The case of Andre Yates has been attracted the attention of many people during a long period of time. Some people cannot understand why Andre was not punished for such a terrible crime; some people still try to find some theoretically reasonable understanding of the case. The current paper is another attention to make use of the theory and evaluate Andrea’s case from a professional point of view. Of course, human emotions predetermine human actions and thoughts; still, it is a high time to become a professional and try to explain what may cause Andrea’s decision to kill all her five children (Greene and Heilbrun 215). The frustration-aggression theory shows that a human inability to achieve a goal, the necessity to block feelings, emotions, and needs, and live with frustration and dissatisfaction may cause violence and inappropriate behavior (Masters, Way, Muscat, Hooper, and Pincu 85); the case of Andrea Yates may be used as the example of how one person’s frustration influences the lives of many people and cause the deaths of five innocent children.
The peculiar feature of Andrea Yates’ case is that the crime was based on a mental sickness of a woman, who has been already treated professionally to overcome her depression. Her behavior, actions, thoughts, and words caused so many misunderstandings. People could not understand and support this woman. It happened that her husband demonstrated his support to his wife, but even he was not understood by the society. A number of people wanted to have one question to be answered: “Why?” (Kunkle para. 33). She was a beloved mother; she enjoyed the time she spent with her children. Some researchers tried to use the modeling theory to explain that she was influenced by one of Law and Order’s episodes, but it was proved that this episode was not even aired (Siegel 130). Therefore, another type of theory may be offered to understand Yates’ motifs.
The frustration-aggression theory is probably the easiest and the most appropriate way to be applied to the case. It says that “frustration always leads to the desire to aggress” (Sanderson 286). Though Andrea’s aggression was in an unexpected form, her actions were aggressive. Andrea could be upset because of the necessity to take care of her children all the time. In addition, she was mentally ill for that moment. So that she could easily be challenged to cope with her family duties, personal challenges, and mental problems. She was confused and unable to think rationally. She made a fatal mistake that could not be ever forgiven. The offered theory is an attempt to give an explanation of the crime like Andrea’s mental illness and the inability to understand the outcomes of her own actions. The frustration-aggression theory helps to discover the fact that aggression may obtain a number of forms, and people are in danger because of their inabilities to discover aggression in time. Andrea’s eldest son, Noah, could observe the results of his mother actions, but it was too late, and he died as all his brothers and sister.
It is not hard to believe that frustration is a natural consequence of a human life that cannot be predicted or understood all the time (Schmalleger 138). People are weak, and their actions are not always understandable. When it became known that Andrea Yates killed her five children and confessed, so many people were confused and could not believe that this was possible. In fact, a human mind is hard to understand, and frustration makes the understanding process more complicated and the outcomes of frustration may be fatal as in the case of Andrea Yates.
References
Greene, Edith and Kirk Heilbrun. Wrightsman’s Psychology and the Legal System. Belmont, CA: Cengage Learning, 2013. Print.
Kunkle, Fredrick. “What Makes Mothers Kill Their Own Children?” The Washington Post 2014. Web.
Masters, Ruth, E., Way, Lori, B., Muscat, Bernadette, T., Hooper, Michael, and Lester Pincu. CJ: Realities and Challenges. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2012. Print.
Sanderson, Catherine, A. Social Psychology. Hoboken, NJ: John Willey & Sons, 2009. Print.
Schmalleger, Frank, J. Criminology Today: An Integrative Introduction. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson, 2014.
Siegel, Larry. Criminology: The Core. Belmont, CA: Cengage Learning, 2010. Print.