UNITED STATES | About the author of the slaughter of Connecticut Neurobiology of mass murder

With so unpredictable intervals as predictable constancy, the horror returns as school massacre . This time it was in Connecticut. But what does it matter where you been? This is the umpteenth time I receive an urgent call from a newspaper: Please write something immediately that there has been a massacre at a school! And always the same, the same horrors, the same questions: Why do these things happen?, Was he crazy? Obviously we always missing data to know, but it is also true that there are common denominators that allow us to analyze the casewithout making too many mistakes. On one side are the statistics that strongly agree: the mentally ill do not commit more violence than non-sufferers. But then there is the social label of "person-strange-impulsive-violent, dangerous" who commits an atrocity unexpected. Certainly we must admit that it is strange that a 20 year old who does these things does not suffer any mental imbalance .Something must happen in your mind. In fact, some voices suggest that the murderer of Connecticut might have a disorder. This anomalous behavior is so clearly that it can not be that all is well in your brain . But, what's the problem? Psychiatrists say they are shorted behaviors that occur in an apparently inexplicable. Now, in order to produce needed incubation, precedents, and often subsequent investigations had shown that abnormal personality traits, behavioral disorders, bizarre behavior, impulsive or aggressive, which were undervalued or neglected by families, or health teachers who knew them.That neglect is common to many mental illnesses. It's sort of 'not-wanting-to-see' perhaps for fear of 'not-knowing-what-do' . In fact, most homicidal and suicidal notified, no longer subtle signs, warnings have gone unheeded. Then one day something happens that breaks the unstable equilibrium, and the next step is to act, impulsivity uncontrollable raging violence. The triggers can be small frustrations , sometimes simple and downs of life, including news 'hot' that lead them to ruminate on their minds how to act.

Brain disorders

Another common feature is suicidal and homicidal suffering violent alterations of certain brain circuits and neurotransmitters that carry the onset of depression, anxiety and impulsivity. The best known is serotonin, a substance that acts as a neuromodulator of emotions and impulses . When descends step favors pathologically impulsive act, both as self-aggressiveness as hetero. It is as if that would prevent them from maintaining self-control and carry them to act without the normal brakes we all have, that allow us to lead with moderation, reason and balance. Obviously, a simple neurochemical alteration can not explain the complexity of human behavior , but we know that that is the common denominator in the brains of aggressive and suicidal people. I do not know if this young Connecticut suffered an illness, but it is very likely that if you analyze his brain neurochemistry are some alteration. We also know that if we give these people drugs that increase serotonin decreases the risk of violent or suicidal impulsivity . This is not to say that there was a clinical negligence in this case, do not know enough, but there are many cases of violence or suicide in which if it had intervened in time perhaps could have been avoided. At least, in all these cases should open a file neuropsychiatric expert in depth , which would allow us to prevent the next one. Otherwise, and unfortunately, it will not take long time to get another urgent call to opine in a similar case. And for the record I would love to be wrong.