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The correlation between mental disorders and terrorism is weak

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Ardavan Khoshnood*
Affiliation:
Resident in Emergency Medicine, Lund University, Skane University Hospital, Department of Clinical Sciences Lund, Emergency and Internal Medicine; MSc Criminology, Department of Criminology, Malmö University; BSc Intelligence Analysis, Lund University, Lund, Sweden; email: ardavan.khoshnood@med.lu.se
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Abstract

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This is an open-access article published by the Royal College of Psychiatrists and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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Copyright © 2017 The Author

Hurlow et al Reference Hurlow, Wilson and James1 contradict the assertion that severe mental illness does not have a significant role ‘overall in the area of terrorism’. The authors state that there is evidence for mental illness in cases of lone-actor terrorism, suggesting that these cases are more likely to come to the attention of psychiatrists.

I strongly disagree with the authors. Although there are several psychological factors contributing to radicalisation, experts in terrorism studies agree that those who commit acts of terrorism ‘are not mentally disturbed’. Reference Alonso, Björgo, Della Porta, Coolsaet, Khosrokhavar and Lohelker2

There is little consensus in the literature regarding the importance of mental illness in lone-actor terrorism. However, the evidence suggests that mental illness is not a key factor contributing to acts of violence in these cases. Reference Danzell and Maisonet Montañez3 It is therefore erroneous to insinuate that psychiatrists have a role in identifying these individuals. It is also highly questionable whether a ‘future potential Breivik’ would – or could – be identified by psychiatrists. In the case of Breivik, the forensic psychiatric evaluation concluded that although he has narcissistic personality disorder, he was not affected by a serious mental disorder when committing the act of terrorism, nor at the time of the evaluation.

The role of individual preventive interventions is limited in preventing relapse in regular criminality Reference Khoshnood and Väfors Fritz4 and remains highly controversial with regards to terrorism. Reference Ranstorp and Ranstorp5 The question of terrorism and mental health is extremely relevant and important, and warrants further study. However, the evidence to date shows a weak correlation between mental disorders and terrorist acts.

References

1 Hurlow, J, Wilson, S, James, DV. Protesting loudly about Prevent is popular but is it informed and sensible? BJPsych Bull 2016; 40: 162–3.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
2 Alonso, R, Björgo, T, Della Porta, D, Coolsaet, R, Khosrokhavar, F, Lohelker, R, et al. Radicalisation Processes Leading to Acts of Terrorism. A concise report prepared by the European Commission's Expert Group on Violent Radicalisation. Submitted to the European Commission on 15 May 2008.Google Scholar
3 Danzell, OE, Maisonet Montañez, LM. Understanding the lone wolf terror phenomena: assessing current profiles. Behavioral Sciences of Terrorism and Political Aggression 2016; 8: 135–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
4 Khoshnood, A, Väfors Fritz, M. Offender characteristics: a study of 23 violent offenders in Sweden. Deviant Behavior 2016. DOI: 10.1080/01639625.2016.1196957.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
5 Ranstorp, M. Introduction: Mapping Terrorism Research. In Mapping Terrorism Research: State of the art, gaps and future direction (ed Ranstorp, M). Routledge, 2007.Google Scholar
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