HOME WEB NEWS IMAGES CLASSIFIEDS YELLOW PAGESPOLLS - SURVEYS WIKI COUNTRIES PHOTOS US UK INDIA
Cities Stocks Weather Movies Coupons Travel Blogs Health Horoscope Maps ASIA EUROPE Classifieds Yellow Pages
|
This article is about psychological theories of psychopathy. For for the diagnostic category of ICD-10 , see Dissocial personality disorder.
|
|
It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Hare Psychopathy Checklist. (Discuss) |
Psychopathy is a psychological construct that describes chronic immoral and antisocial behavior.Bruce A. Arrigo. The Confusion Over Psychopathy (I): Historical Considerations. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, Vol. 45, No. 3, 325-344 (2001). Retrieved on 2007-12-15. The term is often used interchangeably with sociopathy e.g. Arthur S. Reber. Penguin Dictionary of Psychology. 2nd. ed. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin, 1995. Psychopathic personality disorders have been the most studied of any personality disorder. Today the term can legitimately be used in two ways. One is in the legal sense, "psychopathic personality disorder" under the Mental Health Act 1983 of the UK. The other use is as a severe form of the antisocial or dissocial personality disorder as exclusively defined by the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R).Semple, David (2005). The Oxford Handbook of Psychiatry. USA: Oxford University Press, pp. 448–449. ISBN 0198527837. The term "psychopathy" is often confused with psychotic disorders. It is estimated that approximately 1% of the general population are psychopaths. They are overrepresented in the prison system, at the top ranks of corporations, in politics, law enforcement agencies, law firms, and the media."Psychopath" Psychologist Adds Scientific Insight To Loaded Label, Medical News TodayIs there a psychopath in your office?, The Business Journal of MilwaukeeWhat "Psychopath" Means: Scientific American
Contents |
|
|
Please help improve this article or section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion. (December 2007) |
Interest in the psychopathic personality pattern goes back to Theophrastus Armenian Medical Network. In 1801, Philippe Pinel described patients who were mentally unimpaired but nonetheless engaged in impulsive and self-defeating acts. He saw them as la folie raisonnante ("insane without delirium") meaning that they fully understood the irrationality of their behavior but continued with it anyway. Pinel was one of the last to study psychopathic personalities without including a moral judgment in his diagnosis. By the turn of the century Maudsley had begun writing about the moral imbecile, and was arguing that such individuals could not be rehabilitated by the correctional system.[citation needed]
Maudsley included the psychopath\'s immunity to the reformational effects of punishment, owing to their refusal to anticipate further failure, and punishment. In 1904, Emil Kraepelin described four types of personalities similar to the antisocial personality disorder. By 1915 he had identified them as defective in either affect or volition, dividing the types further into categories only some of which correspond to the current descriptions of antisocial. Millon, Theodore (2002). Psychopathy: Antisocial, Criminal, and Violent Behavior pp. 3–18. Guidford Press. Retrieved on 2008-01-13.
In contemporary research, psychopathy has been most frequently operationalized by Robert D. Hare\'s Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R). The checklist assesses both interpersonal and affective components as well as lifestyle and antisocial deficits. However, the research results cannot be easily extrapolated to the clinical diagnoses of dissocial personality disorder or antisocial personality disorder. A sample research finding is that between 50% and 80% of prisoners in England and Wales meet the diagnostic criteria of dissocial personality disorder, but only 15% would be predicted to be psychopathic as measured by the PCL-R. Therefore, the findings drawn from psychopathy research have not yet been shown to be relevant as an aid to diagnosis and treatment of dissocial or antisocial personality disorders.Ogloff, James R.P. (2006). Psychopathy/antisocial personality disorder conundrum. Blackwell Publishing. Retrieved on 2008-01-12.
The following findings are for research purposes only, and are not used in clinical diagnosis. These items cover the affective, interpersonal, and behavioral features. Each item is rated on a score from 0 to 2. The sum total determines the extent of a person\'s psychopathy
Factor1: Aggressive narcissism
Factor2: Socially deviant lifestyle
Traits not correlated with either factor
In practice, mental health professional rarely treat psychopathic personality disorders as they are considered untreatable and no interventions have proved to be effective. In England and Wales the diagnosis of dissocial personality disorder is grounds for detention in secure psychiatric hospitals under the Mental Health Act if they have committed serious crimes, but since such individuals are disruptive for other patients and not responsive to treatment this alternative to prison is not often used.Paul Harrison & John Geddes. Lecture Notes: Psychiatry. Blackwell Publishing, p. 163–165.
Because an individual\'s scores may have important consequences for his or her future the potential for harm if the test is used or administered incorrectly, is considerable, so that the test should only be considered valid if administered by a suitably qualified and experienced clinician under controlled conditions. Hare, R. D. (2003). Manual for the Revised Psychopathy Checklist (2nd ed.). Toronto, ON, Canada: Multi-Health Systems. Hare, R. D., & Neumann, C. N. (2006). The PCL-R Assessment of Psychopathy: Development, Structural Properties, and New Directions. In C. Patrick (Ed.), Handbook of Psychopathy (pp. 58-88). New York: Guilford.
