The Psychoanalytic Frame Susan - Case Study Example

Criminology: A Case Study on Susan Smith Name: University: Instructor: Course Title: Date: Abstract The purpose of this case study was to examine why people commit various offences. Using the case example of Susan Smith who was found guilty of murdering her two sons, the study unpacked why people commit offences by framing her actions with three psychological theories, namely social learning model, psychodynamic theory and psychopath framework. Based on social learning theory, the paper established that Susan committed crime because she was desensitised as result of being brought up in an environment where abuse, molestation attempt or committing suicide was the order of the day and thus, she was likely to imitate the same. Within the psychoanalytic frame Susan emerges as impulsive individual as result of her poor socialisation and childhood experiences and thus, sees no problem in committing murder. Lastly, in the context of psychopath, she emerges as an individual who has no empathy, low level of guilt, non remorseful as result of personality defect and this is why she is able to kill, lie about the murder and show no remorse even during TV interview. 1.0 Introduction Criminology as an eclectic discipline aims at explaining why people engage in criminal activities by framing various instances through biological, psychological, social, economic theories and so on. To attain the same, this case study narrows down on psychological theories which presents relationship viewpoint on the causes of crime such as crime and individual personality or crimes and psychopaths (Moore, 2011, p.227). The subjected of critical review and framing anchored on psychological theories is that of Susan Smith who was convicted on 22 July, 1995 and sentenced to life in prison for murdering her two sons. Thus, in a two pronged approach, the first aim of this case study is to outline the experience of Susan Smith as an offender from childhood to adulthood. Secondly, by employing various relevant psychological theories, it frames and contextualises why Susan Smith might have offended. 2.0 Definition of Offence Henry & Lanier (2001, p.217) conceptualises offence as deviant behaviours that are against societal norms and widely disapproved by larger section of the society. Additionally, the hallmark distinction between offence and other mere deviance is that if they are subjected to legal review, they normally flout laws of a country, state or local authority. Indeed, Andersen & Taylor (2011, p.175) affirms this later perspective by noting that crime entails any action/ behaviour or activity that violates/ contravenes or flouts formal rules/ legal regulations of a country, state government and local authority and thus making that behaviour criminal in nature. Such offences which are criminal in nature are punishable by law if one is found guilty. One can be convicted to serve a sentence, pay a fine or serve the two. 3.0 History of the Offender 3.1 Early Childhood Born on September 26, 1971 to Linda and Harry Vaughan, Susan Smith was the youngest child out of the three children in their family. At the early stages of life, Susan experienced numerous encounters of her life. For instance, at seven years, her parents had divorced. Five weeks into their parents’ divorce, his father aged 37 by then committed suicide leaving her a dejected individual. Her mother, Linda, later got married to Beverly Russell and hence they moved to his resident with the other siblings. At this period, Susan was an exemplary and sterling child. For instance in junior years she was the President of Junior Civitan Club and in the final year voted as the ‘friendliest female’. Despite of exemplifying such stellar character, at the age of 16, her step father started molesting her sexually. She reported this to the mother and Department of Social Services. Nevertheless, nothing tangible arose out of this process. The family rebuked and reprimanded Susan for bringing the abuse into public sphere. 3.2 Relationships and Rejection Experiences The relationships which Susan had had could be considered as turbulent. In her senior year at high school, she had three active sexual relationships, older married man, younger co-worker and her step father. These multiple relationships culminated when she got employed during the summer of 1988. The relationship with the married older man resulted into pregnancy forcing her to abort. The older married man terminated the relationship making Susan attempt suicide. Equally, confided that when she was 13 she had attempted another suicide. At the employment station, she had developed a relationship with a co-worker, David Smith who also happened to be her former school friend. After discovering that she was pregnant, they got married in 1991 and relocated to the husband’s great-grand-mother’s house. At the time of being married the husband’s parents and lost one of their sons and the pain proved much to bear for David’s dad and thus he attempted suicide forcing a separation. As such they spent these early periods squabbling on various issues. For instance, after the birth of Michael in October 1991, Susan was materialistic and tended to seek support from her mother and this did not auger well with David thus forcing separation in March 1992. During separation period, Susan opted to date a former boyfriend who was a former work mate. The announcement by