OJ Simpson Case Study

Psychology 410
November 17, 2000
Gregory E. Haymon

OJ Simpson Case Study
Forensic DNA is a way to explain a crime, but it has to be gathered and stored properly to be counted pure. The OJ Simpson case, the defense claimed that the murder incident and the Simpson estate were not divided when evidence was collected. The defense stated that the bloodstains were found in the Bronco and on OJ's socks. DNA can be beneficial when determining who the killer was and who was at a scene, but the collection has to be done according to standards. The Simpson case was a displayed wrong and the way forensic DNA works when crimes are solved. The OJ Simpson case demonstrates the most challenging evidence created by the forensics scientists. This evidence may not be enough to convince a jury beyond a realistic doubt that an accused individual is guilty. It is well-defined that with highly trained agents who work on a high profile cases or any other cases, it must be accompanied by well-trained crime scene investigators to collect evidences. Therefore, progress of accreditation programs that train police officers and crime scene technicians in the appropriate approaches to handle the evidence in a crime scene investigation should be on-going. The two main points to consider when examining the case study of OJ Simpson is first to provide an overview of selected case. The second step is to explain the emotional, biological, behavioral components, and cognitive disorders in the OJ Simpson Case. The first step is to provide an overview of the OJ Simpson Case. Maladaptive behaviors include behavioral and emotional deregulation (Linehan, 1993). Individuals with Bipolar Personality Disorder typically respond to an invalidating environment by becoming more emotionally vulnerable.
The importance is to explain to clients during the onset of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) that the causes for their disorder are coming from two areas, one is a biological/or brain chemistry imbalance, and the other is an emotional response to the invalidating environment they live in. As a result they display a heightened sensitivity to emotional stimuli followed by deregulation of behaviors. Their perception of emotion can become extremely intense and may include behaviors that are difficult to control to the point of impaired functioning. If we look at the Emotional Cascade model we can see the role that rumination and chaotic relationships play in increasing anger that can result in control problems. Feelings of being alone, being a failure and criticism by others perhaps in this case (his wife), as well as his constant rumination on the negative can all be triggers to the Emotional Cascade which can result in self-harm or suicidal behaviors, (DSM-IV 1994), or more extreme changes such as hostility, or becoming fearful and feeling sad, Trull at al. (2008). The cognitive aspects of BPD are in the rumination on the negative which only magnifies it, Thomsen, 2006. Anger and depression become worse and my result in drug or alcohol use as a way of self-medicating and avoidance. We can also see increased incidences of reckless driving, threatening, pleading and verbal fights in individuals with BPD, (Kruedelpach et, al., 1993). Looking back at O.J. Simpson's behaviors and the police reports and phone recorded incidence of repeated domestic violence, it is clear to see why a Borderline Personality Disorder applies as a diagnosis particularly since much of the domestic/marital issues may have exposed him to a hypercritical and invalidating environment as far as his relationship with his wife Nicole was concerned. The constant conflict and negative emotional stimuli of his home life would be a perfect environment for his deregulating behaviors that clearly included intense emotions and impaired functioning. The media reported on OJ's possible Cocaine use or abuse during this time as well, which may have been an attempt by him to self-medicate and deal with the unpleasant and intense emotions and feelings he was experiencing. As his anger and depression related to his disorder became worse, the question is if he became into a psychotic state. It is well know that stress can contribute to and trigger a psychotic state. If he experienced other psychologically traumatic events recently in his life such as a divorce or other types of loss, these things can definitely contribute to the development of psychosis. OJ Simpson experienced what is called a Short-lived "psychosis" that was triggered by the stress of his marital problems and the abusive use of cocaine. This type of psychosis is a brief reactive psychosis, and patients can spontaneously recover back to a normal state of mind within two weeks’ time, with associated memory loss. Drug abuse, in his case, cocaine can be a major factor as well in causing or worsening a psychotic state, this is generally known as a Substance Induced Psychosis and a Differential Diagnosis may be in order. Was the psychotic state brought on by the BPD and the related domestic stress and dysfunction he lived with, or was it the result of imbalanced brain chemistry that is a