Lifespan Development and Personality: John

Lifespan Development and Personality: John Wayne Gacy

One of the most perplexing questions is why seemingly normal people like John Wayne Gacy choose to kill? On the surface, Gacy was a professional living a reasonably well-integrated life, with ties to his community and friends. "People who knew Gacy thought of him as a generous, friendly and hard-working man, devoted to his family and community...[yet] During a three-year-period, Gacy went on to viciously torture, rape and murder more than thirty other young men, who would later be discovered under the floorboards of his home and in the local river." ("John Wayne Gacy: Crime Library," 2006,

Physical

One possible physical explanation for Gacy's behavior might be found in his physical development as a young man. When Gacy was eleven years old he received a trauma to the head that caused a blood clot in his brain. This was only discovered when he was sixteen. From the period of his life from eleven to sixteen, Gacy experienced frequent blackouts, which could have interfered with normal mental development. He also was diagnosed with a heart condition at age seventeen. ("John Wayne Gacy: Crime Library," 2006, p.2) Gacy's heart condition was exacerbated after he gained weight during his adult career as a salesman. "Weight, heart and back problems would plague Gacy for the rest of his life." ("John Wayne Gacy: Crime Library," 2006, p.3)

Cognitive

Although he did not excel in school as a young man, Gacy was noted to be a quick study of people. He learned the sales trade quickly, as well as management skills during his early professional career, and quickly rose through the ranks.

Intellectually

Gacy struggled during his early schooling school. He never graduated high school, after switching secondary schools four times. He worked as a janitor for several months in Las Vegas. ("John Wayne Gacy: Crime Library," 2006, p.3) However, after returning home, Gacy seemed to recover from this period of adolescent idling and enrolled in a business college. After he graduated, Gacy seemed to find his calling. Gacy was "hired at his first job out of business school at the Nunn-Bush Shoe Company. He excelled in his position as a management trainee." ("John Wayne Gacy, Crime Library:" 2006, p.3)

Emotional

Gacy's father was a physically abusive alcoholic. Gacy's father abused the boy, and as a child Gacy witnessed his mother and siblings being abused by his father, while he was powerless to help them. Despite this fact, "young Gacy deeply loved his father and wanted desperately to gain his devotion and attention. Unfortunately, he was never able to get very close to his father before he died, something which he regretted his entire life." ("John Wayne Gacy: Crime Library," 2006, p.2)

Heritable factors in terms of his father's genetic propensity towards violence may have played an influence in Gacy's own, similar tendency towards violence. However, it cannot be denied that the young Gacy grew up in an abusive environment and his father's parenting practices did not foster childhood healthy development. Community social support systems such as his involvement in the Boy Scouts may have offered some stability.

Personality

Even during his early childhood as an abused young man, Gacy seemed like a people-pleaser. He was active in the Boy Scouts and other organizations that provided a sense of community and family that he lacked at home. Later, as a salesman in Springfield, Illinois, he was the membership chairman of the Chi Rho Club, a board member of the Catholic Inter-Club Council, a commanding captain for the Federal Civil Defense for Illinois, a captain in the Chicago Civil Defense, an officer in the Holy Name Society and a member of the Catholic Jaycees. It was to this group Gacy devoted the majority of his time to and eventually became first vice-president and 'Man of the Year.' ("John Wayne Gacy: Crime Library," 2006, p.4) Gacy was married to a woman whose father owned a Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise, but rumors began to swirl that Gacy had made passes at the young men working at the chain. Gacy was incarcerated for an incident involving a man he had paid for sex and then attempted to have beaten by a thug for hire. ("John Wayne Gacy: Crime Library," 2006, pp.3-4)

Moral

Morally, Gacy came from a conservative Catholic background, was active in many Catholic organizations and the Boy Scouts, yet engaged in gay sexual practices, even when he was married. He was sent to jail for sodomy and battery, yet was a model prisoner. His father was an alcoholic, although Gacy idealized him. There was a profound tension between his outer and his inner persona.

Theories of Personality

Erikson

Erik Erikson attempted to refine Freud's theory of personality, although he saw development as proceeding as a period of stages like Freud. He focused on the child's emotional and social stages of development. The first stages involve learning to trust and model one's behavior. If parents are "unreliable or inadequate," as were Gacy's, the child learns mistrust rather than trust. Mistrustful children are socially withdrawn and as adults their behavior is, "characterized by depression, paranoia, and possibly psychosis." (Boeree, 1998, "Erik Erikson") According to this theory, Gacy's psychosis is the result of his childhood upbringing in an abusive home, which created the seeds of psychosis. His only touchstone for normal behavior was his involvement in conservative and community-based organizations that he could not fully fit into because of his homosexuality. Gacy's fixation on young men also seems like an attempt to recreate the father-son stage in a positive fashion, but he also modeled his abusive adult persona upon his father, symbolically assuming the more powerful and violent paternal role.