GARDEN ROUTE | KAROO NEWS - South Africa is a crime-ridden country ravaged by violence. 

I write as a forensic psychologist from the UK, who has lived in South Africa for 23 years and is familiar with the research literature on the causes of violence. 

South Africa’s homicide rate is more than five times higher than the international average and the second highest in the world. The rate of sexual violence, particularly rape, in South Africa is the highest in the world. 

The annual 16 Days of Activism against Gender Based Violence is a failure. Since 1998 violence against women and children has increased. 

Police kill an average of 450 people a year using deadly force. That’s over twice the number per capita that police kill in the USA. Paradoxically, South African police are six times as likely to be killed at work as US police.

The sociologists, Emile Durkheim and Robert Merton, famously referred to the breakdown of moral values, guidance and norms by which people live as anomie. Robert Merton further suggested that criminality and violence resulted when goals such as the achievement of wealth could not be gained by legitimate means. 

We have anomie in South Africa and research now shows that, like all human behaviour, crime and violence emanate not just from nature but from an interaction between nature and nurture.  

Of the environmental factors poverty is seen by many observers as the main driver causing crime that, since the arrival of democracy, the Government has failed miserably to tackle. 

Unemployment is at record levels at 41.1% which, according to Bloomberg, is the highest in the world. Seventy percent of young people between 15 and 24 are unemployed.

My ex-colleague David Farrington followed up 411 boys, aged  8 and 9 in a deprived area of south London for 40 years to see what factors were related to crime later in life. 

The family factors associated with an increased likelihood of delinquency and violence included a history of violence in the family, neglect at home, poor parental supervision, inconsistent discipline, large family size and poverty. 

Many other social scientists, notably John Bowlby, have highlighted the absence of a parent, leading to criminality and violence in later life.  A staggering seventy percent of black children live without their biological father at home.  

It is something of a truism to say that crime and violence have environmental causes. 

Curiously, however, the biological bases for criminality have been little described in the mainstream media although there is 40 years of research showing that nature is as influential as nurture. 

Twin studies contrast the behaviour of identical twins (who are genetically identical) with the behaviour of fraternal twins (who are only partially similar genetically) brought up in the same or different environments. 

The studies show that identical twins are more likely to be similar in terms of delinquency than fraternal twins later on in life, suggesting a strong genetic influence. 

Studies of adopted children support this conclusion. Adopted children exhibit higher levels of delinquency if their biological parents have a history of criminality, even when their adoptive parents have no such history. 

These studies suggest that half of the explanation for crime is accounted for by genetics and half by the environment. No one is born a criminal but some individuals are predisposed to crime due to genetic, hormonal, or neurological factors.

The seeds of a predisposition for violence are sown early in life.  This is shown in a study of babies.  Those with both birth complications of anoxia (and damage to the fetal brain) and negative parenting had a threefold increase in violence compared with those with only birth complications, or with only negative parenting or with neither 18 years later.

It isn’t just biology and it isn’t just the environment. It’s both together that provide the toxic mix that predicts violence. What else can give a push toward crime? 

Studies show that smoking during pregnancy can lead to offspring becoming violent. The more mothers smoke while pregnant the higher the rates of violence in their offspring decades later.

Towards the end of World War II a large group of mothers in The Netherlands suffered poor nutrition during pregnancy due to a food blockade. They were compared with a group who had good nutrition during pregnancy when food availability was back to normal. 

The offspring of those suffering poor nutrition were 2.5 times as likely to develop an antisocial personality disorder and commit crimes, including violent crimes later in life.

Researchers have found that Omega 3, a fatty acid found in fish oil, if taken as a supplement can reduce antisocial and aggressive behaviour in children, in prison populations, the general population and substance abusers.

There is also research evidence looking directly at the brain. 

My ex-colleague Adrian Raine scanned the brains of both murderers and non-murderers. He found that the pre-frontal cortex, whose role is to moderate social behaviour, is underdeveloped in the majority of murderers. 

Other studies show that those committing violent acts have a part of the brain called the amygdala that is small and underdeveloped. The amygdala is the basis for conscience, remorse, shame and guilt. Those with a small amygdala are three times as likely to commit acts of violence as those with normal-sized amygdales.  

My experience of working with killers in UK prisons suggests that they know it’s wrong to kill but it is the lack of emotion caused by a dysfunctional amygdala that is the likely root cause of the crime. Is it possible to predict from amygdala size future criminality? 

In another study those with low volumes had a threefold increase in violent crimes compared with those with normal volumes; 57% compared with 18%.

In 1976 Richard Dawkins provided us with the concept of the ‘Selfish Gene’ exploring Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection and the survival of the fittest to help explain behaviour. 

Genes are the units of heredity that are responsible for the transmission of traits from generation to generation. 

In the South African setting during the colonial and apartheid periods, delinquent and violent behaviour was sometimes a necessity for many people to survive.  But have specific genes been identified to account for this? 

A gene variant called MAOA (which stands for monoamine oxidase A), better known as the ‘warrior gene’ is involved in the regulation of neurotransmitters, including serotonin and dopamine. 

Studies in the last 10 years show that the warrior gene has been linked to a greater propensity to aggressive behaviour, psychopathy and particularly criminal violence. 

Importantly, there is strong evidence for a gene by environment interaction. In a long-term study that began in 1973 those with an MAOA variant of the gene who had been abused as children were correctly predicted to commit violent crimes decades later in life. 

This finding has been replicated many times.

What can be done to turn the rampant criminal violence in South Africa around? 

The media in South Africa regularly features well-intentioned commentators who suggest that things can be turned around. Suggestions include more and better-trained police, longer prison sentences, community action, sacking corrupt police officers, the death penalty for murderers, increasing government grants for the needy, reducing unemployment and praying to God. 

Given the biological and environmental evidence on the causes of violence, I suggest that none of this is likely to dent, even slightly, violence in South Africa.

This article has focused on violence as perhaps the most extreme and concerning form of criminality in South Africa but, of course, this is the tip of the criminality iceberg. 

The same kind of analysis as I have carried out on the causes of violence could be carried out on corruption, theft and dishonesty. Similar findings will be obtained. 

They are caused by an interaction between biological and environmental factors. As with violence, it is extremely unlikely that this can be turned around without massive social engineering on the part of the Government. 

I’m not holding my breath.

Article by Barry J McGurk BTech MSc PhD CPsychol FBPsS, Forensic and Occupational Psychologist

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