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REVISE and Edit
Revise headings so they clearly state the points you want to make. Edit your paragraphs to make them easy to scan.
289 290
READINGS: “How Many Zombies Do You Know?” Using Indirect Survey Methods to Measure Alien Attacks and Outbreaks of the Undead
· ANDREW GELMAN AND GEORGE A. ROMEROY
· Andrew Gelman, a respected and award-winning professor of statistics and political science at Columbia University, wrote on his blog that he created this unpublished paper to do some “humorous fun-poking” but also to illustrate how a very real cutting-edge survey method could be used for solving difficult research problems. As you read and enjoy this, notice he uses the conventions of the scientific-article genre.
1 Introduction
Zombification is a serious public-health and public-safety concern (Romero, 1968, 1978) but is difficult to study using traditional survey methods. Zombies are believed to have very low rates of telephone usage and in any case may be reluctant to identify themselves as such to a researcher. Face-to-face surveying involves too much risk to the interviewers, and internet surveys, although they originally were believed to have much promise, have recently had to be abandoned in this area because of the potential for zombie infection via computer virus.
In the absence of hard data, zombie researchers1 have studied outbreaks and their dynamics using differential equation models (Munz et al., 2009, Lakeland, 2010) and, more recently, agent-based models (Messer, 2010). Figure 1 shows an example of such work.
But mathematical models are not enough. We need data.
1 By “zombie researchers,” we are talking about people who research zombies. We are not for a moment suggesting that these researchers are themselves zombies. Just to be on the safe side, however, we have conducted all our interactions with these scientists via mail.
2 Measuring zombification using network survey data
Zheng, Salganik, and Gelman (2006) discuss how to learn about groups that are not directly sampled in a survey. The basic idea is to ask respondents questions such as, “How many people do you know named Stephen/Margaret/etc.” to learn the sizes of their social networks, questions such as “How many 290291lawyers/teachers/police officers/etc. do you know,” to learn about the properties of these networks, and questions such as “How many prisoners do you know” to learn about groups that are hard to reach in a sample survey. Zheng et al. report that, on average, each respondent knows 750 people; thus, a survey of 1500 Americans can give us indirect information on about a million people.
Figure 1: From Lakeland (2010) and Messer (2010). There were other zombie graphs at these sites, but these were the coolest.
5 This methodology should be directly applicable to zom.
PRINTED BY [email protected] Printing is for personal, private us.docx
1. PRINTED BY: [email protected] Printing is for personal,
private use only. No part of this book may be reproduced or
transmitted without publisher's prior permission. Violators will
be prosecuted.
REVISE and Edit
Revise headings so they clearly state the points you want to
make. Edit your paragraphs to make them easy to scan.
289 290
READINGS: “How Many Zombies Do You Know?” Using
Indirect Survey Methods to Measure Alien Attacks and
Outbreaks of the Undead
· ANDREW GELMAN AND GEORGE A. ROMEROY
· Andrew Gelman, a respected and award-winning professor of
statistics and political science at Columbia University, wrote on
his blog that he created this unpublished paper to do some
“humorous fun-poking” but also to illustrate how a very real
cutting-edge survey method could be used for solving difficult
research problems. As you read and enjoy this, notice he uses
the conventions of the scientific-article genre.
1 Introduction
Zombification is a serious public-health and public-safety
concern (Romero, 1968, 1978) but is difficult to study using
traditional survey methods. Zombies are believed to have very
low rates of telephone usage and in any case may be reluctant to
identify themselves as such to a researcher. Face-to-face
surveying involves too much risk to the interviewers, and
internet surveys, although they originally were believed to have
much promise, have recently had to be abandoned in this area
because of the potential for zombie infection via computer
virus.
In the absence of hard data, zombie researchers1 have studied
outbreaks and their dynamics using differential equation models
(Munz et al., 2009, Lakeland, 2010) and, more recently, agent-
based models (Messer, 2010). Figure 1 shows an example of
2. such work.
But mathematical models are not enough. We need data.
1 By “zombie researchers,” we are talking about people who
research zombies. We are not for a moment suggesting that
these researchers are themselves zombies. Just to be on the safe
side, however, we have conducted all our interactions with these
scientists via mail.
2 Measuring zombification using network survey data
Zheng, Salganik, and Gelman (2006) discuss how to learn about
groups that are not directly sampled in a survey. The basic idea
is to ask respondents questions such as, “How many people do
you know named Stephen/Margaret/etc.” to learn the sizes of
their social networks, questions such as “How many
290291lawyers/teachers/police officers/etc. do you know,” to
learn about the properties of these networks, and questions such
as “How many prisoners do you know” to learn about groups
that are hard to reach in a sample survey. Zheng et al. report
that, on average, each respondent knows 750 people; thus, a
survey of 1500 Americans can give us indirect information on
about a million people.
Figure 1: From Lakeland (2010) and Messer (2010). There were
other zombie graphs at these sites, but these were the coolest.
5 This methodology should be directly applicable to zombies or,
for that matter, ghosts, aliens, angels, and other hard-to-reach
entities. In addition to giving us estimates of the populations of
these groups, we can also learn, through national surveys, where
they are more prevalent (as measured by the residences of the
people who know them), and who is more likely to know them.
A natural concern in this research is potential underreporting;
for example, what if your wife2 is actually a zombie or an alien
and you are not aware of the fact. This bias can be corrected via
extrapolation using the estimates of different populations with
varying levels of reporting error; Zheng et al. (2006) discuss in
the context of questions ranging from names (essentially no
reporting error) to medical conditions such as diabetes and HIV
3. that are often hidden.
2 Here we are choosing a completely arbitrary example with
absolutely no implications about our marriages or those of
anyone we know.
3 Discussion
As Lakeland (2010) puts it, “Clearly, Hollywood plays a vital
role in educating the public about the proper response to zombie
infestation.” In this article we have discussed how modern
survey methods based on social networks can help us estimate
the size of the problem.
Other, related, approaches are worth studying too. Social
researchers have recently used Google Trends to study hard-to-
measure trends using search volume (Askitas and Zimmerman,
2009, Goel, Hofman, et al., 2010); Figure 2 illustrates how this
might be done in the zombie context. It would also make sense
to take advantage of social networking tools such as Facebook
(Goel, Mason, et al., 2010) and more zombie-specific sites such
as ZDate. We envision vast unfolding vistas of funding in this
area.
4 Technical note
We originally wrote this article in Word, but then we converted
it to Latex to make it look more like science.
291 292
Figure 2: Google Trends report on “zombie,” “ghost,” and
“alien.” The patterns show fascinating trends from which, we
feel, much could be learned if resources were made available to
us in the form of a sizable research grant from the Department
of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, or a major film
studio. Please make out any checks to the first author or deposit
directly to his PayPal account.
