Introduction to Forensic Psychology
Literature lecture 1
Badness, madness and the brain – the late 19th-century controversy on immoral
persons and their malfunctioning brains
William Bigg – killer of animals, molester of girls, torturer of siblings – ‘moral insanity or
congenital defect of the moral sense’ – linking immorality and neurobiology – immoral due
to disordered brain
Bad brains, bad persons: Historical background
o Beginning of 19th century – the reconceptualization of mental disorders as
encompassing all aspects of the human mind and behavior
o Pinel – insanity as mental disease that affects emotions, moral insanity, homicidal
mania
o Medical model of vice as pathology
o 19th century onwards – neuro/biology played a significant role in explaining mental
disorders
o Hereditary dominated at that point – immoral people – offspring of immoral
ancestry
o Theory of degeneration – it was hereditary, but also progressively worse with each
generation
o Darwin – morality as a high and complex development of a species – immorality is
reverse
o Cerebral underpinnings – moral areas in the skull (Gall and Spurzheim) – Moritz
Benedikt – occipital lobes
o Mental disorders of morality – brain dysfunctions
o Brain mediated external causes
Exemplary cases
William Bigg
o Torturing animals, his siblings
o Dangerous, vicious, cunning, devious, infantile, humorless, naïve
o Moral insanity – unethical behavior
o Older and more barbaric lower functions were uncontrolled and elicited wicked
behavior
o Brain-based explanations of immorality pose a legal responsibility
Charles J. Guiteau
o Heredity as a connection between neurological and mental disease
, o Abnormal brain – if that was the case then the autopsy needs to show it
Jane Toppan
o Nurse who murdered employers
o Not guilty by reason of insanity, became delusional in the asylum
o Insanity via hereditary – corrupted family
Patient E.
o No hereditary burden – however withdrawn and uncommunicative but imaginative
o Devious, manipulative
o ‘’moral idiot’’
o Cortex function ‘defective’ however no proof
Christiana Edmunds
o Defective brain
o Chocolate cream poisoner
o Intellect immaculate, no remorse for the poisonings
o Brain-based explanations – moral life is not an option
Bad brains, bad persons: late 19th century
Brain-based explanations for immorality
o many biological explanations
o Heredity, degeneration, evolutionary reversion and brain-based models
o Difference in opinions – brain-based explanations were not convincing then
Evidence for immoral brains
o No technologies to actually study it
o Dead brain analysis – no actual evidence but still a potent explanation
Immorality as mental disorder
o Moral mania, moral imbecility, moral insanity, moral derangement
o Immorality as epiphenomenon or symptom
Immorality VS criminality
o Biomedical explanations for criminality
o Difficult to discriminate between immoral lunatics in mere criminals
Rethinking immoral persons in terms of bad brains
o Observation, evaluation and reprimand
o New domain of predisposing and eliciting conditions – added to personhood and
moral state
o Divesting immoral persons of responsibility
, o Brain is nature – cannot be held accountable, people cannot be liable
o Also ramifications for the penal system
A new controversy: a contemporary case
o Brian Dugan – hampered functioning of brain
o Difference in today’s cases – contexts differ, hereditary explanations are less salient,
and models of genetics are not similar
o Brain as a NETWORK, not a localized thing
Conclusion
o Brain-based views in the 19th century were contested
o Neurological bases diverse – alluded dysfunction, not demonstrated
o emphasis on an immoral person’s adverse neurobiological constituents
indicated changes in thinking about immoral persons at the end of the 19th-century
o unity of neurobiology, mental disorder and immorality
o brain is evoked differently now
Lecture 1
Clinical forensic psychology – deviant behavior, personality, cognitions, prevention,
intervention, diagnostics, the intersection of different psychology disciplines, law, and
psychiatry
Examples of clinical forensics and the judicial system – are police and temporary
incarceration, prisons, penitentiary psychiatric centers (PPCs), pro-Justitia reporting, mental
health institutions on several levels, TBS clinics
