Emailed Threats Less Crazy Than Snail Mail

SoyChemist writes "Psychologists at the University of Nebraska have read 300 threatening letters and 99 angry emails to members of Congress. They concluded that the authors of the electronic messages show less signs of serious mental illness, but they are more profane and disorganized. The report was published in the September issue of the Journal of Forensic Sciences."

Cap'n Obvious

[Futile Rhetoric]

It makes perfect sense; it's a lot easier to send an e-mail than it is to put a pen to paper, then send the letter -- you have to be really pissed off to go through that kind of trouble. I'd say it's highly likely that angry phonecalls aren't quite as "crazy" as angry letters, too -- in general.

Stop linking to shitty sources!

[A beautiful mind]

If someone would take it's two minutes in order to check out the article, then it would be quickly realised that the _abstract [blackwell-synergy.com]_ of the actual paper is more detailed than the whole article linked in the summary and it is also free of the stupid sensationalization.

Mod parent up

[Animats]

Yes. The article is typical blogodreck, and links to a blog.

The research itself has serious problems. These weren't samples from incoming mail. They were samples from Capitol Police files, which means they'd already been considered potential threats by at least three people.

Consider what happens to incoming e-mail at a congressional office. First, it's spam-filtered automatically, so any bulk threat e-mailed to every member of Congress probably was dumped at the filters. Then some junior person reads it and sorts it. (The people who do that job for the White House are unpaid interns.) The basic sort is "opinion", which is just tallied; "casework", constituents of that Congressman who want some specific help; "office matters", something that the office staff actually needs to deal with, and "threats". The threats may get a quick look by a more senior staffer, who decides whether they need to go to the Capitol Police. Then, at the Capitol Police end, someone has to decide if it's worth opening a case file for the letter.

So a study based on Capitol Police files reflects what gets through the automatic and manual filtering. The study may say more about staff thinking than the incoming content.

Re:Why the discrepancy in amounts?

[petes_PoV]

I can't imagine the total amount of emails was smaller than the total amount of letters...

Oh I can.

Emails can be traced back to the sender. If I was going to threaten someone, a "real" letter would have much more impact and be non-tracable. (Unless of course you write your address on the top, in which case the proof of "crazy" has already been made.)

'corse[sic] you'd have to take a few basic precautions: never, ever touch the paper/envelope. Use a common type of printer (no handwritten stuff for analysis, naturally) and don't lick the envelope or stamp, so they've got no DNA. Post it where there are no surveillance cameras, preferably at night to reduce the chance of witnesses.

Have I forgotten anything?