Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Dennis Rader" in Turkish language version.
For most people, emotional words and scenes lead to heightened activity in the amygdala as the emotional sense of the situation overcomes them, often shutting down higher functions. For psychopaths, the amygdala responds less powerfully to the same items and when it does respond it does so in step with higher cortical activity. The cortex is the brain area associated with rational thought and interpretive functions. So, psychopaths presented with an emotional stimulus have to think about its meaning and rationally make sense of it in order to parse their response. They do not feel the effects of others' fear, sadness, or pain, so they have to work to interpret their environment.
This characteristic appears clearly in the allocution of Dennis Rader, the BTK Killer. Standing in court before the judge, the victims' families, and the assembled press, Rader listened as the judge read out the details of his offenses. Without blinking an eye, Rader stopped the judge at several junctures to correct some minor detail. Unmoved by the enormity of his crimes or the responses of the people gathered there, Rader makes almost casual responses to the facts in the case; at one point making mouth noises as he sought a precise fact. This is a man who cannot even begin to appreciate the impact he had on others.
The trait served Rader well in his next job, as a compliance officer for Park City, a Wichita suburb—but his nit-picking won him few friends.
The trait served Rader well in his next job, as a compliance officer for Park City, a Wichita suburb—but his nit-picking won him few friends.