A criminal career starts at an early age, with downward spiral problems, persistent problems
Become an expert on mental health care of youth and adult offenders, scientist-practitioner
– critically thinking about clinical practice, tackling, and analyzing issues from practice
History of forensic psychology
o Hippocrates
o Middle Ages – the right of containment (lock-up), legal guardianship lies with the
family
o 15th-17th century – the enlightenment
15th century – Madhouses
Possessed by the devil – witch hunts (16th-17th century)
Johannes Wier
- A turning point – age of enlightenment
o 18th century – French Evolution
o 1810 – Code Penal (France) – very strict
o 1809 in NL – Criminal Code of Law, 1811 – Code Penal (NL)
, o 1886 – Introduction of Code of Law
o More attention to psychological disorders – scientific approach
o Great Britain – moral treatment
o Several laws for containing mentally disordered
19th century
- Pinel – manie sans delire – state of mind without delusions
o More cases in which offenders are not punished on account of mental
conditions
- 1841. First Krankzinnigenwet – more supervision and improvement
- Later: TBS – severe offenses, not fully responsible, high risk of reoffending
Four explanations of mental disorders and crime:
- Heredity – psychological traits inherited from ancestors, heredity of criminal
behavior, immoral behavior deduced from physical traits
- Degeneration
- Evolution
- Neurological explanations
Juvenile criminal law – 19th and 20th century
- Before – no distinction between children and adults
- During Code Penal – without distinguishing judgement
- 1905 introduction – Kinderwetten
- From punishment and avenging to betterment
- Shift to modern law streams – importance of the offender not the offense – aimed at
betterment, appropriate and milder punishment
20th century
- Van Hamel proposition:
o Mild offenses – regulations or conviction – the aim is DETERRENCE
o Serious offenses – LT treatment
o Very serious offenses – TBR, 10-year treatment followed by reevaluation
o 1928 -Psychopathenwetten – TBS and treatment included in Dutch Law
o Many new institutions – Stop-law in 1933
Development after WWII
- Commission after-war law – nuanced view
- Utrecht school: Baan, Pompe, and Kempe – internationally leading
- Better care for offenders and special care for offenders with a mental disorder
- ’60 – increase duration TBS regulations
- Ca. 1995 – introduction Longstay facilities
Punishment or treatment?
Literature lecture 1
Badness, madness and the brain – the late 19th-century controversy on immoral
persons and their malfunctioning brains
William Bigg – killer of animals, molester of girls, torturer of siblings – ‘moral insanity or
congenital defect of the moral sense’ – linking immorality and neurobiology – immoral due
to disordered brain
Bad brains, bad persons: Historical background
o Beginning of 19th century – the reconceptualization of mental disorders as
encompassing all aspects of the human mind and behavior
o Pinel – insanity as mental disease that affects emotions, moral insanity, homicidal
mania
o Medical model of vice as pathology
o 19th century onwards – neuro/biology played a significant role in explaining mental
disorders
o Hereditary dominated at that point – immoral people – offspring of immoral
ancestry
o Theory of degeneration – it was hereditary, but also progressively worse with each
generation
o Darwin – morality as a high and complex development of a species – immorality is
reverse
o Cerebral underpinnings – moral areas in the skull (Gall and Spurzheim) – Moritz
Benedikt – occipital lobes
o Mental disorders of morality – brain dysfunctions
o Brain mediated external causes
Exemplary cases
William Bigg
o Torturing animals, his siblings
o Dangerous, vicious, cunning, devious, infantile, humorless, naïve
o Moral insanity – unethical behavior
o Older and more barbaric lower functions were uncontrolled and elicited wicked
behavior
o Brain-based explanations of immorality pose a legal responsibility
Charles J. Guiteau
o Heredity as a connection between neurological and mental disease
, o Abnormal brain – if that was the case then the autopsy needs to show it
Jane Toppan
o Nurse who murdered employers
o Not guilty by reason of insanity, became delusional in the asylum
o Insanity via hereditary – corrupted family
Patient E.
