Finnish Homicides and Mental Disorders: An investigation of offense and offender characteristics

Although the majority of people with mental illness are not violent, scientific studies over the last decades show that certain psychiatric disorders increase the risk of violent behavior, including homicide. This thesis examined crime scene behaviors and offender background characteristics among mentally ill Finnish homicide offenders. Previously, homicide crime scene behaviors have been investigated in relation to offender demographic characteristics, whereas this study compares the behaviors of offenders with various mental illnesses. The study design was a retrospective chart review of the forensic psychiatric statements of Finnish homicide offenders. The work consists of four substudies. The aims of the study were as follows: To describe differences in the childhood and family backgrounds as well as in the adolescent and adult adjustment of Finnish homicide offenders belonging to different diagnostic categories (schizophrenia, personality disorder, alcoholism, drug addiction or no diagnosis). Further, the study examined associations between the crime scene behaviors and mental status of these offenders. Also, the distinguishing characteristics between two groups of offenders with schizophrenia were examined: early starters, who present antisocial behavior before the onset of schizophrenia, and late starters, who first offend after the onset of mental disorder. Finally, it was investigated how the use of excessive violence is associated with clinical and circumstantial variables as well as offender background characteristics among homicide offenders with schizophrenia. The main findings of the study can be summarized as follows. First, offenders with personality disorder or drug addiction had experienced multiple difficulties in their early environments: both family and individual problems were typical. Offenders with schizophrenia were relatively well-adjusted in childhood compared to the other groups. However, in adolescence and adulthood, social isolation, withdrawal and other difficulties attributable to these offenders illness became evident. In several aspects, offenders with alcohol dependency resembled offenders with no diagnosis in that these offenders had less problematic backgrounds compared to other groups. Second, the results showed that crime scene behaviors, victim gender and the victim-offender relationship differ between the groups. In particular, offenders with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or drug addiction have some unique features in their crime scene behaviors and choice of victims. Offenders with schizophrenia were more likely to kill a blood relative, to use a sharp weapon and to injure the victim s face. Drug addiction was associated with stealing from the victim and trying to cover up the body. Third, the results suggest that the offense characteristics of early- and late-start offenders with schizophrenia differ only modestly. However, several significant differences between the groups were found in characteristics of offenders: early starters had experienced a multitude of problems in their childhood surroundings and also later in life. Fourth, violent acts where the offender did not commit the offense alone or had previous homicidal history were predictive of excessive violence among offenders with schizophrenia. Positive psychotic symptoms did not predict the use of excessive violence. Nearly one third of the cases in the sample involved multiple and severe violence, including features such as sadism, mutilation, sexual components or extreme stabbing. In sum, mentally disordered homicide offenders are heterogeneous in their offense characteristics as well as their background characteristics. Empirically based information on how the offender s mental state is associated with specific crime scene behaviors can be utilized within the police force in developing methods of prioritizing suspects in unsolved homicide cases. Also, these results emphasise the importance of early interventions for problem families and children at risk of antisocial behavior. They may also contribute to the development of effective treatment for violent offenders.

