# 11 - Prevention

     Prevention is better than cure. Prevention is the safest way that we can stop schooling, without hurting anybody.

     Since the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting incident happened, a lot of suggestions about stricter gun control laws emerged. Is gun control law the only way that we have? The answer to my question was provided by the CNN ,it was entitled “10 ways to putbrakes on mass shootings in schools” which was written by Nicole Saidi.

     I read her article and try to think of what she is trying to say and I realized that these suggestions can really help only if we will listen. Some of the ways on how we can put brakes on mass shootings in schools:

·              Improve mental health care. “Pushing the blame onto guns diverts it from where the real need is…”

·              Focus on parenting. “The best way to reduce violent outbreaks is by teaching our children kindness, empathy and love. Take the time to be a parent.”

·              Watch out for one another. "You can't fix the problem by casting these people out as another. They're us, and we're them."

     These are just simple things but it can really reduce the shootings by doing it. It is better to act than to react to those things we knew for ourselves has a remedy. We can’t save people when they’re already dead, we can only take the incident as a warning for us to learn that the next time this kind of incident will happen we must be more prepared.

     We may not make the gun laws stricter but we can do these things to prevent another school shooting. Change doesn't have to start as a big but it can start as a little and be more effective in the end.

# 10 - What is the influence of relationship to psychology

     Relationships are like chemicals, once they have an interaction they’ll definitely react to each other. It’s now up to us if we’ll have a good or bad interaction with them; we just need to be accountable of the result. It’s a matter of good mixture or in short, a matter of good relationship.

     Mr. Eliot Smith wrote in his article at Psychology Press entitled “chapter 11: close relationships” that, relationships influence our feelings, behaviors, and physical and mental well-being. In this article, he provided examples on how relationship affects, some examples are: intimacy, social support, and health.

     Social support increases physical health and psychological well-being because it offers opportunities for self-disclosure, companionship, and enjoyable interactions. We should give social support to the mentally challenged person so they will not feel that they are alone.

     Influencing can also be affected by our genders; women are more likely to provide emotional support, whereas men offer problem-solving advice. Therefore, women are good emotional supporters that’s why mothers should be more supporting to their kids especially when their kids are in special condition. When people are under stress or ill, emotional support is more helpful.

       In conclusion, relationship affects our psychological being so in order to have a peaceful life with the mentally challenged persons around us; we should always have a good relationship with them. Most chemicals explode because of bad mixture and we don’t want it that way.

#9 What are the causes of mental illness to school shooters?

           “We all have something in common”, this is a famous quote that we can all relate to. In connection to school shooting incidents they also have something in common such as: the shooter is mentally challenged. Some people may believe it, but who do you think can kill people randomly if he’s normal?

            An article by Pat Risser entitled “What is “Mental Illness”? Not What Caused Newton" at the website of Mad in America, helped me on this research. Every school shooter experienced neglect, abuse or/and even trauma in their lives, these things also made them common when it comes to their traits. Mr. Risser also stated that, “they all had taken psychiatric drugs that are known to sometimes cause heightened homicidal or suicidal feelings.”

             Mr. Risser was also able to provide his own feelings toward this problem. One example is this “There are no excuses to justify the sad and unfortunate taking of life in Newtown, but I can’t help but wonder if there might not have been a different course if Adam had something to balance and mitigate some of the despair.”

              Like what Mr. Risser said, What if there’d have been a system that had trauma sensitive peers who knew what it’s like and made a caring connection? I can only imagine that this tragedy could have been avoided and Adam would have chosen another path that wouldn’t have been so full of despair and violence. Perhaps in a life with choices and options and hope and not a life of trauma, psych drugs and despair, force and coercion, Adam would have chosen a different path and this tragedy could have been avoided. We have to change for a better future.

We can reduce their feeling of despair; the change must start in us.

               During their despair and hardships, we are all a part of it. We may be the bully, the cause of their trauma or even the one who abused them. This only means that we may be the reason why school shooters exists, maybe we are really the problem not them. We just have to make sure that we create good relationship towards them to avoid such unwanted behavior from them.

                

                We may have something in common but this particular thing differs on how we treat mentally challenged people because we should always treat them right.

#8 The Link Between Mental Illness and School Shooting.

    What is the link between school shooting and mental illness?

            Do you think a normal person would just gun down innocent kids without a reason? No. Therefore, a school shooter is also a mentally challenged person since a normal person is incapable of doing such crime. In connection, I read an article entitled “Violence and Mental Illness: Is there a link?” by SerenaCareaga at the website of KUOW.             

            She interviewed Dr. Jennifer Stuber to ask some questions and Dr. Jennifer Stuber was able to answer questions concerning the link between school shooting and mental illness. Some examples of the questions and their answers are:

What are the connections between violence and mental illness?

 One symptom that carries the potential for increased violence is threat override, which is a hallucination that can tell a patient to do something that could potentially be violent.  More important than mental health status is the past history of the individual or how the person was raised as a child.

When is it important to a story to report on a person’s mental state?

            Media organizations should expand coverage to contextualize mental illness to the scope of the individual's experience. One relevant topic about mental illness that the media should include in coverage is about the mental health system, particularly when there is a system failure.

            Dr. Jennifer Stuber was also asked about”What stories would you like to see coming from the press?”She answered and said that,” We have found that very sad, tragic incidents like the one in Newtown, Connecticut, become an opportunity for learning. It is an important opportunity for news organizations to take a look at their coverage for ways to tell more positive stories or to use a more balanced approach.”

             To conclude this matter, I want to quote a phrase from Ms. Kate Donovan’s article “Here is a terrible thing. The only thing that could possibly cause someone to do such a terrible, tragic thing is to have This Disorder…” I just want to say that, we just have to make a balanced approach to this kind of person to avoid violence.