Bundy was born Theodore Robert Cowell on November 24, 1946, at the Elizabeth Lund Home for Unwed Mothers in Burlington, Vermont. He lived with his mother and grandparents near Philadelphia during early childhood. The identity of his father is unknown, although his mother described being seduced by a war veteran. To avoid the social stigma attached to being an unwed mother, his grandparents claimed him as their son. Bundy reportedly grew up believing that his mother was his older sister, and likely did not learn the truth about his biological parents until high school or later.
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His grandfather was known to be temperamentally volatile, abusive toward animals, authoritarian, and a consumer of pornography. Bundy later reported a strong early attachment to him (Rule, 2009). Bundy’s mother moved to Washington in 1950, married, and had four more children. Ted spent a great deal of time babysitting and remained detached from his stepfather emotionally, often scorning the Boy Scout camping trips arranged by his stepfather in favor of isolation, preferring reading and listening to radio talk shows.
The Bundy family lived in a middle-class neighborhood in Tacoma, Washington, and was of modest economic means. His mother worked as a secretary and his step-father was a cook at an Army Hospital, and together they picked beans in nearby fields on weekends to supplement their income (Rule, 2009). The family was active in Church-related social activities, and Bundy was a regular attendee at Sunday school. In junior high school, Bundy was frequently teased by his male peers for his shyness.
He performed well academically, but was socially awkward and somewhat introverted. During adolescence, he was arrested twice for suspicion of auto theft and burglary, and became known to juvenile authorities (Rule, 2009). Bundy reported later that he became aware during high school that he did not understand the socialization aspect of life, nor did he understand friendships or why people wanted friends. He also had a fascination with increasingly violent forms of pornography, and devoured detective magazines and books on sexually violent crime.
Bundy later went on to become an honor student in psychology at the University of Washington, and was enrolled in law school in Utah at the time of apprehension for murder in 1975. He became romantically involved with a female student, the daughter of a wealthy California family, who later abruptly ended their relationship due to his lack of ambition, an event he found so humiliating that it may have triggered his murderous rampage (Michaud, 2000). Discussion
Bundy’s development might be best understood in the context of Bowlby/Ainsworth’s attachment theories, Erickson’s psychosocial development theory, and Piaget’s moral development model. The reader should be reminded that some elements of Bundy’s self-reported history may be unreliable due to inconsistencies, manipulation and impression management. Louise Bundy was 22 years old when she gave birth to Ted, and was ostracized by her church and family. After birth, she left infant Ted at the Elizabeth Lund Home for 3 months and returned to Philadelphia, considering whether to put him up for adoption.
Ted was deprived of the proximity and nurturance of his biological mother during a critical development period when important attachments of trust and security are normally met by the caregiver (Broderick, 2010). When she took him home to Philadelphia, the absence of synchrony with his mother was likely characterized by an avoidant/insecure or disorganized/disoriented attachment style, and an important underpinning of healthy emotional development was compromised. Infants who have inconsistent parents may learn that their caregiver can’t be trusted, according to Erickson’s psychosocial development theory (Broderick, 2010).
Usually by 8 months, babies behave in ways that signal a strong preference for one caregiver, usually the mother. Ted later recalled only an attachment to his grandfather of unknown quality, as his grandmother was known to be depressed and treated with electroconvulsive therapy. It is likely that Louise was depressed during this period which likely predisposed him to negative affect, self-directed coping, and interactive failure. Very little is documented about Ted’s infant temperament, although ambivalence was a temperamental trait observed later in his childhood.
One incident in Ted’s early childhood suggested the presence of maladaptive emotional problems. During Ted’s 1987 competency hearing it was reported that at age 3 he placed kitchen knives around his sleeping aunt, who awoke to see the 3 year old by her bed grinning (Rule, 2009). Ted was learning to assert his own autonomy. When he misbehaved he showed no evidence of internalizing parental values that are consistent with this age, and exhibited no shame or remorse for his behavior.