o No hereditary burden – however withdrawn and uncommunicative but imaginative
o Devious, manipulative
o ‘’moral idiot’’
o Cortex function ‘defective’ however no proof
Christiana Edmunds
o Defective brain
o Chocolate cream poisoner
o Intellect immaculate, no remorse for the poisonings
o Brain-based explanations – moral life is not an option
Bad brains, bad persons: late 19th century
Brain-based explanations for immorality
o many biological explanations
o Heredity, degeneration, evolutionary reversion and brain-based models
o Difference in opinions – brain-based explanations were not convincing then
Evidence for immoral brains
o No technologies to actually study it
o Dead brain analysis – no actual evidence but still a potent explanation
Immorality as mental disorder
o Moral mania, moral imbecility, moral insanity, moral derangement
o Immorality as epiphenomenon or symptom
Immorality VS criminality
o Biomedical explanations for criminality
o Difficult to discriminate between immoral lunatics in mere criminals
Rethinking immoral persons in terms of bad brains
o Observation, evaluation and reprimand
o New domain of predisposing and eliciting conditions – added to personhood and
moral state
o Divesting immoral persons of responsibility
, o Brain is nature – cannot be held accountable, people cannot be liable
o Also ramifications for the penal system
A new controversy: a contemporary case
o Brian Dugan – hampered functioning of brain
o Difference in today’s cases – contexts differ, hereditary explanations are less salient,
and models of genetics are not similar
o Brain as a NETWORK, not a localized thing
Conclusion
o Brain-based views in the 19th century were contested
o Neurological bases diverse – alluded dysfunction, not demonstrated
o emphasis on an immoral person’s adverse neurobiological constituents
indicated changes in thinking about immoral persons at the end of the 19th-century
o unity of neurobiology, mental disorder and immorality
o brain is evoked differently now
Lecture 1
Clinical forensic psychology – deviant behavior, personality, cognitions, prevention,
intervention, diagnostics, the intersection of different psychology disciplines, law, and
psychiatry
Examples of clinical forensics and the judicial system – are police and temporary
incarceration, prisons, penitentiary psychiatric centers (PPCs), pro-Justitia reporting, mental
health institutions on several levels, TBS clinics
A criminal career starts at an early age, with downward spiral problems, persistent problems
Become an expert on mental health care of youth and adult offenders, scientist-practitioner
– critically thinking about clinical practice, tackling, and analyzing issues from practice
History of forensic psychology
o Hippocrates
o Middle Ages – the right of containment (lock-up), legal guardianship lies with the
family
o 15th-17th century – the enlightenment
15th century – Madhouses
Possessed by the devil – witch hunts (16th-17th century)
Johannes Wier
- A turning point – age of enlightenment
o 18th century – French Evolution
o 1810 – Code Penal (France) – very strict
o 1809 in NL – Criminal Code of Law, 1811 – Code Penal (NL)
, o 1886 – Introduction of Code of Law
o More attention to psychological disorders – scientific approach
o Great Britain – moral treatment
o Several laws for containing mentally disordered
19th century
- Pinel – manie sans delire – state of mind without delusions
o More cases in which offenders are not punished on account of mental
conditions
- 1841. First Krankzinnigenwet – more supervision and improvement
- Later: TBS – severe offenses, not fully responsible, high risk of reoffending
Four explanations of mental disorders and crime:
- Heredity – psychological traits inherited from ancestors, heredity of criminal
behavior, immoral behavior deduced from physical traits
- Degeneration
- Evolution
- Neurological explanations
Juvenile criminal law – 19th and 20th century
- Before – no distinction between children and adults
- During Code Penal – without distinguishing judgement
- 1905 introduction – Kinderwetten
- From punishment and avenging to betterment
- Shift to modern law streams – importance of the offender not the offense – aimed at
betterment, appropriate and milder punishment
20th century
- Van Hamel proposition:
o Mild offenses – regulations or conviction – the aim is DETERRENCE
o Serious offenses – LT treatment
o Very serious offenses – TBR, 10-year treatment followed by reevaluation
o 1928 -Psychopathenwetten – TBS and treatment included in Dutch Law
o Many new institutions – Stop-law in 1933
Development after WWII
- Commission after-war law – nuanced view
- Utrecht school: Baan, Pompe, and Kempe – internationally leading
- Better care for offenders and special care for offenders with a mental disorder
- ’60 – increase duration TBS regulations
- Ca. 1995 – introduction Longstay facilities
Punishment or treatment?