5 References
Askitas, N., and Zimmermann, K. F. (2009). Google
econometrics and unemployment forecasting. Applied
Economics Quarterly 55, 107-120.
Goel, S., Hofman, J. M., Lahaie, S., Pennock, D. M., and Watts,
4. D. J. (2010). What can search predict? Technical report, Yahoo
Research.
Goel, S., Mason, W., and Watts, D. J. (2010). Real and
perceived attitude homophily in social networks. Technical
report, Yahoo Research.
Lakeland, D. (2010). Improved zombie dynamics. Models of
Reality blog, 1 March. http://models.street-artists.org/?p=554
Messer, B. (2010). Agent-based computational model of
humanity’s prospects for post zombie outbreak survival. The
Tortise’s Lens blog, 10 March.
http://thetortoiseslens.blogspot.com/2010/03/agent-based-
computational-model-of.html
Munz, P., Hudea, I., Imad, J., and Smith, R. J. (2009). When
zombies attack!: Mathematical modelling of an outbreak of
zombie infection. In Infectious Disease Modelling Research
Progress, ed. J. M. Tchuenche and C. Chiyaka, 133-150.
Hauppage, New York: Nova Science Publishers.
Romero, G. A. (1968). Night of the Living Dead. Image Ten.
Romero, G. A. (1978). Dawn of the Dead. Laurel Group.
Zheng, T., Slaganik, M., and Gelman, A. (2006). “How many
people do you know in prison?”: Using overdispersion in count
data to estimate social structure in networks. Journal of the
American Statistical Association 101, 409-423.
A CLOSER LOOK AT: How Many Zombies Do You Know?
· 1. How well does this mock scientific-research report use the
features (organization, feature, style, etc.) of the report genre?
Where does it differ from the typical report genre?
· 2. All of the books and articles cited are real. Some are
serious articles written by scientists and some are added for
humorous effect. Run through the References section and try to
predict which are 292293serious and which are silly. Use
Google or another search engine to actually find these articles
and test the accuracy of your predictions.
· 3. The introduction of a report should define a research
question and explain why it is important to the reader. What is
the question defined here? Does the author explain its
5. importance?
IDEAS FOR: Writing
· 1. Write a mock research report in the style Gelman’s article.
(In fact, this zombies article is a parody of the last item in the
Research section, which Gelman coauthored.) Choose a silly
topic and write a report similar to Gelman’s. Be sure to follow
the report-genre. Try to make the moves he makes, and try to
come up with a few of your own moves.
· 2. Write a bio of Andrew Gelman. Using Google or another
search engine, find Andrew Gelman’s professional page at
Columbia University and take a look at his papers and some of
his blog entries. Do Internet research into his areas of
specialization. Try to capture what distinguishes the work that
he does and how he approaches his work. We usually think of
the scientist as a very, very serious, almost non-human figure
who is devoted to seeking the scientific truth. How is Gelman
different?
Report of the APA Task Force on the Sexualization of Girls:
Executive Summary
EILEEN L. ZUBRIGGEN, REBECCA L. COLLINS, SHARON
LAMB, TONI-ANN ROBERTS, DEBORAH L. TOLMAN, L.
MONIQUE WARD, AND JEANNE BLAKE
This report was published by the American Psychological
Association (APA). It offers a broad review of research done on
portrayals of girls in the media. The report’s methodology
describes how the researchers analyzed a variety of articles on
this important and complex topic. We have included only the
executive summary here. Pay attention to how it follows the
report genre pattern and uses an objective style.
293 294
294 295
295 296
296 297
6. 297 298
Literature Discussion and Writing Plan
Grade level: M
……………Mini-lesson…………… WEEK 6/2015
Venue: classroom seating…
Date
Materials
Connections
Teaching/Modeling mini-lesson
Active engagement
Link to writing
End of workshop
share
Mon:
16/03/15
Book
Title: Henry’s Freedom Box
About: a slave named Henry who risked his life to get freedom
Prior-knowledge
Questioning
Connecting to other readings
Direct instruction
Skill: knowledge and vocabulary
Strategy:
Model strategy: when you find a sticky note, think about what
happened on that page and how Henry felt.
Feeling words: excited, hopeful, thrilled, disappointed,
terrified, depressed, and worried.
7. Introduce new book
Look through the pictures
Discussion prompt: how did Henry feel throughout the story?
Discuss figurative language
Write about Henry’s feelings at the beginning of the story. Use
events to tell why he was feeling that way.
New vocabulary:
Mistress, master, beckoned, tobacco, banjo
Reread sentences to look for clues, check the pictures, use a
known part, make a connection and use the glossary.
Share a new idea you have lifted from the story with the whole
class
Tues:
17 /03/15
Continue Reading the book
Sub title: henry’s journey to freedom
Previous reading
Questioning
Build background
Use character’s feelings to describe henry’s reaction to events
that occur
Strategy focus: retell using character’s feelings
Decoding strategy: Reread and think what would make sense,
cover the ending, use analogies and chunk big words
Fluency and Phrasing
Discussion prompt: share one of the feeling words you wrote
down and talk about what made henry to feel that way.
Vocabulary:
Crate, warehouse, vitriol, baggage car
Word study:
Analogy chart
Write down any tidbit you would like to use in future writing
Wed:
18/03/15
8. Rereading the book
Today you are going to tell the story using feeling words you
recorded on sticky notes. Be sure to include the events from the
story that caused Henry to have those feelings.
Connecting to previous reading
Free writing
Questioning
Skill: fluency, phrasing and comprehension
Strategy: Attend to bold words, punctuation, dialogue,
intonation and expression
Turn and talk to your partner about what the author meant by
‘Henry’s heart twisted in his chest’
Reread the story for fluency and engage in guided writing
Options for guided writing:
Beginning-middle-end, finger-five retell, problem/solution,
chapter summary, compare or contrast, cause/effect,
event/details, main idea/details, character analysis
In group of three, outline the new words to you from the story.
Use analogy chart to create new words from the ones that are in
the story.
Turn and talk to a partner about the basic moral lesson of the
whole story.
