Secrets in the Brains of People Who Have Committed Murder

Amazing stuff! Are we coming finally closer to answer an age old question what distinguishes individuals who murder other humans? What is a criminal mind? Will we finally be able to offer treatments before the murder happens? Quite possible!

Kudos to the principal investigator of this comprehensive and carefully designed study, Kent Kiehl! What an enormous effort over several years!

"... the 200 men who had committed homicide showed significantly reduced gray matter in several brain regions that play important roles in behavioral control and social cognition ... As in the current study ... deployed the mobile scanner to collect MRI scans of the incarcerated teens in New Mexico and discovered differences between those who had committed homicide and their imprisoned peers. The homicide offenders “had significantly less gray matter volume in parts of their temporal lobes,” Cope says. When Kiel compared the data from that study with the results of his latest project, he found a high degree of overlap.  . . . we found and replicated every region that was different in the boys and was different in the adult males, and in the same way,” ... The latest study’s finding that MRI data can distinguish homicide offenders not only from people who committed non-violent crimes, but also from those who performed other violent crimes"

Secrets in the Brains of People Who Have Committed Murder | The Scientist Magazine®: MRI scans from more than 800 incarcerated men pinpoint distinct structural features of people who have committed homicide, compared with those who carried out other crimes.