Cold and hot: the two kinds of violence
Most violence is hot: a threat, a surge, an attack that is over in minutes. A smaller share is cold: planned, quiet, aimed. Forensic science treats them as two different things, and the difference shows up in the files.
Michael Woodworth and Stephen Porter went to the files. They gathered the records of 125 offenders in Canada who had committed homicide, assessed each offender for psychopathy, and coded each killing for what it looked like: was it planned, was it for an external goal, did a burst of emotion come first, or was it what courts and novelists call a crime of passion (Woodworth & Porter, 2002)?
They had a prediction, and the files bore it out. Of the homicides committed by psychopathic offenders, 93.3% were primarily instrumental: premeditated, motivated by an external goal, and not preceded by a strong emotional reaction. Of the homicides committed by the other offenders, 48.4% were (Woodworth & Porter, 2002). The paper's title put it plainly: In cold blood.
The study sits on top of an older idea, one that forensic psychiatry has spent decades testing. Violence comes in two modes, and they are different enough to be treated as different things.
Two modes
The psychologist J. Reid Meloy set out the distinction in his 1988 book The Psychopathic Mind and reviewed the evidence for it in 2006 (Meloy, 1988, 2006). He calls the two modes affective and predatory.
Affective violence is the familiar kind. It is a response to a perceived threat. The body is in high gear: heart rate up, a surge of autonomic arousal, the person consciously feels anger or fear. It is reactive and immediate, often preceded by public posturing, aimed at reducing the threat, and over quickly. Attention is heightened but scattered. The target can shift to whoever is nearest.
Predatory violence looks almost opposite. Arousal is minimal. There is no conscious emotion driving it. It is planned or purposeful, there is no imminent threat, and the attention involved is heightened and narrowly focused on one target. It is not limited to a moment; it can be prepared over days, sometimes with private rehearsal (Meloy, 2006).
Meloy's review draws on several lines of evidence: animal research, where different patterns of attack, a loud defensive display and a quiet stalking strike, can be distinguished in behaviour and in the brain systems that drive them; neurochemistry; psychophysiology; and forensic case material. His conclusion is that the bimodal theory is empirically valid and belongs in forensic practice (Meloy, 2006).
Why the difference matters in court and in prevention
The two modes call for different responses. Affective violence is about situations: threats, provocations, alcohol, crowded places, arguments that escalate. Reducing it means reducing the triggers and giving people ways out of confrontations before they peak.
Predatory violence is about planning, and planning leaves traces. A person who intends harm has to research, prepare, approach and wait. Each of those steps takes time and happens in the world, which means each is a point at which someone might notice, or at which the situation can deny the opportunity. Routine activity theory frames this from the other side: an offence still needs a target without a capable guardian at the moment of contact (Cohen & Felson, 1979). A predator can plan for that moment. A guardian can make it fail to arrive.
The distinction also changes how an act is read after the fact. A killing that looks like rage may be predatory, staged or rehearsed. A killing that looks cold may be the end of a long, hot conflict. Meloy's 2006 paper sets out observational and self-report measures for making the call from evidence rather than impression (Meloy, 2006).
The half the headline leaves out
The striking number in Woodworth and Porter's study is 93.3%. The more important number may be 48.4%. Nearly half the homicides by people who did not meet the criteria for psychopathy were also primarily instrumental (Woodworth & Porter, 2002).
That means "predatory" is a description of an act, not a species of person. Ordinary people plan harm for gain, revenge or control. People with high psychopathy scores are more likely to act in the cold mode, and much less likely to kill in the hot one, but they do not own the cold mode. Reading predatory violence as the signature of a monster is the same mistake that makes the stranger in the dark the centre of public fear. The serial killer, horror's favourite predator, turns out to be a far rarer figure than the genre suggests, and rarer now than a generation ago: the near-disappearance of the serial killer is its own story.
A predatory mind
The phrase "a predatory mind" suggests something fixed: a person built differently, who hunts. The research supports a narrower and more useful claim. Some acts of violence are predatory in their mode: planned, unaroused, aimed. People differ in how readily they act that way, and psychopathic traits are one of the strongest markers of that difference. The mode is measurable from evidence. And because it depends on preparation and opportunity, it can be interrupted.
A heron standing still in shallow water looks calm. It is the opposite of calm. It is doing the thing it is for, with complete attention, and the stillness is the method. Predatory violence is like that: quiet on the surface, focused underneath. The quiet is not a reason to think nothing is happening. It is the signal to look for the preparation.
Short answers
What is predatory violence?
Violence that is planned or purposeful, carried out with little physiological arousal and no conscious emotion, aimed at a chosen target, and not a response to an immediate threat. Its counterpart, affective violence, is reactive, emotional and driven by perceived threat (Meloy, 2006).
Are psychopaths more likely to commit predatory homicide?
In a study of 125 Canadian homicide offenders, 93.3% of homicides by psychopathic offenders were primarily instrumental, compared with 48.4% by other offenders (Woodworth & Porter, 2002).
Is predatory violence only committed by psychopaths?
No. In the same study, nearly half the homicides by non-psychopathic offenders were also primarily instrumental. Predatory describes the mode of an act, not a type of person.
References
- Cohen, L. E., & Felson, M. (1979). Social change and crime rate trends: A routine activity approach. American Sociological Review, 44(4), 588–608. doi.org/10.2307/2094589
- Meloy, J. R. (1988). The psychopathic mind: Origins, dynamics, and treatment. Jason Aronson.
- Meloy, J. R. (2006). Empirical basis and forensic application of affective and predatory violence. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 40(6–7), 539–547. doi.org/10.1080/j.1440-1614.2006.01837.x
- Woodworth, M., & Porter, S. (2002). In cold blood: Characteristics of criminal homicides as a function of psychopathy. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 111(3), 436–445. doi.org/10.1037/0021-843X.111.3.436