part of having BPD? Did his frequent use of Cocaine play a part in his behavior? Perhaps, in this case it is safe to hypothesize that BPD and behavioral and emotional deregulation and interpersonal dysfunction with substance abuse all played a big part in the O.J. Simpson case. The second step is to explain the emotional, biological, behavioral components and cognitive disorders that were analyzed in the OJ Simpson Case. The emotional, cognitive behavioral components of Borderline Personality Disorder that consist of Interpersonal Dysfunction, issues with perception, and issues with emotional reactivity, including hyper-impulsivity, elevated reactions to emotional stimuli and a biological predisposition. Emotions impact personal relationships, either negatively or positively. For example, extreme levels of emotions, such as complete silence and/ or ignoring other people and yielding them insignificant or putting them down (emotional abusive to others is anger) or raging anger-violence and murder are at extreme emotions along the continuum of emotionality. In the middle of the continuum, emotional states are controlled and people can express their emotions without hurting themselves or others, and both understand and are aware of how their emotions impact others. Emotional states can therefore add positive dimensions to relationships. Trust builds in the latter case, where fear and mistrust occurs in the former scenario. At other times, our emotional state might be situational and we can experienced a death in the family or have too much on our plate. When people react negatively to friends, we usually do not do but when we do it affects our emotions and status. It depends on what theory of emotion the person holds and who is attributing the judgment. Attribution theory is a "theory that specifies how people make inferences about the causes of behavior". Some emotional states are part of a person's character or disposition and when the person consistently is always angry at people.
Our emotional state cannot be blamed on others or caused by how much abuse another person will put up with, although some situations and people can determine situational emotional states by doing certain hurtful things to people by killing or hurting someone or, saying emotional hurtful things. Likewise, if individuals do this to others consistently across a number of situations, it is likely that this emotional state is part of our character disposition. Some theory's help us determine if an emotional state is a product of character or situational. For example, Kelley advanced Heider's Attribution theory by proposing hypotheses of factors that influence the formation of attributions. The first example is that Consistency that states the extent to which an individual response is the same in similar situations. The second is the Distinctiveness which specifies the extent to which a response is unique to a given situation. The third example is the Consensus which designates the extent to which a reply is similar across diverse individuals. For example, if a person acts in one way consistently in similar situations, is not unique to the situation (distinctiveness) and is not similar to how people would react in a similar situation, the emotional state and related behavior is more than likely part of her or his character. However, some emotions states are more situational as the person would not react consistently in a similar situations and her emotion is unique to the situation (distinctive), such as where a person is witnessed screaming at her neighbor for killing her dog, which would be a similar response across different people (consensus). The person, who is angry, would be considered situational in this situation. In conclusion now that the two main points were examined and described and have given an overview of the case study of OJ Simpson and analyzed the biological, emotional, cognitive, and behavioral components of the disorder in the OJ Simpson case the thought was too examine how individuals who have difficulty in problem solving skills have the tendency to have abnormal behaviors. Individuals who could not problem solve and use their critical thinking skills may need some type of guidance or person to walk them through decision making or analyze concepts or some type of therapy that will help people to make right choices. Usually the individuals will need help in the emotional, cognitive and behavioral components. The advantage is that there are experts that work in the field of psychology to help with the abnormal behaviors.

Reference
"Simpson (O. J.) Murder Trial." World of Forensic Science. Ed. K. Lee Lerner and Brenda Wilmoth Lerner. Gale Cengage, 2006. eNotes.com. 2006. 28 Apr, 2011 http://www.enotes.com/forensic-science/ simpson-o-j-murder-trial Journal of Research in Personality, Vol 42, Issue 6, December 2008. http://www.unsolved-mysteries.com/forensics/forensic_dna_analysis.html http://www.novelguide.com/a/discover/wofs_0001_0002_0/wofs_0001_0002_0_00514.html

(http://academics.tjhsst.edu/psych/oldPsych/ch14-1/glossary.html, also see http://www.12manage.com/methods_heider_attribution_theory.html).