Ancient Philosophers on Mental Illness

This dissertation is about ancient philosophers notions of mental illness, from Plato onwards. Mental illness here means disorders that, in ancient medical thought, were believed to originate in the body but to manifest themselves predominantly through mental symptoms. These illnesses were treated by physical means, which were believed to address the bodily cause of the illness, conceived of as an elemental imbalance or a state of cephalic stricture , for example. Sometimes the mental symptoms were addressed directly by psychotherapeutic means. The first and most important question explored concerns how the ancient philosophers responded to the medical notion of mental illness, and how they explained such illnesses in their theories of physiology and psychology. Although the illnesses are seldom discussed extensively, the philosophers were well aware of their existence and regarded their occurrence an indication of the soul s close dependence on the body. This called for a philosophical account. The second question addressed has to do with the ancient philosophers role as experts in mental problems of a non-medical kind, such as unwanted emotions. These problems were dubbed diseases of the soul , and the philosophers thus claimed to be doctors of the soul. Although the distinction between mental illnesses and diseases of the soul was often presented as rather obvious, there was some vagueness and overlap. There is still a third question that is explored, concerning the status of both mental illnesses and diseases of the soul as unnatural conditions, the role of the human body in the philosophical aetiologies of evil, and the medico-philosophical theories of psycho-physiological temperaments. This work consists of an introduction and five main chapters, focusing on Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics and Galen, and the Sceptics, the Epicureans and later Platonists. The sources drawn on are the original Greek and Latin philosophical and medical texts. It appears that the philosophers accepted the medical notion of mental illness, but interpreted it in various ways. The differences in interpretation were mostly attributable to differences in their theories of the soul. Although the distinction between mental illness and diseases of the soul was important, marking the boundary between the fields of expertise of medicine and philosophy, and of the individual s moral responsibilities, the problematic aspects of establishing it are discussed rather little in ancient philosophy. There may have been various reasons for this. The medical descriptions of mental illness are often extreme, symptoms of the psychotic type excluding the possibility of the condition being of the non-medical kind. In addition, the rigid normativeness of ancient philosophical anthropologies and their rigorous notion of human happiness decreased the need to assess the acceptability of individual variation in their emotional and intellectual lives and external behaviour.

Non-reductive Physicalism, Irreducibility of the Mental and the Problem of Mental Causation : A study of Donald Davidson's and Georg Henrik von Wright's positions in the philosophy of mind

In this study I consider what kind of perspective on the mind body problem is taken and can be taken by a philosophical position called non-reductive physicalism. Many positions fall under this label. The form of non-reductive physicalism which I discuss is in essential respects the position taken by Donald Davidson (1917-2003) and Georg Henrik von Wright (1916-2003). I defend their positions and discuss the unrecognized similarities between their views. Non-reductive physicalism combines two theses: (a) Everything that exists is physical; (b) Mental phenomena cannot be reduced to the states of the brain. This means that according to non-reductive physicalism the mental aspect of humans (be it a soul, mind, or spirit) is an irreducible part of the human condition. Also Davidson and von Wright claim that, in some important sense, the mental aspect of a human being does not reduce to the physical aspect, that there is a gap between these aspects that cannot be closed. I claim that their arguments for this conclusion are convincing. I also argue that whereas von Wright and Davidson give interesting arguments for the irreducibility of the mental, their physicalism is unwarranted. These philosophers do not give good reasons for believing that reality is thoroughly physical. Notwithstanding the materialistic consensus in the contemporary philosophy of mind the ontology of mind is still an uncharted territory where real breakthroughs are not to be expected until a radically new ontological position is developed. The third main claim of this work is that the problem of mental causation cannot be solved from the Davidsonian - von Wrightian perspective. The problem of mental causation is the problem of how mental phenomena like beliefs can cause physical movements of the body. As I see it, the essential point of non-reductive physicalism - the irreducibility of the mental - and the problem of mental causation are closely related. If mental phenomena do not reduce to causally effective states of the brain, then what justifies the belief that mental phenomena have causal powers? If mental causes do not reduce to physical causes, then how to tell when - or whether - the mental causes in terms of which human actions are explained are actually effective? I argue that this - how to decide when mental causes really are effective - is the real problem of mental causation. The motivation to explore and defend a non-reductive position stems from the belief that reductive physicalism leads to serious ethical problems. My claim is that Davidson's and von Wright's ultimate reason to defend a non-reductive view comes back to their belief that a reductive understanding of human nature would be a narrow and possibly harmful perspective. The final conclusion of my thesis is that von Wright's and Davidson's positions provide a starting point from which the current scientistic philosophy of mind can be critically further explored in the future.