Thurs:
19/03/15
Outline questionnaire
Questioning
Prior knowledge
Skill: writing
Strategy: using information from the outline questionnaire,
write an essay in your own version
Break into groups of three and engage in guided writing using
chapter summary and character analysis
9. Studying pictures of facial expression to reveal different
feelings
Share in groups the experience of writing an essay
Fri:
20/03/15
Book summary guide
Connecting to other readings
Questioning
Skill: decoding and comprehension
Strategy: narrowing the story and making it more focused and
choosing a strong ending
Assessment
Write a summary of the whole story in your own version
Vocabulary created previously using the analogy chart to be
used
Restate the learning targets for the week and rate yourself as a
writer
Record the day’s learning for the whole week in classroom chart
Literature Discussion and Writing Workshop Plans
For the week of / /15.
|-------------------------------------------Minilesson-------------
----------------------------------------|
Date
Materials
Connection
Teaching/Modeling
Mini-Lesson
Active Engagement
Link
To Writing, vocab., sci., ss, math
End of Workshop
Share
10. / /15
Mon.
Select a
Book:
Story:
Poem:
Prior Knowledge
K-W-L
Questioning
Build Background
Connect to other readings
Skill:
Strategy:
Reinforcement skill & strategy
Practice
/ /15
Tues.
12. / /15
Fri.
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be prosecuted.
From Degrading to De-Grading
· ALFIE KOHN
· In this proposal, which was published in High School
magazine, Alfie Kohn first explains the problems with using
grades to motivate students in high school. Then he describes
how high schools could evaluate students in other ways. Kohn,
an education reformer, has published numerous books, has been
featured in a variety of magazines and newspapers, and has
13. appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show.
You can tell a lot about a teacher’s values and personality just
by asking how he or she feels about giving grades. Some defend
the practice, claiming that grades are necessary to “motivate”
students. Many of these teachers actually seem to enjoy keeping
intricate records of students’ marks. Such teachers periodically
warn students that they’re “going to have to know this for the
test” as a way of compelling them to pay attention or do the
assigned readings—and they may even use surprise quizzes for
that purpose, keeping their grade books at the ready.
Frankly, we ought to be worried for these teachers’ students. In
my experience, the most impressive teachers are those who
despise the whole process of giving grades. Their aversion, as it
turns out, is supported by solid evidence that raises questions
about the very idea of traditional grading.
Three main effects of grading
Researchers have found three consistent effects of using—and
especially, emphasizing the importance of—letter or number
grades:
1. Grades tend to reduce students’ interest in the learning itself.
One of the most well-researched findings in the field of
motivational psychology is that the more people are rewarded
for doing something, the more they tend to lose interest in
whatever they had to do to get the reward (Kohn, 1993). Thus, it
shouldn’t be surprising that when students are told they’ll need
to know something for a test—or, more generally, that
something they’re about to do will count for a grade—they are
likely to come to view that task (or book or idea) as a chore.
5 While it’s not impossible for a student to be concerned about
getting high marks and also to like what he or she is doing, the
practical reality is that these two ways of thinking generally
pull in opposite directions. Some research has explicitly
demonstrated that a “grade orientation” and a “learning
orientation” are inversely related (Beck et al., 1991; Milton et
al., 1986). More strikingly, study after study has found that
students—from elementary school to graduate school, and
14. across cultures—demonstrate less interest in learning as a result
of being graded (Benware and Deci, 1984; Butler, 1987; Butler
and Nisan, 1986; Grolnick and Ryan, 1987; Harter and Guzman,
1986; Hughes et al., 1985; Kage, 1991; Salili et al., 1976).
Thus, anyone who wants to see students get hooked on words
and numbers and ideas already has reason to 254255look for
other ways of assessing and describing their achievement.
2. Grades tend to reduce students’ preference for challenging
tasks. Students of all ages who have been led to concentrate on
getting a good grade are likely to pick the easiest possible
assignment if given a choice (Harter, 1978; Harter and Guzman,
1986; Kage, 1991; Milton et al., 1986). The more pressure to
get an A, the less inclination to truly challenge oneself. Thus,
students who cut corners may not be lazy so much as rational;
they are adapting to an environment where good grades, not
intellectual exploration, are what count. They might well say to
us, “Hey, you told me the point here is to bring up my GPA, to
get on the honor roll. Well, I’m not stupid: the easier the
assignment, the more likely that I can give you what you want.
So don’t blame me when I try to find the easiest thing to do and
end up not learning anything.”
3. Grades tend to reduce the quality of students’ thinking. Given
that students may lose interest in what they’re learning as a
result of grades, it makes sense that they’re also apt to think
less deeply. One series of studies, for example, found that
students given numerical grades were significantly less creative
than those who received qualitative feedback but no grades. The
more the task required creative thinking, in fact, the worse the
performance of students who knew they were going to be
graded. Providing students with comments in addition to a grade
didn’t help: the highest achievement occurred only when
comments were given instead of numerical scores (Butler, 1987;
Butler, 1988; Butler and Nisan, 1986).
In another experiment, students told they would be graded on
how well they learned a social studies lesson had more trouble
understanding the main point of the text than did students who
15. were told that no grades would be involved. Even on a measure
of rote recall, the graded group remembered fewer facts a week
later (Grolnick and Ryan, 1987). A brand-new study discovered
that students who tended to think about current events in terms
of what they’d need to know for a grade were less
knowledgeable than their peers, even after taking other
variables into account (Anderman and Johnston, 1998).
More Reasons to Just Say No to Grades
The preceding three results should be enough to cause any
conscientious educator to rethink the practice of giving students
grades. But as they say on late-night TV commercials, Wait—
there’s more.
10 4. Grades aren’t valid, reliable, or objective. A “B” in
English says nothing about what a student can do, what she
understands, where she needs help. Moreover, the basis for that
grade is as subjective as the result is uninformative. A teacher
can meticulously record scores for one test or assignment after
another, eventually calculating averages down to a hundredth of
a percentage point, but that doesn’t change the arbitrariness of
each of these individual marks. Even the score on a math test is
largely a reflection of how the test was written: what skills the
teacher decided to assess, what kinds of questions happened to
be left out, and how many points each section was “worth.”
Moreover, research has long been available to confirm what all
of us know: any given assignment may well be given two
different grades by two equally qualified teachers. It may even
be given two different grades by a single teacher who reads it at
two different times (for example, see some of the early research
reviewed in Kirschenbaum et al., 1971). In short, what grades
offer is spurious precision—a subjective rating masquerading as
an objective evaluation.
255 256
5. Grades distort the curriculum. A school’s use of letter or
number grades may encourage what I like to call a “bunch o’
facts” approach to instruction because that sort of learning is
easier to score. The tail of assessment thus comes to wag the
16. educational dog.
6. Grades waste a lot of time that could be spent on learning.
Add up all the hours that teachers spend fussing with their grade
books. Then factor in all the (mostly unpleasant) conversations
they have with students and their parents about grades. It’s
tempting to just roll our eyes when confronted with whining or
wheedling, but the real problem rests with the practice of
grading itself.