Susan in November 1992 that she was pregnant forced them to reunite. Believing that their relationship was troubled because of not having independence, they borrowed money from Susan’s mother so that they could set up independently. However, this did not achieve the intended outcome as Susan constantly complained. Owing to this loneliness, in June 1993 David initiated another relationship with his co-worker. However, after the birth Alex on 5 August, 1993 they reunited, but this lasted only for three weeks. Susan not willing to work in the same environment as her husband switched to Conso Products where she was rose to be executive secretary and hence exposing her to high profile individuals such as the owner and his son, Tom Findlay. Susan and Findlay began dating casually in January 1994, but this did not last as they reunited with David. Nevertheless, continuing with unstable relationship, they separated and Susan requested for divorce. This prompted her to continue the relationship with Findlay in October 1994. In 17 October, 1994 day before divorce between Susan and David was finalised, Tom Findlay sent Susan a letter wanting to terminate the relationship. Issues highlighted in the letter included differences in their backgrounds, Findlay not wanting children and not wanting to take care of children from other relationship and lack of self respect from Susan since she had kissed another friend of his during party. At this time, Susan was full of narcissistic delusions by not accepting that Tom had dropped her while she equally continued having sexual relationship with David, Russell and Tom’s father. To win favour and convince Tom back, she confided to him about her ongoing sexual escapades with Russell. However, this did not attain the intended rationale. Hence, she confessed on her relationship with Tom’s father who also was her boss and cautioned that such details would emerge during their divorce case with David. Despite of all these attempts, they all worked against her as they pushed Tom away. On the other hand, this created an obsession in Susan and on October 25, 1994, she decided to seek audience with Tom so as to recant her story that she did not have sexual intercourse with his father, but Tom was not amazed. On the same night, she even tried calling a friend who was with Tom at a party to enquire if he had talked about her. 3.3 Murder and Conviction What followed was a horrifying experience. While she earlier denied involvement in the murder of her two sons by lying that that they were abducted, she later confessed on November 3, 1994 after glaring discrepancies emerged in her statements. In her confession, at approximately eight in the evening she strapped her barefooted sons on their rightful position, but armed with the urge to die she drove around and after consideration drove to John D. Long Lake, parked the car on a ramp, got out and put the car in drive, released the brake and from a distance observed as the car plunged into the lake with her sleeping children trapped inside. on 22 July 1995 she was found guilty for murdering his two sons, Michael Daniel Smith who was three years old and his younger brother Alexander Tyler Smith who was 14 months old and convicted to 30 years to life in prison. 4.0 Framing why she offended From a deeper perspective, the question that emerges is why did Susan commit the murder? One of the theories that can be used to contextualise her action is the behavioural theories such as Social Learning Theory. Bandura (1977, p.305 & 306) observes that all human behaviour such as crime/ violence are learnt as result of the happenings that an individual experiences in their immediate environment. Moreover, such behaviours are reinforced if they are rewarded (Bandura, 1978, p.13). Indeed, Bartol (2002) corroborates this thought within the context of violence by noting that those who live in violent neighbourhoods are likely to internalise these behaviours. The same argument is extensible to Susan’s case study. First, she was brought up in an environment where molestation is the order of the day. For instance, at the age of 16, her step father started molesting her. Thus, it can be postulated that she might have acquired this behaviour out of such experience and that is why murdering her children is not a big issue. Moreover, such behaviour of molesting people -physical, psychological or sexual was reinforced in her mind since the behaviour of his step dad was rewarded by being protected by her mother, Linda who feared public embarrassment. Secondly, she was brought up in an environment where committing suicide is the order of the day. For instance, her dad committed suicide, her father in law who was David’s father attempted committing suicide and equally she had attempted at committing suicide twice. This implies that murdering a third party would not be great deal especially if her pleasure/expectations are at stake or if she is extremely disappointed. This is why Susan has gone to the great extent of murdering her two sons so as to meet the expectation of Tom Findlay who is not ready to have a child with her or maintain children from other relationship. Such experiences lead to what is known as desensitisation. Most authors not that desensitisation is the lack of empathy due to over exposure to violent scenes. In a nutshell, exposure to violent programming makes one to be resistant to violence (Bushman and Anderson, 2009, p. 