Terrorists: Caracteristics, Motivation and Action

Abstract

Understanding of a „terrorist personality“ is changing. Yet, the basic comprehension stays the same; terrorist personality does not exist. A decade ago terrorists were young, uneducated and unskilled. Today it is different; terrorists and terrorism is changing and getting new forms. Terrorists are nowadays frequently educated and come from upper social classes. Mostly they are ideologically or religiously devoted, looking for revenge, inclined to aggression and using terrorist attacks as a means to an end. Among terrorists we can find more individuals with borderline and narcissistic personality than it is expected in the "normal" population. But their motivation is not coming from their personality only. An important share of motivation comes from extreme religious beliefs, devotion to the cult leaders and from the support of a socio-economic environment Terrorist actions of different groups may be quite similar but their characteristics and motives are different; this is obvious when we compare European terrorist groups with majority of non-European groups. One of the key factors of becoming a terrorist is a social influence of the terrorist group. With a special treatment in abnormal circumstances relatively normal person could become even suicide terrorist.