of madmen attacking schools and children and mass killing sprees joining us in the now is christopher j. ferguson a professor of psychology at sussing university also contributes to the huffington post and time thanks for being with us is this exclusively an american problem with put this question to our audience what do you think. well that's a great question what seems to be happening is that there are more of these types of incidents in the united states than in other nations it is certainly not an exclusive american phenomenon other countries have had mass shooting events there just wasn't one in canada in the last couple of weeks for instance so it's not exclusively an american phenomenon but it does seem to happen more frequently in the united states than in other industrialized nations for sure it seems few people would argue that america has a gun problem why can't the government curb the lobby and how much of that has to do with gun violence because obama himself says politicians are terrified of the n.r.a. do you think that's true. i think that certainly is part of it i mean it's obviou