From: judgeparker23x@gmail.com   
      
   Psych Central   
      
   How To Read People Like an FBI Profiler By Margarita Tartakovsky, M.S.   
      
   ~ 5 min read   
   How To Read People Like an FBI Profiler    
      
   What do you make of a neighbor who’s married, has kids, dresses in a suit   
   daily, rarely misses a day of work, has a well-groomed lawn and a tidy home,   
   is friendly and polite, always asks about your day and your children, and even   
   shovels your snow when    
   you’re out of town? Most people would think this is the best neighbor on the   
   block.   
      
   So you may be surprised to learn that this very neighbor “was a sexual   
   sadist who was using a small trailer in this backyard as a torture chamber,â€�   
   write Mary Ellen O’Toole and Alisa Bowman in their book Dangerous Instincts:   
   How Gut Instincts    
   Betray Us. O’Toole, a retired FBI profiler, worked the case and interviewed   
   the 60-year-old park ranger David Parker Ray, who appeared charming and even   
   seemed to admire women. As it turned out, he’d been torturing women in his   
   backyard for years,    
   and none of his neighbors ever suspected him to be anything but a “regular   
   guy.â€�   
      
      
   When we try to determine whether someone is a good person or a potential   
   threat, we tend to focus on superficial qualities that actually don’t tell   
   us much about the individual. We assume that people who go to work every day,   
   have a family and a well-   
   kept home are normal—and we give them a lot of credibility, O’Toole said.   
      
   We also assume that our bodies will warn us when we’re around someone   
   dangerous. We’ll experience the sensations of fear and know to stay away.   
   But as O’Toole said, dangerous people have a way of making us feel very   
   comfortable. For instance, they†  
   ™re friendly and courteous and make good eye contact. When O’Toole first saw   
   David Parker Ray, he took her hand and told her how nice it was to meet her.   
   He also was polite and well-mannered. Even O’Toole, who’s worked on the   
   most notorious    
   criminal cases, had to keep reminding herself of his heinous crimes.   
      
   What also complicates our ability to read people accurately is that many of us   
   aren’t good listeners. The best way to tell if someone is dangerous is by   
   observing their behavior, O’Toole said. That’s what FBI profilers do.   
   â€œIn order to be a good    
   reader of behavior, you have to watch and listen,â€� O’Toole said. But if   
   you’re too busy talking the whole time, you may miss key pieces of   
   information.   
      
   We also tend to admire and even get intimidated by people in certain   
   professions and positions, which additionally hampers our judgment. O’Toole   
   calls this “icon-intimidation.â€� We automatically give people a pass if   
   they’re a religious figure,    
   police officer or military person. We assign admirable qualities to them   
   without much thought. We assume they’re intelligent, courageous,   
   compassionate and thereby harmless.   
      
   O’Toole gave the example of a recent case in Washington D.C. The area offers   
   a free carpooling service called Slugging, where people give strangers a ride   
   into the city. Last year two commuters got into a pricey car with a retired   
   high-ranking military    
   officer. After they got in, he started driving 90 mph. The people were   
   terrified and insisted on being let out of the car. Once out, one of the   
   people tried to take a picture of his license plate. He tried to run them over.   
      
   When reading others, people also “are clouded by their own emotional   
   state,â€� O’Toole said. Being depressed or just losing a loved one puts you   
   in a vulnerable state when someone offers to do something nice for you, she   
   said.   
      
      
   In our society, we also hold onto many myths that put us in danger. O’Toole   
   calls one of the most common myths “the myth of the straggly-haired   
   stranger.â€� That is, we think that dangerous people look creepy, unkempt, are   
   unemployed and uneducated    
   and basically stick out like sore thumbs. So we overlook people who may be   
   incredibly dangerous because they look like the rest of us.   
      
   Another myth is that good people just snap and act violently, O’Toole said.   
   However, individuals who “snapâ€� already have traits that predispose them   
   to violence, such as a short fuse or physical aggression. It’s more likely,   
   she added, that    
   people minimize the presence of these red flags and that’s why it seems so   
   unexpected.   
      
   In fact, it’s common for people to minimize danger in general. We may choose   
   to ignore certain patterns of behavior, rationalize them, explain them away or   
   talk ourselves out of taking action, O’Toole said. Take the example of a   
   couple where one    
   partner becomes increasingly obsessive and jealous (and even physically   
   abusive), which O’Toole commonly sees as a consultant to schools and   
   universities. The young woman wants to end the relationship, but she’s   
   afraid of him. He has many good    
   friends, plays competitive sports and comes from a well-to-do family. She   
   doesn’t want to get him in trouble and worries that their friends will hate   
   her. So the parents decide to deal with the situation on their own. They   
   underestimate the danger. But    
   these are criminal behaviors and they don’t just begin in young adulthood,   
   O’Toole said. It’s likely he’s done similar things with other girls and   
   has other concerning traits. Just getting your daughter out of this situation   
   is not enough, and it    
   â€œcould cause your daughter to lose her life.â€�   
      
   Red Flags When Reading People   
      
   Again, reading people accurately means going beyond superficial traits and   
   observing their behaviors. According to O’Toole, these are several red flags   
   of concerning or dangerous actions.   
      
   They anger easily or talk about violence.   
      
   A person who has a short fuse in one situation will usually have it in   
   another. For instance, if a person has road rage, it’s a good indicator that   
   they also have anger problems outside the car, O’Toole said. Another red   
   flag is if they think that “   
   violence is the answer to everything no matter what they’re talking about.â€�   
      
   They are physically aggressive or abusive to others.   
      
   Has the person ever been physically aggressive with you or others? How do they   
   treat staff or servers at a restaurant? If they mistreat others or act like a   
   bully, this likely spills over into other areas of their life, O’Toole said.   
      
   They tend to blame others.   
      
      
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