Personality Characteristics of Violent Offenders and Ability to Predict Extreme Violence

Abstract

This article speaks about the problem of violent crime and school shootings, predominantly those in the USA. First, the Slovene attitude towards violence is presented, followed by the issues of predicting serious crimes by non-problematic teenagers and findings of a longitudinal study about factors contributing to delinquency. Subsequently the article addresses famous shooting incidents in schools in the USA, Finland and Germany, pointing out common characteristics of offenders and incidents found by FBI and the Department for Education. Next, analyses and offenders' classification of American psychologist Langman (2009), an undisputable authority of this field, are listed. In conclusion, the model of threat assessment in schools is presented, since it is an important preventive measure of serious school crime.