They both murder with apparent ease, but do different male and female serial killers have different reasons for their killing sprees? As it turns out, yes.
In a study published in The Journal of Forensic Psychiatry and Psychology, University of Pennsylvania evolutionary psychology professor Marissa Harrison and a team of researchers scoured newspaper clippings dating almost 200 years ago for female serial killers (FSK), mostly because a vast majority of the women had already died, and they had little money to interview living convicts. Nevertheless, the scientists were able to compile a list of 64 female serial killers active from 1821 to 2008 which was the last year the team was able to find a FSK in the news, Harrison told Modern Notion. After surveying the information, they concluded that FSKs are incited to do evil for very different reasons from male serial killers (MSKs).
One particular difference between the genders stuck out to the scientists right away. MSKs tend to stalk their victims, who are typically strangers, and violently kill them for some sort of sexual gratification. On the other hand, FSKs target people they know, particularly family members, and they most commonly choose poison to kill. In addition, their primary goal in committing murder wasn’t sex, but money (just check out Belle Gunness, for instance).
The team also discovered that the FSKs shared a similar profile. Most were white, came from middle to upper-class backgrounds, had some sort of higher education, if not a college degree, and were married at some point. If appearance was mentioned, researchers found most women were described as attractive. As for religion, most identified as Christian.
Though the sample of FSKs’ job positions varied anywhere from teacher to prostitute, about 40 percent worked in the medical field as either nurses or aides, and 22 percent were either mothers or babysitters. Almost two-thirds were related to their victims, one-third killed their lovers and, horrifically, around 44 percent killed their own biological children. Moreover, 50 percent of FSKs killed at least one child, while about 25 percent killed the elderly or infirm. But there was one characteristic that they shared by far: 92 percent of the women knew their victims.
Clearly there’s a marked difference between MSK and FSK methods and motives. But why? Harrison believes it all goes back to evolution. She explained to Modern Notion:
In ancestral times, men were hunters and women were gatherers. When I noted that FSKs tend to kill the people around them, it reminded me of gathering. When I checked the work of Eric Hickey and others, I saw that MSKs tend to kill strangers…they are hunters. It just fits. It doesn’t mean, of course, that we evolved to be SKs, but it does make sense in terms of ancestral drives gone awry.
This study is a huge leap for scientists to understand the psychology of female serial killers, especially since there just hasn’t been that much research done on the topic. But Harrison thinks the reason for the lack of data is two-fold, “I think there is so little research on FSKs because society may not accept that women—moms, nurses, babysitters—can commit such horrible acts.”
And then there’s the newsy factor. Female serial killers tend to be less sensational. “A poisoning might not be as interesting to the public as beheaded corpses buried in a yard,” Harrison added.
Whether this information will strike the public’s fancy or not, the good news is that we’re slowly gathering together a profile on female serial killers, that will hopefully help us identify and stop them in the future.
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