7. Grades encourage cheating. Again, we can continue to blame
and punish all the students who cheat—or we can look for the
structural reasons this keeps happening. Researchers have found
that the more students are led to focus on getting good grades,
the more likely they are to cheat, even if they themselves regard
cheating as wrong (Anderman et al., 1998; Milton et al., 1986;
also see “Who’s Cheating Whom?”).
15 8. Grades spoil teachers’ relationships with students.
Consider this lament, which could have been offered by a
teacher in your district:
· I’m getting tired of running a classroom in which everything
we do revolves around grades. I’m tired of being suspicious
when students give me compliments, wondering whether or not
they are just trying to raise their grade. I’m tired of spending so
much time and energy grading your papers, when there are
probably a dozen more productive and enjoyable ways for all of
us to handle the evaluation of papers. I’m tired of hearing you
ask me ‘Does this count?’ And, heaven knows, I’m certainly
tired of all those little arguments and disagreements we get into
concerning marks which take so much fun out of the teaching
and the learning… (Kirschenbaum et al., 1971, p. 115.
9. Grades spoil students’ relationships with each other. The
quality of students’ thinking has been shown to depend partly
on the extent to which they are permitted to learn cooperatively
(Johnson and Johnson, 1989; Kohn, 1992). Thus, the ill
feelings, suspicion, and resentment generated by grades aren’t
just disagreeable in their own right; they interfere with learning.
The most destructive form of grading by far is that which is
17. done “on a curve,” such that the number of top grades is
artificially limited: no matter how well all the students do, not
all of them can get an A. Apart from the intrinsic unfairness of
this arrangement, its practical effect is to teach students that
others are potential obstacles to their own success. The kind of
collaboration that can help all students to learn more effectively
doesn’t stand a chance in such an environment.
Sadly, even teachers who don’t explicitly grade on a curve may
assume, perhaps unconsciously, that the final grades “ought to”
come out looking more or less this way: a few very good grades,
a few very bad grades, and the majority somewhere in the
middle. But as one group of researchers pointed out, “It is not a
symbol of rigor to have grades fall into a ‘normal’ distribution;
rather, it is a symbol of failure—failure to teach well, failure to
test well, and failure to have any influence at all on the
intellectual lives of students” (Milton et al., 1986, p. 225).
The competition that turns schooling into a quest for triumph
and ruptures relationships among students doesn’t just happen
within classrooms, of course. The same 256257effect is
witnessed at a schoolwide level when kids are not just rated but
ranked, sending the message that the point isn’t to learn, or
even to perform well, but to defeat others. Some students might
be motivated to improve their class rank, but that is completely
different from being motivated to understand ideas. (Wise
educators realize that it doesn’t matter how motivated students
are; what matters is how students are motivated. It is the type of
motivation that counts, not the amount.)
Grade Inflation… and Other Distractions
20 Most of us are directly acquainted with at least some of these
disturbing consequences of grades, yet we continue to reduce
students to letters or numbers on a regular basis. Perhaps we’ve
become inured to these effects and take them for granted. This
is the way it’s always been, we assume, and the way it has to
be. It’s rather like people who have spent all their lives in a
terribly polluted city and have come to assume that this is just
the way air looks—and that it’s natural to be coughing all the
18. time.
Oddly, when educators are shown that it doesn’t have to be this
way, some react with suspicion instead of relief. They want to
know why you’re making trouble, or they assert that you’re
exaggerating the negative effects of grades (it’s really not so
bad—cough, cough), or they dismiss proven alternatives to
grading on the grounds that our school could never do what
others schools have done.
The practical difficulties of abolishing letter grades are real.
But the key question is whether those difficulties are seen as
problems to be solved or as excuses for perpetuating the status
quo. The logical response to the arguments and data summarized
here is to say: “Good Heavens! If even half of this is true, then
it’s imperative we do whatever we can, as soon as we can, to
phase out traditional grading.” Yet many people begin and end
with the problems of implementation, responding to all this
evidence by saying, in effect, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, but we’ll
never get rid of grades because…”
It is also striking how many educators never get beyond
relatively insignificant questions, such as how many tests to
give, or how often to send home grade reports, or what grade
should be given for a specified level of achievement (e.g., what
constitutes “B” work), or what number corresponds to what
letter. Some even reserve their outrage for the possibility that
too many students are ending up with good grades, a reaction
that suggests stinginess with A’s is being confused with
intellectual rigor. The evidence indicates that the real problem
isn’t grade inflation; it’s grades. The proper occasion for
outrage is not that too many students are getting A’s, but that
too many students have accepted that getting A’s is the point of
going to school.
Common objections
Let’s consider the most frequently heard responses to the above
arguments—which is to say, the most common objections to
getting rid of grades.
25 First, it is said that students expect to receive grades and
19. even seem addicted to them. This is often true; personally, I’ve
taught high school students who reacted to the absence of
grades with what I can only describe as existential vertigo.
(Who am I, if not a B+?) But as more elementary and even some
middle schools move to replace grades with more informative
(and less destructive) systems of assessment, the damage
doesn’t begin until students get to high school. Moreover,
elementary and middle schools that haven’t changed their
practices often cite the local high school as the reason they must
get students used to getting grades regardless of their damaging
effects—just as high schools point the finger at colleges.
257 258
Even when students arrive in high school already accustomed to
grades, already primed to ask teachers, “Do we have to know
this?” or “What do I have to do to get an A?”, this is a sign that
something is very wrong. It’s more an indictment of what has
happened to them in the past than an argument to keep doing it
in the future.
Perhaps because of this training, grades can succeed in getting
students to show up on time, hand in their work, and otherwise
do what they’re told. Many teachers are loath to give up what is
essentially an instrument of control. But even to the extent this
instrument works (which is not always), we are obliged to
reflect on whether mindless compliance is really our goal. The
teacher who exclaims, “These kids would blow off my course in
a minute if they weren’t getting a grade for it!” may be issuing
a powerful indictment of his or her course. Who would be more
reluctant to give up grades than a teacher who spends the period
slapping transparencies on the overhead projector and lecturing
endlessly at students about Romantic poets or genetic codes?
Without bribes (A’s) and threats (F’s), students would have no
reason to do such assignments. To maintain that this proves
something is wrong with the kids—or that grades are simply
“necessary”—suggests a willful refusal to examine one’s
classroom practices and assumptions about teaching and
learning.
20. “If I can’t give a child a better reason for studying than a grade
on a report card, I ought to lock my desk and go home and stay
there.” So wrote Dorothy De Zouche, a Missouri teacher, in an
article published in February… of 1945. But teachers who can
give a child a better reason for studying don’t need grades.
