Personality Patterns of Students Who Make a Threat of Targeted School Violence

Tawnya Michelle Ayim

Abstract

Although school shootings date back to the 1760’s (Dixon, 2005), recent attacks at schools in our country have raised awareness of school violence. This study investigates how students from one large school district responded to the personality pattern items on the Millon Adolescent Clinical Inventory, Second Edition after having made a threat to harm another student or staff member. Personality patterns were investigated in the overall sample, as well as within groups designated to be at a Low/Moderate risk level and High/Imminent risk level following a threat assessment. The minimal Differences between the sample for the current study and the secret service study on school shootings are discussed. The severity of the personality profiles for low/moderate risk level and high/imminent risk level groups are examined. Statistical analysis shows that the behavioral presentation between the groups is more severe in the High/Imminent group than the Low/Moderate group overall. Imminent and high risk cases showed an elevated presence of pathology on the following personality profiles: introversive-schizoid, inhibited-avoidant, doleful-depressive, Unruly-Antisocial, Oppositional-negativistic. Low and Moderate risk cases showed an elevated presence of pathology on the following personality profiles: submissive-dependent and conforming-compulsive.