Analyzing Criminal Minds: Forensic Investigative Science for the 21st Century (Brain, Behavior, and Evolution) / Jacobs, Don

An insightful book presenting cutting-edge information on the newest, most remarkable forensic science and methods used for understanding the criminal mind.

Analyzing Criminal Minds: Forensic Investigative Science for the 21st Century explores new and emerging approaches to a perennially fascinating subject. Author Don Jacobs looks at 10 tools and products that have revolutionized the discipline, explaining how modern criminal mind analysis incorporates advances in criminal and forensic psychology, forensic neuropsychology, brain imaging, adolescent neurobiology, criminal profiling, and brain fingerprinting, as well as research into the paralimbic brain system and the impact of the "DANE" brain upon adolescent and young adult behavior.

Twenty-three characteristics shared by jailed violent criminals are analyzed and considered in terms of neuropsychology and developmental psychology. The book also probes psychopathy in its various degrees, in children, adolescents, and adults, and explains a controversial but increasingly accepted theory that psychopathy is a "natural" outgrowth of evolution, describing how this "natural" psychopathy can become a condition typified by violent, sadistic, and irreversible personality disorder.

• A foreword by Dwight Adams, former director at the FBI Lab at Quantico

• Four current autobiographical essays from an ongoing, 25-year study of adolescent behavior

• Illustrative vignettes from current news, pop culture, and literature

• Brain images of midbrain limbic system and prefrontal regions showing modular and interconnection of chemical pathways that ignite feelings, thinking, and behavior

• A glossary of terms

• An extensive bibliography