“By focusing so much on sociopathic characteristics, researchers may have downplayed the importance of the existential processes—compartmentalization and dehumanization—that permit serial killers to rape, torture, and murder with moral impunity. Moreover, by uncritically accepting the sociopathic designation, researchers may have ignored the interaction between sadism and sociopathy that causes empathy to be heightened rather than diminished.” – Dr. Jack Levin from Normalcy in Behavioral Characteristics of the Sadistic Serial Killer

Jack Levin, Ph.D. is the Brudnick Professor of Sociology and Criminology at Northeastern University in Boston, where he co-directs its Center on Violence and Conflict and teaches courses in the sociology of violence and hate.

Serial Killers and Sadistic Murderers, Up Close and Personal

He has authored or co-authored 30 books, including Mass Murder: America’s Growing Menace, Why We Hate, The Functions of Prejudice, Hate Crimes Revisited, The Will to Kill: Making Sense of Senseless Murder, Domestic Terrorism, Serial Killers and Sadistic Murderers—Up Close and Personal (pictured) and The Violence of Hate. Dr. Levin has published more than 150 articles in professional journals and newspapers, including Normalcy in Behavioral Characteristics of the Sadistic Serial Killer co-authored with James Alan Fox found on the OP-EDS/ARTICLES page on his personal site from which we quoted above.