Animal abusers are potential psychopaths if they do not receive counselling for their abnormal behaviour, warns a clinical psychologist.
Urmilah Dass, who has six years of clinical experience, says many criminal offenders displaying psychopathology first begin with attacking small animals.
“In psychology, a common behaviour among such patients is that many of them have purposely hurt and killed some animals when they were young,” she tells Komunitikini in an exclusive interview.
“They will start with small or defenseless animals because they cannot fight back. If no treatment is sought by these people, they may become far more violent”.
From aggressive behavior to anti-social personality disorder
She says these group of people normally do not seem to have a conscience about the wrongdoings they commit.
“They do not display any guilt or remorse whenever they destroy property or hurt and even kill another living being. They have a limited sense of control over themselves,” she adds.
By “nature” she means someone who is found with physiological impairments such as brain irregularities.
“On the other hand, someone who has been exposed to long-term violence in the family, or was treated with violence, may become a person who will resort to violence in his or her life.
“They will grow up and may start inflicting similar violence that they witnessed and endured on animals and people,” she notes, adding that “there is no medication for someone who has personality disorder; we can only treat them effectively if the person realises the need to change.”
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