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Ted Bundy had courtroom groupies. Jeffrey Dahmer and Richard Ramirez were sent love letters in prison. Now, in the age of social media, thousands like, share, and thirst in the comments over stylized fan edits of serial killers. Theres a term for this psychological phenomenon: hybristophilia. A new study has found a connection between young womens engagement with this type of TikTok content and their sexual attraction to criminals. Those who liked or repeatedly watched clips glorifying notorious serial killers, such as Bundy and Dahmer, or fictional villains like Joe Goldberg from Netflixs You, scored higher for hybristophilia than those who scrolled past such content, according to the peer-reviewed research published in the journal Deviant Behavior, the only journal that specifically and exclusively addresses social deviance. The findings also indicate that personality traits like Machiavellianism and psychopathy are strong predictors of these tendencies. Previous research on hybristophilia often focused on women already in relationships with convicted offenders. Instead, researchers at the University of Huddersfield, aimed to explore how this attraction emerges in younger generations, particularly through social media platforms like TikTok. The study analyzed 66 TikToks and 91 comments posted between 2020 and 2024, then surveyed nearly 100 female TikTok users aged 18 to 27, measuring hybristophilia levels, empathy and dark personality traits. As seen in the recent reaction to Healthcare CEO killer Luigi Mangione, who has been obsessively idolized online and sent fan mail in prison, the halo effect can play in these killers favor. Conventionally attractive offenders like Mangione often have their crimes minimized, while researchers found comments like Daddy or Smash commonly used in reference to notorious serial killers. Some users even expressed what the study called a victim fantasy, with 7.6% of participants admitting to having sexual fantasies about conventionally attractive offenders like Bundy. In their research, the studys authors found violent behaviors were often romanticized, recast as crimes of loyalty or passion. Some expressed the belief that love could reform the killers, a theme the researchers called I Can Fix Him. In some cases, social media users conflated the serial killers with their Hollywood counterparts, a phenomenon known as actor-offender transference. Attraction to actors like Zac Efron or Evan Peters, who played Bundy and Dahmer on-screen, then spilled into attraction to the real-life killers. For those concerned that innocently scrolling social media will suddenly have them fantasizing about serial killers, dont fear. The study found exposure to content romanticizing offenders on a social media feed did not by itself predict an attraction to criminals. Only when users engaged in the content by watching, commenting, or otherwise interacting, did a link present itself.
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E-Commerce
Amazon is leading the U.S. stock market on October 31 to the finish of another winning week and month. The S&P 500 was virtually flat after giving up a modest gain from the morning. The index is still near its all-time high set on October 28, and it’s on track to close a third-straight winning week and a sixth-straight winning month, which would be its longest monthly winning streak since 2021. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 102 points, or less than 0.2%, as of 1 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.4% higher. Amazon led the way after jumping 10.3%. The retail giant was by far the strongest force pushing upward on the market after reporting profit for the latest quarter that blew past analysts expectations. CEO Andy Jassy said growth for its booming cloud-computing business has reaccelerated back to a pace it hasnt seen since 2022. Because Amazon is so massive, worth roughly $2.4 trillion, its stock movements carry more weight on the S&P 500 than almost any other company’s. Another highly influential stock, Apple, was having less of an effect even though it’s bigger than Amazon. Apple, which is worth more than $4 trillion, was swinging between modest gains and losses and was most recently up 0.1%. It likewise delivered a better profit report than analysts expected, though by not as big a margin as Amazon did. CEO Tim Cook said Apple benefited from strong revenue for both its iPhone lineup and its services offerings, which include its app store. Elsewhere on Wall Street, online message board Reddit jumped 12.1% to erase losses from earlier in the week after reporting stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. Coinbase Global rose 6.8% after the crypto exchanges profit likewise topped expectations. Outside of earnings reports, Netflix added 3.3% after the video streamer announced a move that could make its stock price more affordable but still leave its investors holding the same amount. Netflix will undergo a 10-for-1 stock split, where it will give nine additional shares to every investor with one. They helped offset a 4.8% drop for AbbVie, even though the medicine maker reported stronger profit for the latest quarter than expected. Analysts pointed to how it’s beating forecasts by less than before, and expectations may have been high after AbbVie’s stock came into the day with a strong 28.4% gain for the year so far. The pressure is on companies to deliver strong growth in profits to justify the huge gains their stock prices have made since April. Criticism has been growing that the stock market has become too expensive. A day earlier, the S&P 500 slumped 1% as investors appeared unnerved by big increases in spending that Meta Platforms and Microsoft are planning as part of the investment spree underway in AI technology. Financial markets also appeared skeptical that President Donald Trumps trade truce with China would put an end to tensions between the two countries. Additional drops on Friday of 1.6% for Microsoft and 2.2% for Meta were two of the heaviest weights on the U.S. market. In stock markets abroad, indexes dipped in Europe following a mixed finish in Asia. Stocks fell 1.4% in Hong Kong and 0.8% in Shanghai after data showed factory activity in China contracted in October for a seventh straight month and at the fastest pace in six months. Japans Nikkei 225, meanwhile, jumped 2.1% to another record after a report showed industrial production rose more in September than expected. In the bond market, Treasury yields eased after their spurt higher in the middle of the week, when Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell warned that another cut to interest rates in December is not a foregone conclusionfar from it. The yield on the 10-year Treasury dipped to 4.09% from 4.11% late on October 30, but its still above the 3.99% level it was at before Powells warning. Other central banks have halted cuts to rates or hinted at pauses recently, and it seems this is it for the 2025 easing season in developed economies, economists at Bank of America wrote in a BofA Global Research report. By Stan Choe, AP business writer AP Business Writers Teresa Cerojano and Matt Ott contributed.
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E-Commerce
Check your medicine cabinet: A major pharmaceutical company has just recalled nearly 600,000 bottles of a blood pressure medication due to the potential presence of a potentially cancer-causing chemical. According to three different recall notices shared by the FDA, the New Jersey-based drugmaker Teva Pharmaceuticals USA has voluntarily recalled several lots of the blood pressure medication prazosin hydrochloride. Heres what to know: What happened? According to the FDAs reports, about 590,000 bottles of prazosin hydrochloride have been recalled due to presence of N-nitroso Prazosin impurity C above the Carcinogenic Potency Categorization Approach (CPCA) acceptable intake limit. Essentially, that means drug testing found that the affected bottles contained a concentration of nitrosaminea potential carcinogenthat was above the acceptable levels established by the FDA. The FDA has categorized this recall as a Class II, meaning, a situation in which use of or exposure to a violative product may cause temporary or medically reversible adverse health consequences or where the probability of serious adverse health consequences is remote. Which blood pressure medication was recalled? The recall includes bottles of Prazosin Hydrochloride in 1 mg, 2 mg, and 5 mg concentrations. There are three different recall numbers for each of these doses, cinlduing: D-0104-2026; 181,659 bottles of a 1 mg dosage D-0105-2026; 291,512 bottles of a 2 mg dosage D-0106-2026; 107,673 of a 5 mg dosage Full lot numbers for every affected batch of the medicine can be found here. What should I do if I have recalled medication? In a statement sent to NBC Chicago, Teva said that anyone with the affected medication should contact their pharmacy to determine what to do with the remaining quantities, and noted that it has already sent letters to its customers with instructions on returning the recalled product. The company added that it has not yet received any complaints about the medication. Its important to note that, during similar cases in the past, the FDA has advised patients to continue taking these medications until they have an alternative, because a heart attack is a more immediate risk than cancer. Teva did not immediately respond to Fast Company‘s request for comment.
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E-Commerce
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