Research substantiates this: when the curriculum is engaging—
for example, when it involves hands-on, interactive learning
activities—students who aren’t graded at all perform just as
well as those who are graded (Moeller and Reschke, 1993).
Another objection: it is sometimes argued that students must be
given grades because colleges demand them. One might reply
that “high schools have no responsibility to serve colleges by
performing the sorting function for them”—particularly if that
process undermines learning (Krumboltz and Yeh, 1996, p.
325). But in any case the premise of this argument is erroneous:
traditional grades are not mandatory for admission to colleges
and universities.
Making change
30 A friend of mine likes to say that people don’t resist
change—they resist being changed. Even terrific ideas (like
moving a school from a grade orientation to a learning
orientation) are guaranteed to self-destruct if they are simply
forced down people’s throats. The first step for an
administrator, therefore, is to open up a conversation—to spend
perhaps a full year just encouraging people to think and talk
about the effects of (and alternatives to) traditional grades. This
can happen in individual classes, as teachers facilitate
discussions about how students regard grades, as well as in
evening meetings with parents, or on a website—all with the
help of relevant books, articles, speakers, videos, and visits to
neighboring schools that are farther along in this journey.
The actual process of “de-grading” can be done in stages. For
example, a high school might start by freeing ninth-grade
classes from grades before doing the same for upperclassmen.
(Even a school that never gets beyond the first stage will have
done a considerable service, giving students one full year where
21. they can think about what they’re learning instead of their
GPAs.)
Another route to gradual change is to begin by eliminating only
the most pernicious practices, such as grading on a curve or
258259ranking students. Although grades, per se, may continue
for a while, at least the message will be sent from the beginning
that all students can do well, and that the point is to succeed
rather than to beat others.
Anyone who has heard the term “authentic assessment” knows
that abolishing grades doesn’t mean eliminating the process of
gathering information about student performance—and
communicating that information to students and parents. Rather,
abolishing grades opens up possibilities that are far more
meaningful and constructive. These include narratives (written
comments), portfolios (carefully chosen collections of students’
writings and projects that demonstrate their interests,
achievement, and improvement over time), student-led parent-
teacher conferences, exhibitions and other opportunities for
students to show what they can do.
Of course, it’s harder for a teacher to do these kinds of
assessments if he or she has 150 or more students and sees each
of them for 45–55 minutes a day. But that’s not an argument for
continuing to use traditional grades; it’s an argument for
challenging these archaic remnants of a factory-oriented
approach to instruction, structural aspects of high schools that
are bad news for reasons that go well beyond the issue of
assessment. It’s an argument for looking into block scheduling,
team teaching, interdisciplinary courses—and learning more
about schools that have arranged things so each teacher can
spend more time with fewer students (e.g., Meier, 1995).
35 Administrators should be prepared to respond to parental
concerns, some of them completely reasonable, about the
prospect of edging away from grades. “Don’t you value
excellence?” You bet—and here’s the evidence that traditional
grading undermines excellence. “Are you just trying to spare
the self-esteem of students who do poorly?” We are concerned
22. that grades may be making things worse for such students, yes,
but the problem isn’t just that some kids won’t get A’s and will
have their feelings hurt. The real problem is that almost all kids
(including yours) will come to focus on grades and, as a result,
their learning will be hurt.
If parents worry that grades are the only window they have into
the school, we need to assure them that alternative assessments
provide a far better view. But if parents don’t seem to care
about getting the most useful information or helping their
children become more excited learners—if they demand grades
for the purpose of documenting how much better their kids are
than everyone else’s, then we need to engage them in a
discussion about whether this is a legitimate goal, and whether
schools exist for the purpose of competitive credentialing or for
the purpose of helping everyone to learn (Kohn, 1998; Labaree,
1997).
Above all, we need to make sure that objections and concerns
about the details don’t obscure the main message, which is the
demonstrated harm of traditional grading on the quality of
students’ learning and their interest in exploring ideas.
High school administrators can do a world of good in their
districts by actively supporting efforts to eliminate conventional
grading in elementary and middle schools. Working with their
colleagues in these schools can help pave the way for making
such changes at the secondary school level.
In the meantime
Finally, there is the question of what classroom teachers can do
while grades continue to be required. The short answer is that
they should do everything within their power to make grades as
invisible as possible for as long as possible. Helping students
forget about grades is the single best piece of advice for
creating a learning-oriented classroom.
259 260
40 When I was teaching high school, I did a lot of things I now
regret. But one policy that still seems sensible to me was saying
to students on the first day of class that, while I was compelled
23. to give them a grade at the end of the term, I could not in good
conscience ever put a letter or number on anything they did
during the term—and I would not do so. I would, however, write
a comment—or, better, sit down and talk with them—as often as
possible to give them feedback.
At this particular school I frequently faced students who had
been prepared for admission to Harvard since their early
childhood—a process I have come to call “Preparation H.” I
knew that my refusal to rate their learning might only cause
some students to worry about their marks all the more, or to
create suspense about what would appear on their final grade
reports, which of course would defeat the whole purpose. So I
said that anyone who absolutely had to know what grade a given
paper would get could come see me and we would figure it out
together. An amazing thing happened: as the days went by,
fewer and fewer students felt the need to ask me about grades.
They began to be more involved with what we were learning
because I had taken responsibility as a teacher to stop pushing
grades into their faces, so to speak, whenever they completed an
assignment.
What I didn’t do very well, however, was to get students
involved in devising the criteria for excellence (what makes a
math solution elegant, an experiment well-designed, an essay
persuasive, a story compelling) as well as deciding how well
their projects met those criteria. I’m afraid I unilaterally set the
criteria and evaluated the students’ efforts. But I have seen
teachers who were more willing to give up control, more
committed to helping students participate in assessment and
turn that into part of the learning. Teachers who work with their
students to design powerful alternatives to letter grades have a
replacement ready to go when the school finally abandons
traditional grading—and are able to minimize the harm of such
grading in the meantime.
References
Anderman, E. M., and J. Johnston. “Television News in the
Classroom: What Are Adolescents Learning?” Journal of
24. Adolescent Research 13 (1998): 73–100.
Beck, H. P., S. Rorrer-Woody, and L. G. Pierce. “The Relations
of Learning and Grade Orientations to Academic Performance.”
Teaching of Psychology 18 (1991): 35–37.
Benware, C. A., and E. L. Deci. “Quality of Learning With an
Active Versus Passive Motivational Set.” American Educational
Research Journal 21 (1984): 755–65.
