Psychology Today
psychologytoday.com › us › blog › wicked-deeds › 201410 › serial-killers-and-the-essential-role-fantasy
Serial Killers and the Essential Role of Fantasy | Psychology Today
October 13, 2014 - They were going on for too long ... have revealed that the most common childhood traits among them, which extended into their adolescence and adulthood, are daydreaming and compulsive masturbation....
ScienceDirect
sciencedirect.com › science › article › abs › pii › S1359178914000846
A psychological and developmental profile of sexual murderers: A systematic review - ScienceDirect
August 14, 2014 - In Hill, Habermann, Berner, and Briken's (2006) study, 90.4% of sexual murderers diagnosed as sexual sadists reported “masturbation with sadistic fantasies”. Causal links between sadistic fantasies and sadistic behaviors (i.e., rape and ...
Reddit
reddit.com › r/serialkillers › question: what do you think triggers and connects the sexual arousal to violence?
r/serialkillers on Reddit: Question: what do you think triggers and connects the sexual arousal to violence?
August 5, 2022 -
Hello everyone, I know the question can seem vague so I’ll elaborate.
I’m not a big expert, I’m passionate about the psychology of the serial killer phenomenon and I read/watched documentaries about Bundy, Gacy, Zodiac, Dahmer and some other less famous.
My question is more about the psychology than the facts themselves, and it is:
What causes the association between sexual arousal and violence?
As far as I know , often serial killers decide to kill in order to live a fantasy they have had for a long time. Furthermore, in the 70s the so called detective magazines were pretty common and they depicted images of murder/corpses in a sexualised way.
As a neurotypical person I’m trying to understand how your mind begins to associate something that excites you (for example a naked body of a woman or a man) with the idea of destroying, making suffer, violate them. The “normal” process would be to avoid those thoughts, instead in these cases they are a trigger. So how do you think this connection is made in those minds? Thank you.
Top answer 1 of 5
130
I’d imagine there isn’t one answer but many serial killers have talked about the sense of power that killing another gives them which is what arouses them.
2 of 5
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I listened to a podcast about Anthony Sowell years ago, and I can’t recall if it came from his police interviews or what but it talked about this specific thing. When he was a kid, he lived with a family member who raised him and a bunch of other kids, I think his grandmother. She was very abusive and the podcast talks about how she would make one of the girls strip naked, then tie her up and beat her and would make the other kids watch. Apparently it happened around the time he hit puberty and because of those two things happening around the same time, his brain associated sexual arousal with violence against women. It could all be BS to try to garner some kind of sympathy but it kind of makes sense psychologically. I’m sure it’s also not the only reason.
CNN
cnn.com › 2023 › 07 › 24 › us › serial-killers-psychology
What causes someone to become a serial killer? It’s a malignant combination of factors, experts say | CNN
July 24, 2023 - It becomes like a fantasy loop that plays over and over in their minds throughout adolescence and into early adulthood. They frequently combine it with masturbation, so they fantasize about doing terrible things to people, bondage and raping ...
SAGE Publications
sk.sagepub.com › ency › edvol › violentcrime › chpt › lust-murder
Sage Reference - Encyclopedia of Murder and Violent Crime - Lust Murder
September 15, 2007 - Paraphilia is defined as a sexual ... are a number of essential elements to paraphilic behaviors, including fantasy, compulsive masturbation, and facilitating agents such as alcohol, drugs, and pornography....
CBS News
cbsnews.com › crime › experts explain what causes someone to become a serial killer
What causes someone to become a serial killer and what are the signs | Experts explain
July 24, 2023 - It becomes like a fantasy loop that plays over and over in their minds throughout adolescence and into early adulthood. They frequently combine it with masturbation, so they fantasize about doing terrible things to people, bondage and raping ...
PubMed
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov › 16882237
The motivation behind serial sexual homicide: is it sex, power, and control, or anger? - PubMed
Controversy exists in the literature and society regarding what motivates serial sexual killers to commit their crimes. Hypotheses range from the seeking of sexual gratification to the achievement of power and control to the expression of anger. The authors provide theoretical, empirical, evolutiona …
Waldenu
scholarworks.waldenu.edu › cgi › viewcontent.cgi pdf
Factors That Influence Violence and Homicidal Ideation ...
serial killer find what he or she believes to be a vulnerable population and try to · accommodate their truest desires with the said population? Perhaps, it is the physical ... The child may engage in auto-vampirism in tasting his own blood and during puberty. These acts are eventually sexualized and reinforced through masturbation.
Cambridge Core
cambridge.org › core › books › abs › understanding-sexual-serial-killing › looking-for-a-thrill › EBAE4B2B934271A848029470EF12C419
Looking for a Thrill (Chapter 10) - Understanding Sexual Serial Killing
These can have sexual associations and are sometimes accompanied by masturbation. Dopamine activation is at the basis of elevations in arousal. Serial lust killers commonly have a history of committing non-sexual crimes and arson.
