I hope that, once and for all, the message is clear — someone who has a mental illness is at no greater risk for violent crime. So says a new study that looked at the rate of violent crime in over 8,000 people diagnosed with schizophrenia between 1973 and 2006, and a control group of 80,000 people from the general population of Sweden.
According to the new study published in JAMA, five percent of the general population was convicted of violent crime during this time period, compared to eight percent of those with schizophrenia and no substance abuse, which was not a statistically significant difference. These results echo previous research in the U.S. that has also found no significant relationship between mental illness and violence.
What the study did find was that the overrepresentation of individuals with schizophrenia in violent crime is almost entirely attributable to concurrent substance abuse. That means that you will only find a statistically significant increase in violent acts in people with mental illness when substance abuse is also present. (Not surprisingly, you will find the same association in people without mental illness too — alcohol and drugs make people do things they ordinarily wouldn’t do. So this association is not unique to people with a mental disorder.)
I’ve written about this issue time and time and time again, because the media often looks for a scapegoat to blame a random act of violence on the fact that someone had a mental disorder. Meanwhile, too often mainstream media fails to put these relationships into any type of context or proper perspective, making it seem like anyone with a mental illness is far more prone to violence than someone without one.
The research is clear. There’s now a sufficient body of empirical data showing that this relationship between mental illness and violence must be seen for what it is — an attempt to further discriminate amongst people with mental disorders and take from them their due process and dignity.
Read the full news article: Schizophrenia Does Not Influence Risk of Violent Crime
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Links to This Article
Conspirama (5/22/2009)
No Significant Relationship Between Violent Crime and Mental … (5/22/2009)
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4 Comments to
“No Significant Relationship Between Violent Crime and Mental Illness”
Wish the soldiers could benefit from such research.
Glad to see this study and that it’s been getting so well publicized. I’ve had psychology professors who said things like ‘people with schizophrenia can be dangerous’. I cringe thinking, ‘Don’t say that! This is how stigma gets formed!’ Lots of people can be dangerous don’t go spreading the negative stereotypes.
This article missed two essential facts necessary to a true understanding of this issue. One, substance abuse is a mental disorder (see DSM-IV). Two, substance abuse comorbid with paranoid personality or paranoid schizohrenia is an extremely high risk factor for future violence. Numerous studies point this out clearly. Otherwise, the article is accurate.
Substance abuse and alcoholism live in a world unto themselves. While technically true that these are considered mental disorders, they are rarely treated by the same professionals or considered amongst the same people who have a mental illness. In some states, they are even handled by completely different human service agencies.
Perhaps this is because alcoholism and substance abuse are something someone does — initially, at least — voluntarily, and undertakes it for recreational purposes. These substances then directly affect the body and brain chemistry and, interacting with genetics, can make a person codependent fairly quickly.
This is significantly different than every other mental disorder, where there is no external substance being taken that causes the depression, anxiety or mania or ADHD or what-not.
Once you take away the substance abuse/alcoholism, there is no significant effect for violence. And that’s the main point.
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Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 22 May 2009