Butler, R. “Task-Involving and Ego-Involving Properties of
Evaluation: Effects of Different Feedback Conditions on
Motivational Perceptions, Interest, and Performance.” Journal
of Educational Psychology 79 (1987): 474–82.
Butler, R. “Enhancing and Undermining Intrinsic Motivation:
The Effects of Task-Involving and Ego-Involving Evaluation on
Interest and Performance.” British Journal of Educational
Psychology 58 (1988): 1–14.
Butler, R., and M. Nisan. “Effects of No Feedback, Task-
Related Comments, and Grades on Intrinsic Motivation and
Performance.” Journal of Educational Psychology 78 (1986):
210–16.
De Zouche, D. “‘The Wound Is Mortal’: Marks, Honors,
Unsound Activities.” The Clearing House 19 (1945): 339–44.
Grolnick, W. S., and R. M. Ryan. “Autonomy in Children’s
Learning: An Experimental and Individual Difference
Investigation.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 52
(1987): 890–98.
Harter, S. “Pleasure Derived from Challenge and the Effects of
Receiving Grades on 260261Children’s Difficulty Level
Choices.” Child Development 49 (1978): 788–99.
Harter, S. and Guzman, M. E. “The Effect of Perceived
Cognitive Competence and Anxiety on Children’s Problem-
Solving Performance, Difficulty Level Choices, and Preference
for Challenge.” Unpublished manuscript, University of Denver.
1986.
Hughes, B., H. J. Sullivan, and M. L. Mosley. “External
Evaluation, Task Difficulty, and Continuing Motivation.”
Journal of Educational Research 78 (1985): 210–15.
25. Kage, M. “The Effects of Evaluation on Intrinsic Motivation.”
Paper presented at the meeting of the Japan Association of
Educational Psychology, Joetsu, Japan, 1991.
Kohn, A. Punished by Rewards: The Trouble with Gold Stars,
Incentive Plans, A’s, Praise, and Other Bribes. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin, 1993.
Kohn, A. “Only for My Kid: How Privileged Parents Undermine
School Reform.” Phi Delta Kappan, April 1998: 569–77.
Krumboltz, J. D., and C. J. Yeh. “Competitive Grading
Sabotages Good Teaching.” Phi Delta Kappan, December 1996:
324–26.
Labaree, D. F. How to Succeed in School Without Really
Learning: The Credentials Race in American Education. New
Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1997.
Meier, D. The Power of Their Ideas: Lessons for America from
a Small School in Harlem. Boston: Beacon, 1995.
Milton, O., H. R. Pollio, and J. A. Eison. Making Sense of
College Grades. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1986.
Moeller, A. J., and C. Reschke. “A Second Look at Grading and
Classroom Performance: Report of a Research Study.” Modern
Language Journal 77 (1993): 163–69.
Salili, F., M. L. Maehr, R. L. Sorensen, and L. J. Fyans, Jr. “A
Further Consideration of the Effects of Evaluation on
Motivation.” American Educational Research Journal 13 (1976):
85–102.
Alfie Kohn, “From Degrading to De-Grading.” Copyright 1999
by Alfie Kohn. Abridged from an article in High School
magazine with the author’s permission. For the complete text,
as well as other resources, please see www.alfiekohn.org.
A CLOSER LOOK AT: From Degrading to De-Grading
· 1. This article follows the organization of a traditional
proposal. Look through the article and identify the places where
Kohn describes (a) the problem, its causes, and its effects; (b) a
solution to the problem, including any major and minor steps;
and (c) the benefits of accepting his plan.
· 2. Some of Kohn’s major points are supported with empirical
26. evidence and some aren’t. Do you think the use of empirical
evidence in this proposal makes parts of his argument more
credible? Why or why not? In places where he has not backed
up his argument with empirical sources, do you find his
arguments reasonable and solid? Why or why not?
· 3. In your opinion, what are Kohn’s three strongest arguments
against grading and what are his two weakest arguments? What
are his three best ideas for alternative ways to evaluate and
motivate students? What are the two ideas in his plan that you
are most skeptical about?
PRINTED BY: [email protected] Printing is for personal,
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transmitted without publisher's prior permission. Violators will
be prosecuted.
READINGS: Nervous Nellies
· TAYLOR CLARK
· People usually assume, in general, that women are naturally
more nervous or anxious than men. In this research paper, which
is based on the book Nerve: Poise Under Pressure, Serenity
Under Stress, and the Brave New Science of Fear and Cool,
Taylor Clark argues that scientists have demonstrated that
women are not biologically inclined to be more anxious.
Instead, they are socialized to be this way. While reading this
argument, look at the ways Clark uses sources to back up his
arguments.
In the jittery world of anxiety research, one of the field’s most
consistent findings is also perhaps its biggest source of
controversy: Women, according to countless studies, are twice
as prone to anxiety as men (Kendler & Prescott, 1999; Todero,
Biing-Jiun, Raffa, Tilkemeier & Niaura, 2007). When pollsters
call women up, they always confess to far higher levels of
worry than men about everything from crime to the economy.
Psychologists diagnose women with anxiety disorders two times
27. as often as men, and research confirms—perhaps
unsurprisingly—that women are significantly more inclined
toward negative emotion, self-criticism, and endless rumination
about problems. From statistics like these, some have even leapt
to the Larry Summers-esque claim that women are simply built
to be much more nervous than men—an idea that has outraged
many women inside (and outside) the psychology community
(Summers, 2005).
According to new evidence, however, the outraged are right:
When it comes to our preconceived notions about women and
anxiety, women are unfairly being dragged through the mud.
While women are indeed more fretful than men on average right
now, this difference is mostly the result of a cultural setup—one
in which major social and parenting biases lead to girls
becoming needlessly nervous adults. In reality, the idea that
women are “naturally” twice as anxious as men is nothing more
than a pernicious illusion.
Before we can unleash the vengeance of the furies on this
falsehood, though, there’s some bad news we need to get out of
the way first: a few recent studies have indicated that the
hormonal differences between the sexes really do make women
a touch more biologically inclined toward anxiety than men.
One noteworthy experiment from last year, for example, found
that female brains—well, female rat brains—get more rattled by
small levels of a major stress hormone called corticotrophin-
releasing factor than male brains (Valentino, 2010). Another
2010 study, at Florida State University, likewise revealed that
male rats’ higher testosterone levels seem to give them a larger
buffer against anxiety than female rats have (Hartung, 2010).
(Don’t get hung up on the fact that these studies were on
rodents; most of what we know about the neuroscience of fear
actually comes from tormenting lab rats.) Just how big a role
these biological factors play in human women’s anxiety isn’t
yet clear.