ScienceDirect
sciencedirect.com › science › article › abs › pii › S1359178916301367
The modus operandi of serial and nonserial sexual murderers: A systematic review - ScienceDirect
September 24, 2016 - Sexual aggressors following the ... social isolation), deviant sexuality (e.g. sadistic fantasies), and hypersexuality (e.g. compulsive masturbation)....
Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Lust_murder
Lust murder - Wikipedia
September 10, 2025 - The most critical component in the psychological development of a serial killer is violent fantasy, especially in the lust murderer. Fantasies accompany "intrusive thoughts about killing someone that are associated with other distressing psychopathological processes".
ScienceDirect
sciencedirect.com › science › article › abs › pii › S0047235217300685
When is a murder a sexual murder? Understanding the sexual element in the classification of sexual killings - ScienceDirect
April 23, 2017 - To expand on this, for the sadistic sexual killers, the offence appeared to be a result of sexual excitement to sadistic fantasies reinforced by the use of pornography and compulsive masturbation.
9News
9news.com.au › world › what-causes-someone-to-become-a-serial-killer-its-a-malignant-combination-of-factors-experts-say › 469f7c4e-8c0a-4871-8777-2c7d400381c2
What causes someone to become a serial killer?
July 24, 2023 - It becomes like a fantasy loop that plays over and over in their minds throughout adolescence and into early adulthood. They frequently combine it with masturbation, so they fantasise about doing terrible things to people, bondage and raping ...
HealthyPlace
healthyplace.com › personality-disorders › malignant-self-love › psychology-of-serial-and-mass-killers
The Psychology of Serial and Mass Killers | HealthyPlace
He is emotionally "lazy" because ... narcissist prefers fantasyland to reality, grandiose self-conception to realistic appraisal, masturbation and sexual fantasies to mature adult sex, and daydreaming to real life achievements....
Drreidmeloy
drreidmeloy.com › wp-content › uploads › 2015 › 12 › 2000_TheNatureAndDyn.pdf pdf
THE NATURE AND DYNAMICS OF SEXUAL HOMICIDE
strangling them was much greater than that which I experienced while masturbating. (von Krafft- Ebing, 1886/1965, p. 101) Relatively rare and sensational, these acts of sexual homicide, whether single or serial,
Reddit
reddit.com › r/serialkillers › sexually motivated serial killers?
r/serialkillers on Reddit: Sexually motivated serial killers?
June 6, 2021 -
What do you think leads to sexually motivated killers to kill? I was wondering if they kill for sexual gratification or kill to cover up their crime?
Top answer 1 of 5
130
To have complete control over the victim and eliminate the feeling of being judged by the victim.
2 of 5
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Definitely depends on the individual, I wouldn’t trust a word out of any of their mouths for the most part when they say why they did it but I’m sure it’s different for each one
APA
apa.org › news › podcasts › speaking-of-psychology › serial-killer-mind
Understanding the mind of a serial killer
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Forensicpsychiatryinstitute
forensicpsychiatryinstitute.com › home › sexually motivated homicide: descriptive characteristics and empirical evidence
Sexually Motivated Homicide: Descriptive Characteristics and Empirical Evidence < Forensic Psychiatry Institute
April 24, 2025 - This can include foreign object insertion into the genitalia or genital mutilation. This can also include evidence of sexual activity in the immediate vicinity of the body, such as evidence of masturbation inferring sexually deviant and sexually sadistic interest specifically;
ScienceDirect
sciencedirect.com › science › article › abs › pii › S1359178909000020
Becoming the victim: Beyond sadism in serial sexual murderers - ScienceDirect
January 8, 2009 - They are socially isolated, rejected, and humiliated, and take refuge in compulsive masturbation in paraphilias, which compensate for the poverty of their emotional, relational, and sexual lives. NSMs are polymorphic criminals who are easily angered when their immediate needs are not met. They adopt a victim stance, and sexual murder is a way of exacting vengeance and an outlet for their anger. ... For a subset of serial killers, sadism is suffused with masochism, and these individuals derive pleasure from both giving and receiving pain (Hill, Habermann, Berner, & Briken, 2006; Knoll, 2009; Myers et al., 2006, 2008), often engaging in acts of self-mutilation, genital self-torture, or autoerotic asphyxiation (choking oneself almost to the point of unconsciousness during masturbation) (Everitt, 1999; Newton, 1990).
Allied Academies
alliedacademies.org › articles › the-psychology-of-serial-killers-unraveling-the-minds-of-notorious-criminals-26136.html
The psychology of serial killers: Unraveling the minds of notorious criminals.
These fantasies provide an outlet for their inner desires and can escalate in intensity over time. Serial killers often engage in a process of "fantasy reinforcement," where their violent thoughts become more elaborate and consuming, eventually leading to the actualization of their fantasies ...