Developmental origins of psychological vulnerability factors for mental disorders

Premature birth and associated small body size are known to affect health over the life course. Moreover, compelling evidence suggests that birth size throughout its whole range of variation is inversely associated with risk for cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes in subsequent life. To explain these findings, the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) model has been introduced. Within this framework, restricted physical growth is, to a large extent, considered either a product of harmful environmental influences, such as suboptimal nutrition and alterations in the foetal hormonal milieu, or an adaptive reaction to the environment. Whether inverse associations exist between body size at birth and psychological vulnerability factors for mental disorders is poorly known. Thus, the aim of this thesis was to study in three large prospective cohorts whether prenatal and postnatal physical growth, across the whole range of variation, is associated with subsequent temperament/personality traits and psychological symptoms that are considered vulnerability factors for mental disorders. Weight and length at birth in full term infants showed quadratic associations with the temperamental trait of harm avoidance (Study I). The highest scores were characteristic of the smallest individuals, followed by the heaviest/longest. Linear associations between birth size and psychological outcomes were found such that lower weight and thinness at birth predicted more pronounced trait anxiety in late adulthood (Study II); lower birth weight, placental size, and head circumference at 12 months predicted a more pronounced positive schitzotypal trait in women (Study III); and thinness and smaller head circumference at birth associated with symptoms of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children who were born at term (Study IV). These associations occured across the whole variation in birth size and after adjusting for several confounders. With respect to growth after birth, individuals with high trait anxiety scores in late adulthood were lighter in weight and thinner in infancy, and gained weight more rapidly between 7 and 11 years of age, but weighed less and were shorter in late adulthood in relation to weight and height measured at 11 years of age (Study II). These results suggest that a suboptimal prenatal environment reflected in smaller birth size may affect a variety of psychological vulnerability factors for mental disorders, such as the temperamental trait of harm avoidance, trait anxiety, schizotypal traits, and symptoms of ADHD. The smaller the birth size across the whole range of variation, the more pronounced were these psychological vulnerability factors. Moreover, some of these outcomes, such as trait anxiety, were also predicted by patterns of growth after birth. The findings are concordant with the DOHaD model, and emphasise the importance of prenatal factors in the aetiology of not only mental disorders but also their psychological vulnerability factors.

Early-onset depressive disorders,related mental health disorders and substance use-A prospective : longitudinal study of Finnish twins born 1983-1987

Early-onset psychiatric illnesses effects scatter to academic achievements as well as functioning in familial and social environments. From a public health point of view, depressive disorders are the most significant mental health disorders that begin in adolescence. Using prospective and longitudinal design, this study aimed to increase the understanding of early-onset depressive disorders, related mental health disorders and developing substance use in a large population-derived sample of adolescent Finnish twins. The participants of this study, FinnTwin12, an ongoing longitudinal population-based study, came from Finnish families with twins born in 1983-87 (exhaustive of five birth cohorts, identified from Finland s Central Population Register). With follow-up ongoing at age 20-24, this thesis assessed adolescent mental health in the first three waves, starting from baseline age 11-12 to follow-ups at age 14 and 17½. Some 5600 twins participated in questionnaire assessments of a wide range of health related behaviors. Mental health was further assessed among an intensively studied subsample of 1852 adolescents, who completed also professionally administered interviews at age 14, which provided data for full DSM-IV/III-R (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Health disorders, 4th and 3rd editions) diagnoses. The participation rates of the study were 87-92%. The results of the study suggest, that the diagnostic criteria for major depressive disorder (MDD) may not capture youth with clinically significant early-onset depressive conditions outside clinical settings. Milder cases of depression, namely adolescents fulfilling the diagnostic criteria for minor depressive disorder, a qualitatively similar condition to MDD with fewer symptoms are also associated with marked suicidal thoughts, plans and attempts, recurrences and a high degree of comorbidity. Prospectively and longitudinally, early-onset depressive disorders were of substantial importance in the context of other mental health disorders and substance use behaviors: These data from a large population-derived sample established a substantial overlap between early-onset depressive disorders and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in adolescent females, both of them significantly predictive for development of substance use among girls. Only in females baseline DSM-IV ADHD symptoms were strong predictors of alcohol abuse and dependence and illicit drug use at age 14 and frequent alcohol use and illicit drug use at age 17.½ when conduct disorder and previous substance use were controlled for. Early-onset depressive disorders were also prospectively and longitudinally associated to daily smoking behavior, smokeless tobacco use, frequent alcohol use and illicit drug use and eating disorders. Analysis of discordant twins suggested that these predictive associations were independent of familial confounds, such as family income, structure and parental models. In sum, early-onset depressive disorders predict subsequent involvement of substance use and psychiatric morbidity. A heightened risk for substance use is substantial also among those depressed below categorical diagnosis of MDD. Whether early recognition and interventions among these young people hold potential for substance use prevention further in their lives has potential public health significance and calls for more research. Data from this population-derived sample with balanced representation of boys and girls, suggested that boys and girls with ADHD behaviors may differ from each other in their vulnerability to substance use and depressive disorders: the data suggest more adverse substance use outcome for girls that was not attenuated by conduct disorder or previous substance use. Further, the prospective associations of early-onset depressive disorders and future elevated levels of addictive substance use is not explained by familial factors supporting future substance use, which could have important implications for substance use prevention.

