What is Behavioral Science? Is it even a "science?"

“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us,” Ralph Waldo Emerson (“Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes”).

Actions are the direct result of our psyches. And what our psyche generates — subconscious wants, needs, and intentions; conscious wants, needs, and intentions — determines our actions (Priddy). On the outside stands a single body over his victim, yet on the inside is a man’s spectrum of conscious and subconscious emotions and intentions which provoked him to commit the crime.

Something made the man murder a fellow man — but what? Why is that something there? How can we stop that something from causing another man to murder? This is where the humble forensic psychologist comes in.

A behavior analysist’s job is to fully understand this spectrum of intentions and emotions — this something that makes you you, and me me. Training, experiencing, and specializing in man’s behavior, they are the true experts in criminal psyches...so why does the court belittle them and their career? To this day, forensic psychology and behavior analysis reports are not admissible as direct evidence — more commonly known as hard evidence — nor are the psychologists themselves allowed to testify without a judge’s opinionated consent in a court of law (Ramsland 223). However, forensic psychology is a factual and trustworthy profession, and this regulation undervalues it greatly, disregarding the concrete foundations of behavior analysis. Forensic psychology reports should be admissible as direct evidence in court. Why is this such a controversial notion? I’m convinced the people as a whole don’t fully understand what it is they do; therefore, this profession should be brought to light.

Skeptics scoff at the thought of a profile--the forensic psychology report--being suitable in any court of law, saying forensic psychology is “voodoo,” and the analysts are merely “gratified mystics,”(Grezlak) but they are far from the truth. Forensic psychology reports are legitimate sources of evidence which deserve to be treated as just that.

The FBI has a unit for all forensic psychologists: the Behavioral Analysis Unit, or BAU. Those agents’ job is to use what they know of the suspects’ — also referred to as “unsubs”, meaning the unknown subjects (Ramsland 287) — behavior and predict their future behavior retrospectively and prospectively. Retrospective profiling uses details at crime scenes to assess personality traits and predict future behavior, while prospective profiling relies on past unsubs’ characteristics and behaviors to compare them to present unsubs’ (Ramsland 150).

The foundation of forensic psychology revolves around the concept that everything we do, as humans, is intentional — consciously and subconsciously. Subconscious choices stem from memories; for example, I hit you with a stick and it hurts. I swing the stick again, and you duck out of the way subconsciously. Your brain is intentionally choosing an action based on its past experiences (Priddy). Likewise, in many cases when a mother abuses her son at a young age, and that child grows up to have a violent outrage, he will most likely target women in their mid-40’s because, though he may not realise it, subconsciously that unsub is seeking revenge on his mother for all the torment and abuse (Munro).

“‘I use a formula, 'How plus Why equals Who,’’” former BAU chief John Douglas says. “‘If we can answer the hows and whys in a crime, we generally can come up with the solution,’” (Ramsland). This is the foundation of forensic psychology. Through crime scene forensics, victimology, and apprehension, the overall goal of behavior analysis is to find means and motive — the how and why.

The process of victimology is the main source of retrospective profiling (Ramsland 34), as it is both credible and reliable. Who the unsub targets, where the victim is captured, how the unsub handles the victim, how he/she chooses to murder, and where the disposal site of the victim is tells forensic psychologists nearly everything they need to know to put together an accurate profile of the unsub. The BAU agents decipher what type of transportation the unsub has, what social class the unsub falls under, what type of workspace the unsub must hold the victim(s) in, whether or not the unsub knew the victim(s), etc. by victimology (Ramsland 34). All of these questions answered reflect many personal characteristics of the unsub, as they narrow down the suspect pool sufficiently. Additionally, if the unsub is a serial offender, by identifying the remains, the agents working the case can predict the type of torment the next victim will likely suffer.

Victimology also includes basic apprehension techniques, cross-checking the victims contacts and whereabouts to determine what trait they all have in common (Ramsland 34). This often overlaps with graphical profiling — a profiling technique predicting the transportation limits of an unsub as well as where he/she may live or have their workspace (Young 5).

Theresa M. Young, honors student at Northeastern University, battles the validity of many profiling techniques: “Upon examination, these typologies [geographic profiling, investigative psychology, criminal investigative analysis, and behavioral evidence analysis] are flawed, as are their practical application processes, and have implications in training, accessibility, and utility,” (Young iii). To a certain extent, Young is accurate by saying that some components of certain profiling techniques are faulty.

There is no set template for a violent offender’s behavior patterns; therefore, prospective profiling can be inaccurate. Racial profiling, using statistics of which races have committed which crimes in the past, is argued to be extremely racist. Geographical profiling, an “investigative methodology” that uses the “locations of a connected series of crimes” to determine the most logical region of an offender’s workspace or home (Harries), is said to be inaccurate because it revolves around the assumption that a killer’s “dump site” is directly related to where the unsub lives (Young 7).

