British criminologists have identified the characteristics of men who kill their families.
They made the assessment after researching newspaper records of 'family annihilator' events from 1980 to 2012.
They found that a family break-up was the most common trigger, followed by difficulties financially and honour killings, the BBC reported.
The four types of these men are:
1. Self-righteous: These types of killers seek to locate blame for their crimes upon their mother, who they hold responsible for the breakdown of the family.
2. Anomic: The family becomes firmly linked to the economy in the mind of the killer; the father begins to see his family as the result of his economic success, allowing him to display his achievements. However, if he becomes a failure, he looks at the family, as no longer serving this function.
3. Disappointed: This killer believes that his family has let him down or has acted in ways that undermines or destroys his vision of ideal family life.
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4. Paranoid: People who perceive an external threat to the family; the father fears that the social services or the legal system will side against him and take away the children. Here, the murder is motivated by a weird desire to protect his family.
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The study has been published in the Howard Journal of Criminal Justice.