Implications of co-twin dependence for twins' social interactions, mental health and alcohol use : A follow-up study of Finnish twins from adolescence to early adulthood

Objective: The aim of the present study was to examine co-twin dependence and its impact on twins' social contacts, leisure-time activities and psycho-emotional well-being. The role of co-twin dependence was also examined as a moderator of genetic and environmental influences on alcohol use in adolescence and in early adulthood. Methods: The present report is based on the Finnish Twin Cohort Study (FinnTwin16), a population-based study of five consecutive birth cohorts of Finnish twins born in the years 1975-1979. Baseline assessments were collected through mailed questionnaires, within two months of the twins' sixteenth birthday yielding replies from 5563 twin individuals. All respondent twins were sent follow-up questionnaires at ages of 17, 18½, and in early adulthood, when twins were 22-27 years old. Measures: The questionnaires included a survey of health habits and attitudes, a symptom checklist and questions about twins' relationships with parents, peers and co-twin. Measures used were twins' self-reports of their own dependence and their co-twin's dependence at age 16, reports of twins' leisure-time activities and social contacts, alcohol use, psychological distress and somatic symptoms both in adolescence and in early adulthood. Results: In the present study 25.6% of twins reported dependence on their co-twin. There were gender and zygosity differences in dependence, females and MZ twins were more likely to report dependence than males and DZ twins. Co-twin dependence can be viewed on one hand as an individual characteristic, but on the other hand as a pattern of dyadic interaction that is mutually regulated and reciprocal. Most of the twins (80.7%) were either concordantly co-twin dependent or concordantly co-twin independent. The associations of co-twin dependence with twins' social interactions and psycho-emotional characteristics were relatively consistent both in adolescence and in early adulthood. Dependence was related to higher contact frequency and a higher proportion of shared leisure-time activities between twin siblings at the baseline and the follow-up. Additionally co-twin dependence was associated with elevated levels of psycho-emotional distress and somatic complaints, especially in adolescence. In the framework of gene-environment interaction, these results suggest that the genetic contribution to individual differences in drinking patterns is dependent on the nature of the pair-wise relationship of twin siblings. Conclusions: The results of this study indicate that co-twin dependence is a genuine feature of the co-twin relationship and shows the importance of studying the impact of various features of co-twin relationships on individual twins' social and psycho-emotional life and well-being. Our study also offers evidence that differences in inter-personal relationships contribute to the effects of genetic propensities.

