Divided Personality Theories

In the article, The Divided Self: Toward an Understanding of the Dark Side of the Serial Killer (Carlisle, 1993), the divided personality theory is explored to understand the mind-set of serial killers. The article explores the theory that serial killers have a divided personality, which explains that the individual has a good side and a bad side. The good side is described as a well-known community member that is often very intelligent, energetic, and actively involved in their communities. The bad side is eventually pressured to act out the murderous fantasies. These individuals resort to their vicious fantasies to avoid experiencing the painful memories and past life experiences they’ve endured; their personalities then become torn between

Each serial killer examined in the article had the capabilities of maintaining a socially high functioning lifestyle while committing the crimes, they are also able to make precise, creative, and logical decisions regarding the process of each crime. With this information, they had the ability to successfully understand the differences between right and wrong. The article also believes that serial killers should not be labelled psychopaths because although it may be adaptive to label the individuals behaviour, it does not explain the individual’s psychological well-being as to what has cause the person to kill for personal satisfaction. It also lacks the description as to why the person failed to possess consciousness. Lastly, it does not explain if the individual suffered psychological trauma in their early years, which resulted in the censoring of moral direction in society (Carlisle, p. 24,

Psychological experts should be able to work alongside criminals who have committed serious such as murder and/or show no remorse or guilt. The medical model explains that delinquency is a symptom of disease; the notion of pathology makes it possible to assume qualitative differences between delinquent individuals and their societal peers. The medical model is one of many primary prevention programs that examine and treat people who commit serious crimes and are deemed to have mental illnesses (Siegel & McCormick, 2015, p. 189). The medical model is viewed as a pretrial program that is implemented to divert offenders into non-punitive rehabilitative programs that is created to treat the offenders rather than punish them (Siegel & McCormick, 2015, p. 190). Carlisle (1993) does not agree the medical model is effective because he explains that the obsession of continuously allowing their urge to kill does not justify or excuse their actions of taking the lives of other individuals. He argues that the serial killer has enabled the process into creating their own monster within them. Furthermore, he explains that there is no way to rationalize the responsibility of the person’s decisions to commit the crimes. (Carlisle, p. 35,