But one thing we do know for certain is that the way we raise
children plays a huge role in determining how disposed toward
28. anxiety they are later in life, and thus the difference in the way
we treat boys and girls explains a lot about the heightened
nerves we 328329see in many adult women. To show just how
important this is, let’s start at the very beginning. If women
really were fated to be significantly more anxious than men, we
would expect them to start showing this nervousness at a very
young age, right? Yet precisely the opposite is true: According
to the UCLA anxiety expert Michelle Craske, in the first few
months of infants’ lives, it’s boys who show greater emotional
neediness. While girls become slightly more prone to negative
feelings than boys at two years (which, coincidentally, is the
age at which kids begin learning gender roles), research has
shown that up until age 11, girls and boys are equally likely to
develop an anxiety disorder. By age 15, however, girls are six
times more likely to have one than boys are (McGee, Feehan,
Williams & Anderson, 1992).
5 Why the sudden gap in diagnosed anxiety? Well, one answer
is that as a flood of adolescent hormones sends these boys’ and
girls’ emotions into overdrive, the difference in their
upbringings finally catches up with them. After all, whether
parents intend to or not, they usually treat the emotional
outbursts of girls far differently than those of boys. “From a
socialization angle, there’s quite a lot of evidence that little
girls who exhibit shyness or anxiety are reinforced for it,
whereas little boys who exhibit that behavior might even be
punished for it,” Craske told me.
In my book Nerve, I call this the “skinned knee effect”: Parents
coddle girls who cry after a painful scrape but tell boys to suck
it up, and this formative link between emotional outbursts and
kisses from mom predisposes girls to react to unpleasant
situations with “negative” feelings like anxiety later in life. On
top of this, cultural biases about boys being more capable than
girls also lead parents to push sons to show courage and
confront their fears, while daughters are far more likely to be
sheltered from life’s challenges. If little Olivia shows fear, she
gets a hug; if little Oliver shows fear, he gets urged to
29. overcome it.
The result of these parenting disparities is that by the time girls
grow into young women, they’ve learned fewer effective coping
strategies than their male counterparts, which translates to
higher anxiety. The sexes learn to deal with fear in two very
different ways: men have been conditioned to tackle problems
head-on, while women have been taught to worry, ruminate, and
complain to each other (hey, I’m just reporting the research)
rather than actively confront challenges. These are
generalizations, of course; the fact that I have always been an
Olympic-caliber worrier offers us just one example of how men
can fret with the best of them, and everyone knows at least one
woman who appears not even to know what fear is. Still, these
differences in upbringing clarify quite a bit about the gender
gap in anxiety.
Yet parenting doesn’t tell the full story of feminine nerves,
because even if a young woman emerges from childhood as a
relatively cool and resilient adult, she still has to do battle with
social forces that seem bent on making her anxious. You may
expect me to dwell here on the viselike pressure that
contemporary culture exerts on women to look beautiful and
young forever (one highly questionable survey found that
women worry about their bodies an average of 252 times a
week), but while this is a significant issue, the cultural biases
about women and anxiety run deeper still (Alexander, 2009).
We have an odd tendency to label women as anxious even when
they aren’t. A recent, highly revealing study showed that even
in situations in which male and female subjects experience the
same level of an emotion, women are consistently seen—and
even see themselves—as being “more emotional” than men. It
shouldn’t be too surprising, then, that this bias holds for anxiety
as well; we buy into the fretful-women stereotypes far too often.
Another report, for 329330example, found significant
differences in the way doctors respond to patients who report
common stress symptoms like chest pain: Whereas men get full
cardiac workups, women are more often told that they’re just
30. stressed or anxious, and that their symptoms are in their heads.
10 It should be pretty clear by now that the claims about women
being far more innately anxious than men are suspect, but
before I depart in a blaze of justice, one final point is in order:
Men are getting off much too easily in the anxiety discussion.
Probably the most significant reason why women get diagnosed
with anxiety disorders twice as often as men isn’t that they’re
doubly fearful. It’s because anxious men are much less likely to
seek psychological help.
The flip side of being raised to always show strength is that
men come to feel that going to a therapist is a sign of weakness
or failure (think of Tony Soprano’s mopey resistance to the
benefits of psychiatry), which is why men constitute just 37
percent of therapy patients, by some estimates. If nearly twice
as many women seek help from a psychologist, then they’ll
obviously be diagnosed more often with anxiety disorders.
Troublingly enough, the evidence shows that while women deal
with anxiety and stress by worrying, men are more likely to try
to bury these feelings with alcohol or drugs—which offers one
rationale for why men are at higher risk for “antisocial”
disorders like alcoholism.
So take heart, women of the world: You’re not necessarily
bioengineered to be worry machines. The deeper truth behind
the great anxiety divide is this: We all get stressed-out and
nervous sometimes. Women are simply more honest about their
anxiety, because they’ve been taught to deal with it through
unencumbered fretting. Of course, I’m not about to declare that
if we raised boys and girls exactly the same, eradicated the
cultural anxiety bias against women, and frogmarched more men
into therapy, the gender nervousness gap would magically
disappear. We would almost certainly see, though, that this gap
is far smaller than we think.
References
Alexander, H. (2009, November 23). Women worry about their
bodies 252 times a week. Telegraph.co.uk. The Telegraph.
Retrieved from
31. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/6634686/Women-
worry-about-their-bodies-252-times-a-week.html
Clark, T. (2011). Nerve: Poise under pressure, serenity under
stress, and the brave new science of fear and cool. Little, Brown
and Company.
Harting, R. (2010, September 1). Why does anxiety target
women more? Florida State University. Retrieved April 27,
2011, from http://www.fsu.com/News-Archive
/2010/September/Why-does-anxiety-target-women -more-FSU-
researcher-awarded-1.8M-grant-to-find-out
Kendler, K., & Prescott, C. (1999). A population-based twin
study of lifetime major depression in men and women. Archives
of General Psychology, 56, 39–44.
McGee, R., Feehan, M., Williams, S., & Anderson, J. (1992).
DSM-III disorders from age 11 to age 15 years. Journal of
American Academy of Child Adolescent Psychology, 31(1), 50–
59.
Summers, L. (2005, January 14). Remarks at NBER Conference
on diversifying the science & engineering workforce. Office of
the President, Harvard University. Retrieved April 27, 2011,
from http://classic-
web.archive.org/web/20080130023006/http://www.president.har
vard.edu/speeches/2005/nber.html
Todaro, J., Biing-Jiun, S., Raffa, S., Tilkemeier, P., & Niaura,
R. (2007). Prevalence of anxiety disorders in men and women
with established coronary heart disease. Journal of
Cardiopulmonary Rehabilitation & Prevention, 27(2), 86–91.
doi:10.1097/01. HCR.0000265036.24157.e7
330 331
Valentino, R. (2010, August 20). Stress hormone receptors less
adaptive in female brain. National Institute of Mental Health.