Genotype-Phenotype Relationships in Long QT Syndrome: Role of Mental Stress, Adrenergic Activity and a Common KCNH2 Polymorphism

Long QT syndrome is a congenital or acquired arrhythmic disorder which manifests as a prolonged QT-interval on the electrocardiogram and as a tendency to develop ventricular arrhythmias which can lead to sudden death. Arrhythmias often occur during intense exercise and/or emotional stress. The two most common subtypes of LQTS are LQT1, caused by mutations in the KCNQ1 gene and LQT2, caused by mutations in the KCNH2 gene. LQT1 and LQT2 patients exhibit arrhythmias in different types of situations: in LQT1 the trigger is usually vigorous exercise whereas in LQT2 arrhythmia results from the patient being startled from rest. It is not clear why trigger factors and clinical outcome differ from each other in the different LQTS subtypes. It is possible that stress hormones such as catecholamines may show different effects depending on the exact nature of the genetic defect, or sensitivity to catecholamines varies from subject to subject. Furthermore, it is possible that subtle genetic variants of putative modifier genes, including those coding for ion channels and hormone receptors, play a role as determinants of individual sensitivity to life-threatening arrhythmias. The present study was designed to identify some of these risk modifiers. It was found that LQT1 and LQT2 patients show an abnormal QT-adaptation to both mental and physical stress. Furthermore, as studied with epinephrine infusion experiments while the heart was paced and action potentials were measured from the right ventricular septum, LQT1 patients showed repolarization abnormalities which were related to their propensity to develop arrhythmia during intense, prolonged sympathetic tone, such as exercise. In LQT2 patients, this repolarization abnormality was noted already at rest corresponding to their arrhythmic episodes as a result of intense, sudden surges in adrenergic tone, such as fright or rage. A common KCNH2 polymorphism was found to affect KCNH2 channel function as demonstrated by in vitro experiments utilizing mammalian cells transfected with the KCNH2 potassium channel as well as QT-dynamics in vivo. Finally, the present study identified a common β-1-adrenergic receptor genotype that is related a shorter QT-interval in LQT1 patients. Also, it was discovered that compound homozygosity for two common β-adrenergic polymorphisms was related to the occurrence of symptoms in the LQT1 type of long QT syndrome. The studies demonstrate important genotype-phenotype differences between different LQTS subtypes and suggest that common modifier gene polymorphisms may affect cardiac repolarization in LQTS. It will be important in the future to prospectively study whether variant gene polymorphisms will assist in clinical risk profiling of LQTS patients.

Health-Related Quality of Life and Mental Disorders in Finland

Quality of life (QoL) and Health-related quality of life (HRQoL) are becoming one of the key outcomes of health care due to increased respect for the subjective valuations and well-being of patients and an increasing part of the ageing population living with chronic, non-fatal conditions. Preference-based HRQoL measures enable estimation of health utility, which can be useful for rational rationing, evidence-based medicine and health policy. This study aimed to compare the individual severity and public health burden of major chronic conditions in Finland, including and focusing on reliably diagnosed psychiatric conditions. The study is based on the Health 2000 survey, a representative general population survey of 8028 Finns aged 30 and over. Depressive, anxiety and alcohol use disorders were diagnosed with the Composite International Diagnostic Interview (M-CIDI). HRQoL was measured with the 15D and the EQ-5D, with 83% response rate. This study found that people with psychiatric disorders had the lowest 15D HRQoL scores at all ages, in comparison to other main groups of chronic conditions. Considering 29 individual conditions, three of the four most severe (on 15D) were psychiatric disorders; the most severe was Parkinson s disease. Of the psychiatric disorders, chronic conditions that have sometimes been considered relatively mild - dysthymia, agoraphobia, generalized anxiety disorder and social phobia - were found to be the most severe. This was explained both by the severity of the impact of these disorders on mental health domains of HRQoL, and also by the fact that decreases were widespread on most dimensions of HRQoL. Considering the public health burden of conditions, musculoskeletal disorders were associated with the largest burden, followed by psychiatric disorders. Psychiatric disorders were associated with the largest burden at younger ages. Of individual conditions, the largest burden found was for depressive disorders, followed by urinary incontinence and arthrosis of the hip and knee. The public health burden increased greatly with age, so the ageing of the Finnish population will mean that the disease burden caused by chronic conditions will increase by a quarter up to year 2040, if morbidity patterns do not change. Investigating alcohol consumption and HRQoL revealed that although abstainers had poorer HRQoL than moderate drinkers, this was mainly due to many abstainers being former drinkers and having the poorest HRQoL. Moderate drinkers did not have significantly better HRQoL than abstainers who were not former drinkers. Psychiatric disorders are associated with a large part of the non-fatal disease burden in Finland. In particular anxiety disorders appear to be more severe and have a larger public health burden than previously thought.