With an ultimate goal of limiting the suspect pool, traits such as age and sex are most beneficial. A profile constructed through behavioral analysis, however, does not include the age and sex of the unsub. BAU agents regularly refer to these components as “problem characteristics” because they can rarely be determined from the crime scene evidence and victimology (Turvey 342), and must instead be inferred through prospective profiling — the type of profiling least accepted by the public because of it’s roots in statistics (Ramsland). They rely on ideas of what behavior is most likely from certain groups — stereotypes. For example, women are generally less aggressive than men, and 80 year olds tend not to strangle teenagers. This prospective profiling, though still based on neuroscience studies, gets poor feedback because its paramount source of information is statistics; unquestionably, some offenders won’t match up exactly with any prior statistic, and therefore prospective profiling will be fallacious.

At this point in time, behavioral analysis isn’t admissible in court as hard evidence; rather, it’s the judge’s decision whether or not the forensic psychologist is allowed to even testify. “Because a profile is based on behavioral science, which uses probability assessments, whether a profiler can testify is often subject to the judge’s discretion...if a profiler is not admissible in court...profilers [are permitted to] offer assistance to court personnel in recognizing personality traits...[and] clarify other aspects of forensic evidence, explain technical angles, and help reconstruct the crime. They can offer information...to shed light on how offenders might have been thinking when they made certain decisions,”(Ramsland 223-224). Though this regulation has a technical loophole, it is still unfounded, biased, and defective.

The law says that a forensic psychologist can investigate as much as they want, yet cannot speak in the court unless the judge deems them worthy (Ramsland 223). So essentially, if that judge is a skeptic, there’s no way that analyst--no matter how much experience or education he/she has gained — would be allowed to testify. Mentioned above, the loophole to this is for an analyst to help prosecutors with strategy to get the unsub convicted.

A real-life example of this unjust law is the trial of Christopher Distefano, a murderer. In this trial, Dr. Richard Walter, a Michigan prison psychologist, wasn’t allowed to testify by order of the judge, and neither could Robert Hazelwood, “who worked for 16 years in the Behavioral Science Unit.” The judge didn’t see that these two highly qualified analysts were suitable to testify because the reports had“ little probative value,"(Grezlak), which meant that they had little proof or evidence.

Direct evidence, more commonly known as hard evidence, is practically the only way to convict an unsub. It is evidence which requires no thinking, consideration, or proof of its existence, proving the issue as a fact without inference or presumption (“Real and Demonstrative Evidence”). One wouldn’t question the existence of a fingerprint or blood spatter, so why would anyone question the existence of the neuroscience behind behavioral analysis and forensic psychology?

Neuroscience, the study of the brain and its functions, is the stem of all behavior-knowing, and has had many advances throughout this past decade — advantages such as the functions of the amygdala, an almond-shaped set of neurons deep in the temporal lobe, is linked to the psyche’s responses in fear and pleasure (Bruzza, Hurlemann, Welsh, Hughes). People with damage to their amygdalae are more likely to take bigger risks for smaller gains (DeMartino), such risks include robbery and homicide. Also with damage to the amygdala, much emotion is lost: decisions don’t take into account any emotional processing (Stenson).

Damage to the amygdala can also mean the development of personality disorders such as narcissism, psychosis, sociopathy, and psychopathy — each of which are diagnosed in hundreds or killers time and time again (Ramsley 87). Knowing this helps considerably with narrowing down a suspect pool. For example, if an unsub has kidnapped Suzie, and the BAU has narrowed down the suspect pool to George O’Malley, a philosopher diagnosed with ADHD, or Jimmy McClean, a mechanic diagnosed with sociopathy, the house agents will search first is Jimmy McClean’s, primarily because statistics show that a large number of violent offenders are diagnosed with disorders such as this one.

With each study performed, neuroscience progresses and new neurological information is discovered, further developing the accuracy of prospective profiling and retrospective profiling alike. Each statistic, each test, each biopsy is a lead to getting our streets cleared of violent offenders, which is why forensic psychology needs to be taken seriously in a court of law. Reports shouldn’t have to go through a judge’s opinion before being offered to the jury. Doesn’t anyone see how biased and unjust that is? Behavioral analysis gets results; that is an undeniable fact. It’s truly a science and should be treated as such in every courtroom across the globe.

Robert Brault once wrote, “One can only imagine how effective justice might be if admissible in a court of law;” (“Justice Quotes”) he could not be more accurate. With regulations like these existing in the government, no wonder so many criminals remain free. And what happens when criminals are allowed to walk away without a scratch? Vigilantes, or men and women of society who take it upon themselves to seek out and murder criminals who were rendered not guilty--a.k.a., more crime. If the court just audits its rulings to be just and righteous, hundreds of killers will be locked up for good, and our streets will be safer. However, as Brault wrote, it’s unlikely the court will ever be just and true...we can only hope.