Discussing the relationship between post-traumatic stress disorder and crime

Abstract

This dissertation outlines the potential relationship between post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and criminal offending, presenting literature on post-traumatic stress disorder from the perspectives of crime victims, offenders, and witnesses. The association between trauma and criminal behaviour has been proven by research to be strong (Burton, Foy, Bwanausi, Johnson, & Moore, 1994; Cantürk, Faraji, & Tezcan, 2021; Wilson & Zigelbaum, 1983). However, little research has attempted to investigate what underlies this association and delineate the possible developmental routes between traumatic experiences and subsequent criminal offending. When exploring this relationship, few studies distinguish trauma differences in crime victims (Janoff-Bulman, 1989), witnesses (Patki, Solanki, & Salim, 2014), and perpetrators (Collins & Bailey, 1990) of crime (Malik, 2023). With this dissertation the aim is to gain a richer and more nuanced understanding of the impact of post-traumatic stress disorder, particularly related to crime, on a person’s future life-course while accounting for some inconsistent results in the relevant literature. As the focus of this dissertation is the relationship between crime and PTSD from the perspectives of crime victims, offenders, and witnesses, as well as an examination of how it affects their future life course, literature from various disciplines was brought together. Insights from sociology, public health, social welfare, criminal justice system, psychology, psychiatry and medicine were used to describe the link between crime and PTSD, highlight areas of consensus and disagreement in findings, and examine the role of PTSD in intergeneration crime. Additionally, conclusions were drawn that might be helpful for clinicians currently treating victims and researchers studying this problem, alongside with exploring treatment options and their implementation within correctional settings. In this dissertation, I note that there are several potentially harmful effects of being a witness of violence as a child such as the higher likelihood of developing into a victim or perpetrator of domestic abuse (Komarovskaya, 2009; Nandi et al., 2020; Woods, 2005). Utilizing the ‘Cycle of Abuse’, it was argued that the experience of crime can lead to PTSD and thus the transmission of criminal behaviour across generations (i.e., inter- and transgenerational crime) (Browne & Finkelhor, 1986; Browne, Miller, & Maguin, 1999; Cloitre, Tardiff, Marzuk, Leon, & Portera, 1996). Discussion of the findings also include the overall limitations of this review and suggestions for further research.