Within a year of this incident, Louise and Ted left for Washington State, a move that disrupted a secure attachment with his grandfather. When his stepfather, Johnnie Bundy, married Louise, Ted spent time with him only grudgingly, despite Johnnie’s efforts to involve him in activities. He later admitted he was embarrassed by his family’s poverty, and felt humiliated at being seen riding in Johnnie’s run-down Rambler (Michaud, 2000), perhaps his earliest documented recollection of feelings of inadequacy, inferiority, and a poorly developed self-concept.
Ted began isolating in his bedroom with the radio and an earpiece, listening to news broadcasts or talk shows because he enjoyed eavesdropping on others conversations, and it became a primary source of stimulation. He kept this activity secret from his parents, along with his first ventures into pornography. His isolative pattern would support a profile of daydreaming, which is brought on by an over-productive imagination and fantasy. Such isolation breeds characteristic of feelings of inadequacy experienced by other known serial killers (Ressler, 1990).
Not surprisingly, Bundy entered adolescence without a sense of identity and certain role confusion. He had no quality attachments, no modeling figure in his life, a mother that he called his sister, and a biological father that never existed for him. As a juvenile, he constantly sought to create an impression of being a member of the “popular” group, and relied on his academic achievement to differentiate himself from others. While he made friends, he was found to be socially unreliable, preferring to babysit his younger siblings, likely due to social iscomfort rather than seeking parental approval for his good deeds. Bundy later lamented the lack of significant events in his life, or the omission of important developments. Bundy appeared to linger in the pre-moral period of Piaget’s moral development model, unconcerned with rules, although signs of autonomous morality were apparent in his juvenile years. He was alternately the fiercely competitive student who excelled while looking good, and the juvenile delinquent who stole cars and burglarized, demonstrating that rules were based on social agreement and could be altered when it suited his needs.
Bundy’s moral development viewed in the context of Kohlberg’s Theory of Moral Reasoning (Broderick, 2010) is indicative of overriding instrumental hedonism, while giving the appearance of adopting a member of society image. These flirtations with conventional morality were transient, with intermittent regressions to Hedonism, and he was never to achieve adult post-conventional stages of moral reasoning. Despite the time he spent cultivating the “right” impression, he was stilted and socially inept.
He gave the appearance of prosocial behavior in terms of social competence, self-competence and effortful control, but he simply could not achieve popularity, perhaps due to an absence of altruism, empathy and sympathy. He was unable to attain Erickson’s model of intimacy through satisfying attachment relationships with peers and romantic partners. In his relationship with Stephanie, the daughter of wealthy California parents, Bundy admitted that he was less in love with her than with the idea that he could successful rise above class boundaries, thereby denying his humble roots.
Of course, that relationship ended badly, and Bundy’s life went horribly wrong. Bundy sought out women whose appearance and background satisfied his craving to escape his common origins. His predominant interest in early adulthood relationships was to be seen with attractive women and to be admired, and his obsession with social pretense became insatiable leaving him vulnerable to the devastating effects of humiliation. Eventually, Bundy, using generalization, transferred internalized humiliation to his victims.
Once uninhibited, the internalized humiliation became a terrible destructive force. Summary The absence of meaningful attachments is central to an understanding of Bundy’s emotional deficits and poorly developed self-concept. Attachment theory reminds us that all human growth and human problems occur in some relational context. Lacking such important attachments, he experienced a pattern of isolation and glaring social inadequacies. Bundy was born into a difficult circumstance, yet raised by well meaning individuals who were apparently moral, church-going, hardworking middle class parents.
There is no evidence that he was physically, sexually or even emotionally abused as a child. There is no documentation about prototypical preoccupations with killing small animals, or physical aggression toward others. Certain characteristics of Psychopathy emerged later in the murder and trial phase of his life. Beyond his preoccupation with pornography, there is little about this profile that might suggest that this individual would become a notoriously brutal serial killer.
