<p>Recently I've watched Netflix's &quot;Mindhunters&quot; show where the agents do &quot;criminal-personality profiling&quot; on serial killers to try and predict what they are going to do next. I'm wondering if this technique is still done today, and if so, is it seen as credible?</p>
<p>It seems like there is obviously no causal evidence on what motivates a person to become a serial killer, so at best, we're left with observational evidence which would need to be extrapolated from to create the post-hoc narrative and &quot;psychological insights&quot; about what the killer is going to do next.</p>
<p>Are tells like teenage bed-wedding or torturing small animals as a kid actually predictive of becoming a serial killer or are these insights just communicating that early-life PTSD is a possible cause?</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-11-12T23:02:24.163Z
Perhaps [Forensic Psychology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forensic_psychology) is what you are looking for?
Tony Mobbs
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-11-13T03:36:55.353Z
I'm not able to add the forensic psychology tag for some reason, but that doesn't answer my question
John-Henry
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-11-13T03:43:25.017Z
No worries - worth a try.  The tags "forensic-psychology" and "criminology" are synonyms within Psychology.SE
Tony Mobbs
<personality><criminology>
How useful are the psychological profiles of serial killers?
John-Henry
# How useful are the psychological profiles of serial killers?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2020-11-12)

Recently I've watched Netflix's "Mindhunters" show where the agents do "criminal-personality profiling" on serial killers to try and predict what they are going to do next. I'm wondering if this technique is still done today, and if so, is it seen as credible?

It seems like there is obviously no causal evidence on what motivates a person to become a serial killer, so at best, we're left with observational evidence which would need to be extrapolated from to create the post-hoc narrative and "psychological insights" about what the killer is going to do next.

Are tells like teenage bed-wedding or torturing small animals as a kid actually predictive of becoming a serial killer or are these insights just communicating that early-life PTSD is a possible cause?

**Tags:** personality, criminology

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Perhaps [Forensic Psychology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forensic_psychology) is what you are looking for?  
> **username_0**: I'm not able to add the forensic psychology tag for some reason, but that doesn't answer my question  
> **username_1**: No worries - worth a try.  The tags "forensic-psychology" and "criminology" are synonyms within Psychology.SE  

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## 0 answers

