That there is a link between lead exposure and violent crime has been known for quite a l0ng time, and is the subject of some quite extraordinary correlations between removal of lead from petrol and reduction in violent crime rates across the globe, backed up by plenty of studies that illuminate the potential causal links.
This has often led to quips about the impacts of lead exposure on the manners, social media utterances, and other character traits of shooters. It has been difficult not to take the micky. It has certainly been a temptation which has been too great for some of our number over the years.
And it seems we were absolutely right. In a study published last week in a health journal the aggression shown by shooters was compared with that demonstrated by archers. The study took place in South Africa. To be fair, the study looked at shooters who used target ranges (and archers who did the same) so they may not be directly transferrable to the windy uplands of the UK grouse moors – but then again, maybe they are.
Shooters and archers were well-matched in age, income etc (although archers stayed in education to a later stage).
Shooters had higher blood lead levels than archers – really quite a lot higher. The more you shoot, the higher your blood lead levels.
Shooters were more aggressive, in all sorts of ways, than archers.
Shooters with higher blood lead levels had greater aggression overall (but only significantly when looking at ‘hostility’ rather than ‘verbal aggression’, ‘physical aggression’ or ‘anger’) than shooters with lower blood lead levels.
Don’t shout at me, I’m just reporting the results of the paper.
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Well that explains a number of things really. Perhaps too Mark it explains the attitude of THAT keeper we met with Chris, Ruth and Ruth, poor chap had a high lead content in his blood.
All those angry keepers over the years all down to simple blood chemistry, they are not really antisocial after all.
Doesn’t lead poisoning also lead to madness?
Lead exposure will be an important factor, but spending a considerable proportion of your waking hours killing things probably doesn’t help either.
Certainly explains why the “hang ’em and flog ’em” brigade are the same social demographic as the hunting, shooting, and fishing brigade.
Interesting. Does the study show whether the shooters were using lead ammunition? The definitive study would be to compare two groups of shooters, one using lead ammunition and one using an alternative.
Alick – the link is in the blog (but I’m not sure it says). And you would need to find shooting ranges, not shooters, who used lead to compare with any that didn’t since the route of exposure includes inhalation and ingestion. And I guess diet might vary between archers and shooters (although that only affects the mechanism of exposure, not the results of the potential impacts).