Can twitter help expose psychopath killers' traits?

Ted Bundy, most psychopaths are not Hannibal Lecters

Scientists are trying to discover if we can spot a psychopathic killer using anything he or she has written, from a tweet to a blog post. The researchers want to take methods used to analyze the language of psychopaths and apply it to the general population using social media, reports CBS News.

Professors Jeff Hancock from Cornell University, and Michael T. Woodworth and Stephen Porter from the University of British Columbia studied hardcore criminals, including “14 psychopathic and 38 non-psychopathic homicide offenders.”

According to the study’s abstract, psychopaths often use cause-and-effect descriptors like “because” and “since.” They tend to focus on material needs like money, food and drinks. There are fewer references to family or religion. There was a higher frequency of “uh” and “um,” which indicates that emotional events are difficult for them to describe. Finally, they tend to talk in the past tense, which indicates psychological detachment from an incident.

Because they take the text and calculate percentage, it makes it possible to use data as little as 140 character tweets. The study will be published in the Legal and Criminological Psychology journal.

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WHY I AM NOT A DISPENSATIONALIST; John Nelson Darby is recognized as the father of dispensationalism later made popular in the United States by Cyrus Scofield's Scofield Reference Bible. Charles Henry Mackintosh, 1820–1896, with his popular style spread Darby's teachings to humbler elements in society and may be regarded as the journalist of the Brethren Movement. CHM popularised Darby more than any other Brethren author. As there was no Christian teaching of a “rapture” before Darby began preaching about it in the 1830s, he is sometimes credited with originating the "secret rapture" theory wherein Christ will suddenly remove His bride, the Church, from this world before the judgments of the tribulation. Dispensationalist beliefs about the fate of the Jews and the re-establishment of the Kingdom of Israel put dispensationalists at the forefront of Christian Zionism, because "God is able to graft them in again," and they believe that in His grace he will do so according to their understanding of Old Testament prophecy. They believe that, while the methodologies of God may change, His purposes to bless Israel will never be forgotten, just as He has shown unmerited favour to the Church, He will do so to a remnant of Israel to fulfill all the promises made to the genetic seed of Abraham. I am not a dispensationalist; it is unbiblical.