Mental Disorders among Burn Patients

ABSTRACT Mental disorders and suicide attempts among acute burn patients were investigated in a collaborative research project between National Institute for Health and Welfare and Departments of Psychiatry and Plastic surgery in University of Helsinki in Finland. This project was realized in two parts. The first cohort of burn patients consisted of all burn patients admitted to the Helsinki Burn Centre during 1989 97. In this retrospective cohort, 5.7% (N=46) of the total of 811 burn patients had attempted suicide. The burn severity of suicide attempters was markedly higher than in the other burn patients. Suicide attempters were more often unemployed or on disability pension and had psychiatric history before the injury. The second sample was a prospective cohort of all acute consecutive burn patients admitted to the Helsinki Burn Centre during 18 months in 2006- 2007. All subjects (N=107) of the cohort were interviewed with the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV for Axis I and II mental disorders (SCID-I and SCID-II) at baseline and then 86 % of all (N=92) with SCID-I at the end of six-month follow-up. Most (61%) patients had at least one lifetime mental disorder before burn; 47 % substance-related, 10% psychotic and 23% personality disorders. The overall prevalence of Axis I mental disorders increased significantly from the month prior to burn to acute care but decreased significantly from acute care to six months. However, more than one half (55%) of the cohort suffered from some mental disorder during follow-up. Less than one half of the burn patients with estimated need for psychiatric care received psychiatric care. Burn severity independently and strongly predicted risk for mental disorders during follow-up and pre-burn psychiatric history, severe burns and estimated need for psychiatric care significantly predicted psychiatric care received. The proportion of patients with self-inflicted burns is not high but mental disorders are common among burn patients. Mental disorders may predispose to burns. After burn injury, more than half of the patients suffer from mental disorders and a strong relationship exists between burn severity and some post-burn mental disorders. A minority of the patients with unequivocal need for psychiatric care actually receive it. Psychiatric consultations and care follow mainly the course of acute burn treatment.

Origins of the sex differences in handedness and mental rotation ability : genetic, environmental and hormonal effects

In humans, well-replicated and robust sex differences in cognitive functions exist for handedness and mental rotation ability. A common characteristic in human cognitive functions is the lateralization of language functions. Handedness is a common measure of laterality and is related to language lateralization. The prevalence of left-handedness is higher in males than in females, the male to female ratio being about 1.2. Among cognitive abilities, the largest sex difference is evident in the Vandenberg and Kuse Mental Rotation Test (MRT), which requires the ability to rotate objects in mental space. On average, males achieve scores one standard deviation higher than females in the MRT. The present thesis investigated the origins of the sex differences in laterality and spatial ability as represented by handedness and mental rotation ability, respectively. Two population-based Finnish twin cohorts were utilized in this study. Handedness was studied in 25 810 twins and 4068 singletons born before 1958 from the Older Finnish Twin Cohort, and in 4736 twins born in 1983-87 from the FinnTwin12. MRT was studied in a sub-sample of 804 young adult participants from the FinnTwin12 sample. The main findings of this study were: 1) the prevalence of left-handedness was higher among males than among females in both singletons and in twins; 2) males had significantly higher scores than females in MRT; 3) about one quarter of the variance in handedness and about half of the variance in MRT was explained by genetic effects, whereas the remainder of the variance in these traits was explained by environmental effects unique to each individual. The magnitude of the genetic effects was similar in both sexes; 4) left-handedness was significantly less common in female co-twins of a male than in female co-twins of a female, and female co-twins of a male scored significantly higher than did female co-twins of a female in the Mental Rotation Test. This dissertation discusses whether these differences between females from opposite- and same-sex twin pairs are due to the prenatal transfer of testosterone from the male fetus in females with male co-twins or whether they arise from postnatal socialization effects.