

Is There a Link Between Mental Health and Gun Violence? - pmcpinto
http://www.newyorker.com/science/maria-konnikova/almost-link-mental-health-gun-violence

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dasmithii
Violent crime is, to some degree, a defining characteristic of mental
instability. Is it not? Should it be?

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DanBC
Are you suggesting that if someone commits a violent crime they must have some
kind of mental illness? And that we just haven't defined "prepared to commit
an act of violence" as a mental illness.

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dasmithii
I'm suggesting that these are commonly held beliefs, not that I hold them
personally. More so, I was looking for input on the subject, as my personal
experience in this area is virtually nonexistent.

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ctdonath
That's like asking if there's a link between IQ and computer usage. The answer
is unsurprising, a study establishing it is appropriate insofar as proving the
objective basis for the answer, but the interesting question is why someone
would actually fund such a project.

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DanBC
Did you read the article?

> When Swanson first analyzed the ostensible connection between violence and
> mental illness, looking at more than ten thousand individuals (both mentally
> ill and healthy) during the course of one year, he found that serious mental
> illness alone was a risk factor for violence—from minor incidents, like
> shoving, to armed assault—in only four per cent of cases. That is, if you
> took all of the incidents of violence reported among the people in the
> survey, mental illness alone could explain only four per cent of the
> incidents. When Swanson broke the samples down by demographics, he found
> that the occurrence of violence was more closely associated with whether
> someone was male, poor, and abusing either alcohol or drugs—and that those
> three factors alone could predict violent behavior with or without any sign
> of mental illness. If someone fit all three of those categories, the
> likelihood of them committing a violent act was high, even if they weren’t
> also mentally ill. If someone fit none, then mental illness was highly
> unlikely to be predictive of violence. “That study debunked two myths,”
> Swanson said. “One: people with mental illness are all dangerous. Well, the
> vast majority are not. And the other myth: that there’s no connection at
> all. There is one. It’s quite small, but it’s not completely nonexistent.”

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runamok
Thank you so much for the synopsis and illustrating one of the points of
scientific studies: Even if answers are a foregone conclusion surprising
results do occur. Even confirming the foregone conclusion has value.

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theVirginian
How many mentally healthy people have been perpetrators of school shootings?
My guess would be not many...

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DanBC
> But if you look at people like Jaylen Fryberg, Mason Campbell, or Karl
> Pierson, you see no formal diagnosis of mental illness, and often, no actual
> signs of instability, either.

From the article.

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001sky
Doe we need a scientific study?

Guns don't kill people.

People kill people.

Knives seem to be doing a good job lately.

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lomnakkus
> Doe we need a scientific study?

Uh, yes?

