too hopeful.
Original post by Sop.Hia
Yeah whatever, if I want to do it I'll do it, everyone else needs to stop trying to make me feel sh*t about my f*cking choice on here, bunch of stuck up TSR users the lot of you.

It's this kind of hubris that leads to all sorts of problems later on.

I'm not saying don't do criminology, I'm saying don't expect to get a career out of it without enormous challenges. Who knows - you might be one of the very few to buck the trend - but frankly I doubt it.
Original post by Trinculo
A lot of things in Criminology are next to impossible. There are far too many people reading psychology and criminology relative to the number of jobs the field can sustain - and not by a little bit. It's oversupply far in excess of almost anything else. Relative to something like law, there are a comparably large number of jobs in legal practise. There are very few jobs in criminology and tens of thousands of graduates every year. I've said this before - but more people graduate every single year with Psych and Crim degrees than actually currently practise.

This might be mitigated a little bit in coming years - isn't it 2020 when new police officers are going to be required to be graduates? I can see a hybrid law/criminology/policing degree becoming a thing at that point.

On point - people research serial killers for two purposes - general psychological/scientific research and for psychological profiling.

There are problems with this. First, serial killers are very rare. This makes them a tiny population to try and draw any conclusions from.

Second - psychological profiling isn't in any way proven and has a lot of serious problems. A lot of the media about serial killers is basically a cash cow for a small number of ex-FBI people looking to earn big money producing TV shows.

If you end up doing Criminology, I would think a fair proportion of it would be about just how wrong we are on just about everything. The FBI scrapped their Behavioural Science Unit for a reason. Pretty much everyone with any credit has given up on Psychological Profiling - because it's unscientific and it sucks.

Criminology is something you can do if you really like the subject, but in terms of career prospects, I wouldn't be too hopeful.


Interesting answer,but hasn't the behavioural science unit now simply the behavioural analysis unit ?Its not like the FBI has stopped using psychological profiling .
(edited 5 years ago)
You can just do Psychology and choose forensic psychology during 3rd year options, perhaps even year two. Then do a masters in forensic psychology, Newcastle do the best on imo, work placement with the police force.
Original post by bobby147
Interesting answer,but hasn't the behavioural science unit now simply the behavioural analysis unit ?Its not like the FBI has stopped using psychological profiling .


To the best of my understanding they moved on all the people from the original BSU and now the BAU does a lot of things, only one of which is offender profiling, but there has been a great deal of pressure to stop using offender profiling in favour of geographic or scene profiling.

The problem is they spent years training thousands of people in police forces round the country and there is a media industry built around the sanctity of offender profiling now - it's very difficult and sensitive for them to just say "we got that all wrong, it doesn't really work".
Original post by bobby147
Interesting answer,but hasn't the behavioural science unit now simply the behavioural analysis unit ?Its not like the FBI has stopped using psychological profiling .


The FBI still profile, unless my former university completely lied.
Original post by Sop.Hia
What sort of "hubris" will cause problems you tw*t


This sort.
Original post by Sop.Hia
What sort of "hubris" will cause problems you tw*t


There's really no need to be so hasty. He wasn't even saying don't do Criminology, he just stated it'll be difficult to get a career in the field. Not every area of study has a guaranteed career at the end but that doesn't mean you shouldn't pursue your degree, providing you're willing to put the effort in and hope for the best career-wise.

This is coming from someone else who also wants to do Criminology. It'll be difficult for me to get to my dream career (homicide detective) but I'm willing to try. Perhaps you should look into a similar career if you're genuinely interested in crime and the mental health aspects. You could also do forensic psychology as a degree as that's pretty similar.
Original post by Trinculo
To the best of my understanding they moved on all the people from the original BSU and now the BAU does a lot of things, only one of which is offender profiling, but there has been a great deal of pressure to stop using offender profiling in favour of geographic or scene profiling.

The problem is they spent years training thousands of people in police forces round the country and there is a media industry built around the sanctity of offender profiling now - it's very difficult and sensitive for them to just say "we got that all wrong, it doesn't really work".


I am not sure I agree it should be scrapped ,since there are actual psychologists working to make it better and can be of help sometimes
https://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug04/criminal.aspx
,but I do agree its overrated if you see how many times its on TV programs compared to its actual usefulness in solving crimes.
Its media portrayal is a good example of survivorship bias .
Why would it be impossible? Forensic psychology is a thing, it sounds like that. Go for it.
Original post by random_matt
The FBI still profile, unless my former university completely lied.


They are supposed to have finished with CIA because it's been demonstrated in their own reports to be art rather than science and in their own terms immeasurable. They can't even determine the frame of reference for its success. They've moved to geographic profiling which isn't in any way similar to CIA, and the people doing the CIA and who believed in it are supposed to have moved on. It wouldn't surprise me if people are still doing it, though.
Original post by bobby147
I am not sure I agree it should be scrapped ,since there are actual psychologists working to make it better and can be of help sometimes
https://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug04/criminal.aspx
,but I do agree its overrated if you see how many times its on TV programs compared to its actual usefulness in solving crimes.
Its media portrayal is a good example of survivorship bias .


I'm on the side of getting rid of behavioural type profiling all together. It's been proven to be far too problematic, and everyone agrees that it's not in any way scientific.

My main problem with it is that the populations are too small, there's no external validity and the whole premise is self-fulfilling (i.e. success is measured by cases solved. Success of a profile can't be measured by cases not solved)
Original post by Trinculo
I'm on the side of getting rid of behavioural type profiling all together. It's been proven to be far too problematic, and everyone agrees that it's not in any way scientific.

My main problem with it is that the populations are too small, there's no external validity and the whole premise is self-fulfilling (i.e. success is measured by cases solved. Success of a profile can't be measured by cases not solved)


Out of interest,how do you know so much of this stuff ?
Its odd to find a med student reading stuff like this.
Original post by bobby147
Out of interest,how do you know so much of this stuff ?
Its odd to find a med student reading stuff like this.


I'm not a medical student. I read Political Science and then PhD in political violence/crime/terrorism.
Original post by Trinculo
I'm not a medical student. I read Political Science and then PhD in crime.


Oh cool :tongue:!I swear I have seen you ,or someone with your avatar picture,in the medicine forums .
Oh wow.
Whats your thesis on :h:?
Original post by bobby147
Oh cool :tongue:!I swear I have seen you ,or someone with your avatar picture,in the medicine forums .
Oh wow.
Whats your thesis on :h:?


Whether or not terrorists are rational decision makers.

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