Animal Cruelty and Interpersonal Violence

Social researchers, psychological researchers and criminological researchers alike have all applied the MacDonald triad theory to explain violent crime against humans. The triad theory simply uses three main variables, enuresis, pyromania, and animal cruelty during childhood to explain aggression that graduates to violent crimes against humans in adulthood. This research only looks at methods of animal cruelty used, and age of onset abuse. By identifying animal cruelty in childhood and adolescent children findings can be used as an indicator of adult violence and in turn develop the grounds for intervention and prevention. This research is replicated from studies done primarily by Hensley and Tallichet. In the early 1990’s Hensley and Tallichet researched and examined different aspects of animal cruelty and wrote several articles based on the same sample taken from inmates surveyed at both a medium and maximum security prisons in a southern state. According to Tallichet & Hensley (2008), the assertion that youthful animal abusers graduate to later aggression against humans, known as the “graduation hypothesis,” has become more commonly accepted by clinicians, social scientist, law enforcement, and animal advocates alike.

Ascione’s (1993) definition of animal cruelty is defined as “socially unacceptable behavior that intentionally causes unnecessary pain, suffering, or distress to and/or death of an animal” exclusive of socially condoned behavior, such as legal hunting and certain agricultural and veterinary practices. Not all violent individuals have been previously cruel to animals but studies have shown that a great number of them have exhibited this behavior. A great majority of the literature calls for a better understandin...

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