Mental illness not to blame for gun violence study finds
Counter to a lot of public opinion, having a mental illness does not necessarily make a person more likely to commit gun violence. According to a new study, a better indicator of gun violence was access to firearms.
A study by researchers at The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston looked into the association between gun violence and mental health in a group of 663 young adults in Texas. Their results were published in the journal Preventive Medicine.
"Counter to public beliefs, the majority of mental health symptoms examined were not related to gun violence," said Dr. Yu Lu, a postdoctoral research fellow at UTMB and the lead author of the study.
What researchers found instead was that individuals who had gun access were approximately 18 times more likely to have threatened someone with a gun. Individuals with high hostility were about 3.5 times more likely to threaten someone.
"These findings have important implications for gun control policy efforts," Lu said.
Each year, an estimated 75,000 to 100,000 Americans are injured by firearms and 30,000 to 40,000 die from firearms, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
"Much of the limited research on gun violence and mental illness has focused on violence among individuals with severe mental illnesses or rates of mental illness among individuals arrested for violent crimes," Lu said. "What we found is that the link between mental illness and gun violence is not there."
Lu and Dr. Jeff Temple, another author of the study and a professor at UTMB, surveyed participants in a long-term study about their firearm possession and use as well as about anxiety, depression, stress, posttraumatic stress disorder, hostility, impulsivity, borderline personality disorder, mental health treatment and other demographic details.
The researchers found that individuals who had access to guns, compared to those with no such access, were over 18 times more likely to have threatened someone with a gun, even after controlling for a number of demographic and mental health variables. Meanwhile, most mental health symptoms were unrelated to gun violence.
"Taking all this information together, limiting access to guns, regardless of any other mental health status, demographics or prior mental health treatments, is the key to reducing gun violence," Temple said.
User comments
Your selective quoting of the amendment doesn't help your case. "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
The first two clauses modify the third. The 2nd Amendment *doesn't* guarantee personal freedom to own guns, although it has been read as though it does. It guarantees the security of the state by arming citizens.
People will always find a way to hurt other people if they are so inclined. We see this in countries that have banned guns. They use knives, cars, bombs, acid, bricks etc etc. And yes, somehow, magically people in these gun free countries still find ways to get...guns! The black market for guns in these countries is more profitable than drugs.
Later rulings high court reversed this emphasis to say that militia was just an example of the use of a gun. Using that dynamic we sill have:
a) the amendment suggest that guns need to be fit for purpose and
b) the purpose must be well regulated (implying by the government).
Put those two things together and the have the Australian model where you can still buy and use an AR-15, for instance, if you actually need that weapon for your employment (eg culling animals from a helicopter).
Please sign in to add a comment. Registration is free, and takes less than a minute. Read more