Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, March 23, 1992 TAG: 9203210206
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: EXTRA 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOE KENNEDY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
He was a clinical psychologist who evaluated juveniles charged with homicide. He was stunned by their stories about their backgrounds, especially their relationships with their families.
People from the courts and community wanted to know why these young people had committed such violent acts. Cornell couldn't say. And that frustrated him.
Cornell now is an associate professor of education and clinical psychologist at the University of Virginia. He also is author, with psychiatrist Elissa Benedek, of the book "Juvenile Homicide."
He has studied juvenile killers in detail; most recently, he used Virginia Department of Corrections records and other sources to look at 71 juveniles who had been convicted of homicide and compared them to other juvenile offenders.
The work is timely, he says: Nationally, the juvenile homicide rate has increased every year since 1984, while the adult rate has stayed about the same.
He found lots of reasons behind the violent acts and no easy answers.
Violence is spawned by many factors coming together, he says. The media play a role. The family plays a big role. Substance abuse, the availability of weapons - they, too, play roles.
"If there was a single cause of violence, or a simple answer, we would have discovered it and resolved it."
Instead, there is an intricate web of influences dating beyond childhood to one's parents and, presumably, to preceding generations. Some of the problems could be prevented, or at least mitigated, by early educational efforts. And some, like society's fascination with guns, are frightening to contemplate.
Cornell and his associates studied two groups of juvenile killers - those who had killed a family member and those who had killed in the course of a robbery or burglary. The former often had grown up in intense conflict with a parent, and often were abused physically or psychologically by a parent.
The latter more often were substance abusers with prior delinquent activities.
Cornell found that those who had killed non-family members were weak in language skills and comprehension as compared to their abilities to solve puzzles and their non-verbal tasks.
Poor language skills led many of them to drop out of school. It also meant that they had trouble negotiating to settle conflicts.
"They learned that they were unsuccessful when they tried to deal with things verbally," Cornell said, "and somewhat more successful when they used non-verbal means."
Strangers weren't important to them, Cornell said. The juveniles lacked sensitivity to other people's feelings and values. They saw people as "obstacles to their needs."
Those who killed family members possessed more maturity and empathy, but in conflicts tended to dehumanize the other person.
Family disruptiveness was common to both groups. A parent, usually the father, was gone; in childhood, the killers, who were overwhelmingly male, lacked male supervision. Often, the remaining parent had problems with substance abuse, violence and criminal behavior.
Most were from blue-collar or lower-middle-class homes, and minorities were "over-represented," a function of their socioeconomic status. Violent juveniles can be found in every ethnic group and on every socioeconomic level, Cornell said.
The explosive mix of environmental factors is rendered more dangerous by the proliferation of weapons. "Guns are so pervasively available among teen-agers - in some communities, they are accepted as a sign of status - that a juvenile is almost expected by his peers to carry a gun."
The glorification of violence in the media also contributes, he said. "Every day, they watch TV and movies in which the way to settle a dispute is to blow the person away" - usually with no depiction of the grisly reality and horrific consequences.
The three strikes of juvenile violence: drugs, guns and a lack of parental supervision.
What can we do?
"Parents need to talk with their children about violence in the media," he said. Parents should not assume children understand that it's make-believe. Parents should express strong disapproval of violent behavior, of drug use and about guns.
They should monitor movies, recordings and television programs and discuss real-life consequences to the activities depicted. And they should discuss positive ways of resolving conflicts in the real world.
And what about the inadequate language skills, which can lead, ultimately, to violence?
The answer to that is money for education, Cornell said.
"It's very shortsighted to cut out programs for children with learning problems and then pay the consequences. It costs far less to educate a child in elementary school than to house him in prison as a teen-ager."
by CNB