In today's society we see more and more serial killers in the media. Although it shocks and disgusts us, we are fascinated. Why do some people become serial killers? Is it a nature or nurture question? For the purpose of comparing and contrasting serial killers I have chosen four well-known serial killers and looked at certain personality traits and their childhoods in an attempt to determine what creates a serial killer. The serial killers I chose were Jeffery Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy, Richard Ramirez, and Ted Bundy.

Serial killers are portray several elements:

· The need to continuously kill until stopped

· Motivation is generally fueled by fantasies and generally internal (www.serialkillers.net/profiling/who_is.html)

Jeffery Dahmer was a wanted and cherished child who experienced no known child abuse. He was a happy and outgoing child until he started school. By the time he started the second grade he didn't want to attend school because he had a fear of others and a lack of self-confidence. He started high school with an alcohol addiction, was painful shy, and was considered a loner by classma

"As a youth, Ted was terrible shy and was often teased and made the brunt of pranks by bullies in his junior high school. Regardless of the sometimes humiliating experiences he suffered, he was able to maintain a high grade average that would continue through out high school and college."(wysuwyg://8/http://www.crimelibrary.com/bundy/early.html). In 1967 he met Stephanie Brooks and fell in love however in 1968 she broke off relations with Ted. Ted never recovered from the break up. He became obsessed with her and that obsession would span his lifetime and lead to a series of events that would shock the world. ."(wysuwyg://8/http://www.crimelibrary.com/bundy/early.html).

tes. After one semester of college he had flunked out and joined the Army. Even though he enjoyed Army life he was discharged for being habitually drunk. Jeffery had a life long fascination of dead things starting at approximately age 4. That fascination would eventually lead him to the life of a serial killer.

Ted Bundy was charming, handsome, extremely intelligent, self assured and was considered to have a great future ahead of him. He had obtained a degree in Psychology and used it to counsel the depressed, suicidal and alcoholics. He was also a law student.

rt went on to say that "Dahmer had been teased by his peers as a child, and had chosen never to defend himself, he had internalized feeling of hostility" (www.fortuencity.com/underworld/killer/86/dahmer2.html) creating in Jeff an inability to form relationships. Dahmer also discovered he was attracted to men further aggravating his hostilities because he was "not normal." "Dr. Palermo, in conclusion, told the court that the murders were the result of pent up aggression within himself. He (Dahmer) killed those men because he wanted to kill the source of his homosexual attraction to them. In killing them, he killed what he hated in himself." (www.fortuencity.com/underworld/killer/86/dahmer2.html).

There are four distinctive types of serial killers not one. Dahmer falls under the category of "The Mission-Oriented Motive Type. This type displays no psychosis to the outside world, but on the inside, this killer has a need to rid the world of what he considers immoral or unworthy. This type of killer will select groups of individuals to kill off." (i.e.: homosexuals) (www.serialkillers.net/profiling/who_is.html). Dahmer was sentenced to life in prison however; a psychotic inmate killed him.

Next comes John Wayne Gacy who had homosexual tendencies but also maintained a heterosexual relationship. Gacy was the second of three children and was raised Catholic in a middle class neighborhood. He wasn't a real popular kid in school but made friends and joined the Boy Scouts. "Gacy seemed to have a normal childhood with exception of his relationship with his father and a series of accidents." (wysiwyg://10/http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial/gacy/gacybegin.html). Gacy's father was an alcoholic that abused his wife and children both physically and verbally. His father often called him a "sissy boy" and hit him as he was saying it. Gacy attended four different high schools before finally dropping out without graduating.

In examining the types of serial killers the only one not mentioned was "The Visionary Motive Type - this type is the group considered insane...psychotic. They often hear voices in their head telling them to commit the crime." (www.serialkillers.net/profiling/who_is.html). The Son of Sam maybe considered this type of killer.

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2355
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)