Jeffrey Dahmer Personality Type – MBTI & Big Five

Today we are digging into the personality type of Jeffrey Dahmer, using the Big Five Traits, Myers Briggs Type Indicator, and any other important psychological factors, including possible personality disorders and general mental health.

Jeffrey Dahmer was born in 1960. He was an American serial killer, and generally a very disturbing individual. He mutilated and dismembered his victims. His crimes also involved cannibalism and necrophilia. He was believed to have killed 17 victims in total.

Jeffrey Dahmer was considered sane during his trial. However, he had been diagnosed with schizotypal personality disorder, psychotic disorder (psychosis), and borderline personality disorder.

Jeffrey Dahmer Personality Type – Big Five

Openness

He seemed to be high in some aspects of openness, such as an interest in aesthetics. He had a fascination with how things looked. He also had a fascination and curiosity with how things worked, including how living creatures worked and looked on the inside, including humans.

Conscientiousness

Jeffrey Dahmer seemed to be on the low end of the conscientiousness scale. From what I know, he didn’t have a strong work ethic, or was particularly ambitious. He was also extremely low in the orderliness aspect. This includes the emotion of disgust. People who are high in the emotion of disgust dislike mutilation because it’s both disgusting and disorderly. Jeffrey been extremely low in this emotion is likely to be one of his motivators for committing the murders.   

Extroversion

He certainly seemed low on extroversion. He was mostly quiet and kept himself to himself. He had friends in school, but he often sought to be alone. He was socially awkward, but this was not necessarily a sign of introversion. He had many psychological issues which likely combined to produce his awkwardness.  

Agreeableness

Being cooperative, morality, compassion and building relationships didn’t seem like his dominant motivators. I think that’s fair to say, it definitely seems likely that he was on the low end of the agreeableness scale.

Neuroticism

Jeffrey Dahmer was very low on certain aspects of trait neuroticism. Being very low on trait neuroticism is associated with psychopathic traits. Very low neuroticism means they are immune or very nearly immune to stress and anxiety.    

Jeffrey Dahmer Mental Health Summary

A combination of his big five personality traits explain some of his mental health issues and disorders. Anybody with extreme traits puts them into a minority category. He was likely extremely private and introverted. This makes expressing oneself and making friends difficult. Very low agreeableness meant he wasn’t very interested in relationships and people, again making connections with others difficult.

It also means he was not motivated to be cooperative with others, but rather to pursue his interests and fascinations. Combined with very low neuroticism means his ability to feel empathy was absent. When he committed his crimes he had no conscience and no emotion. Even if he knew he was doing something wrong, he had no emotion about it, simply wishing to fulfil his twisted desires.

Being very low in orderliness and the emotion of disgust may have been why he got pleasure from mutilation (sadistic), and generally from creating chaos.

The cause of his mental problems and disturbed impulses was likely to be because of biological imbalances caused by brain development issues. He was not believed to have been abused as a child, and had mostly normal parents. However, his mother did have mental health issues and was reportedly on medication while she was pregnant with Jeffery. Some might speculate that this was the cause of Jeffrey’s mental issues and imbalances.       

Jeffrey Dahmer Personality Type – MBTI

He often keeps himself to himself and naturally private, so, introverted. He also seemed to have a high amount of curiosity and detachment from the now and reality, with strong creative urges, so, an intuitive type. He lacked compassion, empathy, and a general detachment from his emotions, so, a thinker type. He also didn’t have a particularly strong work ethic, or had respect for duty or authority. This makes him more in line with a perceiver type. This combines to make him an INTP, however, a particularly troubled and disturbed INTP.