Retrieved April 27, 2011, from
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/media/audio/stress-hormone-
receptors-less-adaptive-in-female-brain.shtml
A CLOSER LOOK AT: Nervous Nellies
· 1. In this research paper, Clark argues against the assumption
32. that women are naturally more nervous or anxious than men.
Instead, he is arguing that women are socialized to be this way.
Where in the article does he use evidence from sources to prove
his point?
· 2. This essay can be considered an “argumentative” research
paper. Where in the text does the author signal that he is
arguing, not only explaining? Where does he reveal the main
point (thesis) of his argument? What are three or four major
arguments in support of his main point? What strategies does he
use to argue for his position?
· 3. Clark agrees that women are in general more nervous and
anxious than men. Where and how does he agree to this
assumption? What are the reasons he gives for these differences
between women and men? What suggestions does he offer to
lessen women’s tendencies to be more nervous or anxious than
men?
IDEAS FOR: Writing
· 1. Write a two-page rhetorical analysis in which you explain
why you find Clark’s argument effective or ineffective. Look
closely at his use of reasoning (logos), authority (ethos), and
emotions (pathos) to support his arguments. Your rhetorical
analysis should not argue for or against Clark’s main point.
Instead, explain why you find his argument strategies effective
or not.
· 2. Write a rebuttal in which you argue against Clark’s main
point or one of his major arguments. You can argue from your
own experience, but you should also back up your arguments
with your own sources. Also, you can agree with Clark’s overall
argument, but you could disagree with his reasoning or his
suggestions for dealing with anxiousness in women.
331 332
Serial Murder: A Forensic Psychiatric Perspective
· JAMES KNOLL, MD
· TV shows and magazine articles about serial killers are
common in today’s media, but what do we really know about
serial murder? To answer that question, forensic psychiatrist
33. James Knoll reports on the scientific and medical research and
reveals what we know and what we need to find out through
further research. As you read, pay attention to the way that
Knoll takes on myths and misconceptions about serial murder
and the kind of research he uses to reach his conclusions.
· ‘You feel the last bit of breath leaving their body. You’re
looking into their eyes. A person in that situation is God!’ —
Ted Bundy
· Ressler: “Do you have any idea at all, of what would start
bringing this type of fantasy to mind…?”
· Dahmer: “It all revolved around having complete control. Why
or where it came from, I don’t know.” —How to Interview a
Cannibal Robert K. Ressler
When law enforcement apprehends a serial murderer, the event
is consistently the focus of unswerving media coverage. For
local communities, the ordeal can be particularly shocking and
upsetting. Residents living in a community that is exposed to
serial murder may even experience posttraumatic stress disorder
symptoms for varying periods of time (Herkov and Beirnat,
1997).
Over the past three decades, our society has become fascinated
by the phenomenon of serial murder as evidenced by the
numerous books, movies and television shows on the subject.
Yet, despite the high level of interest, there is no current theory
that adequately explains the etiology of serial murder (Holmes
et al., 2002). This is primarily due to the fact that serial murder
is an event with an extremely low base rate and therefore is
difficult to study via rigorous scientific methods (Dietz, 1986).
While serial murder is a universally terrifying concept, it is an
extraordinarily rare event. In a study of the frequency of serial
sexual homicide, McNamara and Morton (2004) found that it
accounted for only 0.5% of all homicides over a 10-year period
in Virginia. In contrast to the sensationalized perception that
serial murder is a growing epidemic, there is no solid evidence
that this is the case. An analysis of homicide victims from 1960
to 1998 indicated that the percentages of female homicide
34. victims have actually decreased (Schlesinger, 2001a). Because
the victims of serial murderers are overwhelmingly female,
these data fail to support the notion that serial murder is
increasing in frequency.
332 333
Historically, the term serial murder may be relatively new, but
its occurrence is not. In the United States alone there have been
documented cases as far back as the 1800s. In 16th-century
France, it is likely that myths such as “werewolves” were used
to explain the deeds of serial murderers that were too horrifying
to attribute to human beings (Everitt, 1993). In all likelihood,
serial murderers have always been among us.
5 In 1886, psychiatry professor Richard von Krafft-Ebing wrote
the classic Psychopathia Sexualis, in which he described the
characteristics of individuals who appeared to obtain sexual
gratification from acts of sadistic domination. The next major
psychiatric contribution to our understanding of serial
murderers was in 1970 when forensic psychiatrist Robert
Brittain produced detailed descriptions of sadistic murderers he
had encountered over his career. Beginning in the early ‘70s,
media coverage of notorious cases such as Ted Bundy and the
Hillside Strangler produced a sense of urgency to study and
explain the phenomenon.
Thus far, the study of serial murder has been somewhat
hampered by lack of a unanimously agreed upon definition.
However, most experts agree on the criteria that the offender
must have murdered at least two victims in temporally unrelated
incidents. This phenomenon usually involves a cooling off or
refractory period between killings that varies in duration for
each individual offender. To date, our greatest source of
knowledge and data on serial murder has come from experts
working in the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Behavioral
Science Unit, now called the Behavioral Analysis Unit. To
emphasize the sexual nature of the crimes, and to distinguish
these offenders from others who murder serially for other
reasons (e.g., contract killers), Douglas et al. (1997) have used
35. the term sexual homicide. For each individual serial sexual
homicide offender, the performance and meaning of the sexual
element may vary.
TABLE 1 Offender Traits
Organized
Disorganized
Good verbal skills, socially adept
Poor verbal and social skills
May live with spouse
Loner or lives with parents
Reasonably intelligent
Low intelligence
Usually employed
Under- or unemployed
Planning of crime
Little to no planning of crime
Ruse or con to gain control of victim
Blitz or surprise attack of victim
Targeted victim
Victim of opportunity
Crime scene: suggests control, order
Crime scene: disarray
Crime scene and death scene not the same
Crime scene and death scene often the same
Movement of body
Body left at death scene
Attempts to conceal evidence
Little to no attempts to conceal evidence
Source: Knoll J (2006)
Researchers at the FBI gathered data from detailed interviews of
36 convicted serial murderers and were able to extract and
analyze important personality and behavioral characteristics
that helped distinguish different types of serial murderers. For
ease of communication and conceptualization, the offenders
were categorized into either “organized” or “disorganized”
types (Table 1). These terms were initially meant to help law
36. enforcement interpret crime scenes and can be understood as
generally applicable concepts. They may also have appeal to
forensic mental health professionals in that they