Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-l7hp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-29T03:18:25.507Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Criminality and Violence in Epileptic Prisoners

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

John Gunn
Affiliation:
Institute of Psychiatry; Maudsley Hospital, London S.E.5
John Bonn
Affiliation:
St. Bartholomew's Hospital, London E.C.1 (Maudsley Hospital)

Extract

The belief that the phenomena of ‘crime’ and of ‘epilepsy’ are associated has a long history and probably was put in its most forceful form by Lombroso (1889; see Ferrero, 1911). Nobody now believes, as did Lombroso, that most criminals are epileptics, but the controversies surrounding the extent and form of any relationship have by no means yet been finally resolved.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1971 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alström, C. H. (1950). ‘A study of epilepsy in its clinical social and genetic aspects.’ Acta Psychiatrica et Neurologica Supplement 63.Google Scholar
College of General Practitioners (1960). ‘A survey of the epilepsies in general practice.’ British Medical Journal, ii, 416–22.Google Scholar
Ferrero, G. L. (1911). Criminal Man, New York.Google Scholar
Guerrant, J., Anderson, W. W., Fischer, A., Weinstein, M. R., Jaros, R. M., and Deskins, A. (1962). Personality in Epilepsy. Springfield, Ill. CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gunn, J. C. (1969a). ‘The prevalence of epilepsy among prisoners.’ Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 62, 60–3.Google ScholarPubMed
Gunn, J. C. (1969b). Epileptics in Prison. M.D. Thesis, University of Birmingham.Google Scholar
Gunn, J. C. and Fenton, G. W. (1969). ‘Epilepsy in prisons: a diagnostic survey.’ British Medical Journal, iv, 326–9.Google Scholar
Hill, D. (1953). ‘Psychiatric disorders of epilepsy.’ Medical Press, 229, 473–5.Google Scholar
Hill, D. and Pond, D. A. (1952). ‘Reflections on one hundred capital cases submitted to electroencephalography.’ Journal of Mental Science, 98, 2343.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lishman, W. A. (1968). ‘Brain damage in relation to psychiatric disability head injury.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 114, 373.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lombroso, C. (1889). L'Uomo Delinquente. Turin: Bocca.Google Scholar
Roth, M. (1968). ‘Cerebral disease and mental disorders of old age as causes of antisocial behaviour’ in The Mentally Abnormal Offender. Ciba Foundation, London.Google Scholar
Small, J., Hayden, M., and Small, I. (1966). ‘Further psychiatric investigations of patients with temporal and non-temporal lobe-epilepsy.’ American Journal of Psychiatry, 123, 303–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stafford-Clark, D., and Taylor, F. H. (1949). ‘Clinical and electroencephalographic studies of prisoners charged with murder.’ Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry, 12, 325–30.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Stevens, J. (1966). ‘Psychiatric implications of psycho-motor epilepsy.’ Archives of General Psychiatry, 14, 461–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, D. C. (1969). ‘Aggression and Epilepsy.’ Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 13, 229–36.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ursin, H. (1960). ‘The temporal lobe substrate of fear and anger.’ Acta Psychiatrica et Neurologica Scandinavica, 35, 378.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.