273; Cantor and Wilson, 2003, p. 363; Fanti et al., 2009, p. 185). Apart from being resistant, Cantor and Wilson (2003, p. 4) notes that exposure to justified violence weakens inhibition against engaging in aggressive behaviour. This is why when Susan appeared in the Television for interview she showed little remorse, she was more concerned with her appearance and hence, she had no any regret. On the other hand, psychoanalytic posits that well adjusted people are able to repress their aggression/ id, but if not managed, this is likely to overcome an individual and thus allowing one to carry out violent activities (Englander, 2007, p.22). Hence, those who engage in crime are seen as those who are unable to regulate their impulsive pleasure seeking drives (Toch, 1979, 81). Adding to Freud’s work Aichorrn, observed that it is not stressful conditions that drove people to criminal or violent activities since everyone at one moment or other experiences stress, but noted crime is as a result of mental state known as latent delinquency (DiNapoli, 2002, 447). This mental status arise as result of discrepancy in socialisation, inhibited ability to feel guilty and reduced empathy and thus exhibits itself in ones urge for instantaneous indulgence. The poor childhood socialisation as result of violence, abuse and neglect makes one to have a weak ego therefore making it difficult to deal with stressful scenario. The emerging theme out of immediate preceding discourse is psychodynamic models conceptualise violent individual as one who is impulsive, effortlessly irritated and submerged in the past childhood events. The same trend is exhibited by Susan. In attempt to meet her impulsive pleasure drives which is to sustain her relationship with Tom Findlay she goes ahead and murder her two sons. Equally she comes out as an easily frustrated individual. The rationale for such argument is anchored on the fact that after receiving the letter from Tom Findlay informing her of his need to terminate their relationship she went berserk instead of handling the break up in calmed manner. Later in the day she went to Tom’s office to recant her statement of having sexual liaison with his father and calling another friend who was with him at party to confirm if he had talked about her. Additionally, she confessed on about the feeling of taking away her life. Lastly, it is true that she had a troubled childhood right from the death of her father and sexual molestation by her step dad. Susan also comes out as person with personality defect and thus can be treated as psychopath. This is because of impulsiveness and reduced guilt (Edens et al., 2001, p.54). It believed that psychopath is caused by early childhood experiences such parents who are not emotionally stable, parental rejection and lack of or inadequate love (Edens et al., 2007, p.52; Lykken, 1996, p.32). These are the same trends that Susan experienced at early childhood. For instance, the father hanged herself causing her be traumatised and be dejected, the step dad continuously, molested her instead of loving and the mother constantly siding with the step dad. Such experiences reduced her empathy and guilt level and that is why she was able to murder her two sons in one of the crudest ways without having single guilt as exhibited during trial and in public appearance where she pretended to be remorseful by faking emotions. 5.0 Conclusion The ultimate focus of the case study was to critically assess why Susan might have murdered her two sons by applying various psychological theories. Based on this need, the case study was divided into three significant sections. The first is the section that conceptualised what constitutes an offence and it was established that these are behaviours that contravened formal rules of a country. Secondly, the case study summarised the experiences of the offender from childhood to adulthood and how she ended up committing the offence. Lastly, using various theoretical models, the case study contextualised why she might have committed the crime. In unpacking why Susan might have committed the murder, the study employed social learning theory where it established that Susan might have learnt the offence from immediate surrounding which was full of abuse, molestation and suicide and thus, she was desensitised and saw no big deal in committing the same. Secondly, the study employed psychodynamic framework where it was established that as result poor socialisation, she was easily frustrated individual and impulsive and this is evident when Tom Findlay wrote a letter to her wanting termination of the relationship where she ended murdering her children. Lastly, the study employed psychopath model where it established that Susan had personality defect making her impulsive, self centred, cold hearted and with no or reduced guilt. This is why she able to kill her children so as to retain her relationship with Tom. References Andersen, M. L. and Taylor, H. F. (2011). Sociology: The Essentials, 6th edn. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning. Bandura, A. (1977). Social Learning Theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Bandura, A. (1978). Social learning theory of aggression. Journal of communication, 28(3), 12- 29. Bartol, C. (2002). Criminal Behaviour: A Psychological Approach. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Bushman, B. 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