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In the end of this video, Dr. Park Dietz says:

Because every time we have intense saturation coverage of a mass murder, we expect to see one or two more within a week.

Is this true?

ike
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    Interesting. If I'd had to guess, I'd say it's so called "Baader-Meinhof Effect". After significant shooting media focuses more attention on anything shooting related. Thus reporting even less significant ones, which wouldn't make news otherwise. – vartec Jun 23 '15 at 08:44
  • The formulation *we expect more* is ambiguous. – gerrit Jun 23 '15 at 09:54
  • @nomenagentis It sounded like he meant "we" as in "the people who study these things", based on context. There's a transcript [here](https://www.thestranger.com/seattle/does-media-coverage-of-school-shootings-lead-to-more-school-shootings/Content?oid=20329038) – ike Jun 23 '15 at 12:30
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    Unless he's got a very different definition of "mass murder" I'm afraid he is talking garbage. Even in the US there are only about 3 mass killings a year, and they certainly all don't happen in the same week. If nothing else we'll know in about a day if there was another killing a week the Charleston shooting. – DJClayworth Jun 23 '15 at 13:27
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    @DJClayworth Find sources and write an answer, then. – ike Jun 23 '15 at 17:13
  • @Spork The quote+context makes it clear that he's claiming a causal link. Would you prefer the full quote in the question? – ike Jun 23 '15 at 17:14
  • There's a fairly settled science that media coverage of suicides promotes more suicides, IIRC. If so, this may very well be a similar, if even more exaggregated, effect (since mass murderer's goal is often to make a point) – user5341 Jun 26 '15 at 01:48
  • @DVK The difference is that suicides are assumedly easier to perform than mass murders, require less planning, etc. So it might not even be a large enough effect to be measured. – ike Jun 26 '15 at 14:30

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