Hare wants the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders to list psychopathy as a unique disorder, saying that psychopathy has no precise equivalentHare, R. D. Psychopathy and Antisocial Personality Disorder: A Case of Diagnostic Confusion, Psychiatric Times, February 1996, XIII, Issue 2 Accessed June 26, 2006 in either the DSM-IV-TR, where it is most strongly correlated with the diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder, or the ICD-10, which has a partly similar condition called dissocial personality disorder. Both organisations view the terms as synonymous. But only a minority of what Hare and his followers would diagnose as psychopaths who are in institutions are violent offenders.Belmore, M. F., & Quinsey, V. L. Correlates of psychopathy in a noninstitutional sample. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 9(3), 339-349 1994Hersh, K., & Gray-Little, B. Psychopathic traits and attitudes associated with self-reported sexual aggression in college men. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 13(4), 456-471 1998 The manipulative skills of some of the others are valued for providing audacious leadership. Hercz, R \'Psychopaths among us.\' 2001 retrieved from [1] It is argued that psychopathy is adaptive in a highly competitive environment, because it gets results for both the individual and the corporationsBabiak, P. Psychopathic manipulation in organizations: Pawns, patrons, and patsies D. J. Cooke, Rache 71-99, lizbet1998 A. E. Forth, J. P. Newman, & R. D. Hare (Eds.), Issues in criminological and legal psychology: No. 24, International perspective on psychopathy (pp. 12-17). Leicester, UK: British Psychological Society. 1996 or, often small political sects that they represent.Mealey. L. \'The Sociobiology of Sociopathy: An Integrated Evolutionary Model\' retrieved from [2] However, these individuals will often cause long-term harm, both to their co-workers and the organization as a whole, due their manipulative, deceitful, abusive, and often fraudulent behaviour.Babiak, P. From darkness into the light: Psychopathy in industrial and organizational psychology. In Herve, H. & Yuille, J.C. (Eds.), The Psychopath: Theory, Research and Practice. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. 2007
Hare describes people he calls psychopaths as "intraspecies predatorsOchberg FM, Brantley AC, Hare RD, et al (2003). "Lethal predators: psychopathic, sadistic, and sane". International journal of emergency mental health 5 (3): 121-36. PMID 14608825. Simon, R. I. Psychopaths, the predators among us. In R. I. Simon (Ed.) Bad Men Do What Good Men Dream (pp. 21-46). Washington: American Psychiatric Publishing, Inc.1996 who use charm, manipulation, intimidation, sex and violenceD. J. Cooke, A. E. Forth, & R. D. Hare (Eds.), Psychopathy: Theory, research, and implications for society Dordrecht, The Netherlands: KluwerHeilbrun, K. Violence risk: From prediction to management. In D. Carson & R. Bull (Eds.), Handbook of psychology in legal contexts, 2nd edition (pp. 127-142). New York: Wiley 2003 Harris, G. T., Rice, M. E., & Lalumiére, M. Criminal violence: The roles of psychopathy, neurodevelopmental insults, and antisocial parenting. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 28(4), 402-426 2001. to control others and to satisfy their own selfish needs. Lacking in conscience and in feelings for others, they take what they want and do as they please, violating social norms and expectations without guilt or remorse".Hare, Robert D, Psychopaths: New Trends in Research. The Harvard Mental Health Letter, September 1995 "What is missing, in other words, are the very qualities that allow a human being to live in social harmony."Hare, Robert D. Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of Psychopaths Among Us, (New York: Pocket Books, 1993) pg 2.
Early factor analysis of the PCL-R indicated that it consisted of two factors. Harpur, T. J., Hare, R. D., & Hakstian, A. R. (1989). "Two-factor conceptualization of psychopathy: Construct validity and assessment implications.". Psychological Assessment 1 (1): 6-17. Factor 1 capture traits dealing with the interpersonal and affective deficits of psychopathy (e.g. shallow affect, superficial charm, manipulativeness, lack of empathy) whereas Factor 2 dealt with symptoms relating to anti-social behaviour (e.g. criminal versatility, impulsiveness, irresponsibility, poor behaviour controls, juvenile delinquency). The two factors have been found by those following this theory to display different correlates. Factor 1 has been correlated with narcissitic personality disorder, low anxiety, low empathy Zagon, I. K., & Jackson, H. J. (1994). "Construct validity of a psychopathy measure.". Personality and Individual Differences 17 (1): 125-135. , low stress reaction Verona, E., Patrick, C. J., & Joiner, T. E. (2001). "Psychopathy, Antisocial Personality, and Suicide Risk". Journal of Abnormal Psychology 110 (3): 462-470. and low suicide risk but high scores on scales of achievement and well-being. In contrast, Factor 2 was found to be related to anti-social personality disorder, social deviance, sensation seeking, low socio-economic status and high risk of suicide . The two factors are nonetheless highly correlated and there are strong indications that they do result from a single underlying disorder.Cooke, D. J., Kosson, D. S., & Michie, C. (2001). "Psychopathy and ethnicity: Structural, item and test generalizability of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) in caucasian and African American participants". Psychological Assessment 13 (4): 531-542. However, research has failed to replicate the two-factor model in female samples. Salekin, R. T., Rogers, R., & Sewell, K. W. (1997). "Constuct validity of psychopathy in a female offender sample: A mutlitrait-multimethode evaluation". Journal of Abnormal Psychology 106 (4): 576-585.
Recent statistical analysis using confirmatory factor analysis by Cooke and Michie Cooke, D. J., & Michie, C. (2001) (2001). "Refining the construct of psychopathy: Towards a hierarchical model". Psychological Assessment 13 (2): 171-188. indicated a three-factor structure, with those items from factor 2 strictly relating to anti-social behaviour (criminal versatility, juvenile delinquency, revocation of conditional release, early behavioural problems and poor behavioural controls) removed from the final model. The remain items divided into three factors: Arrogant and Deceitful Interpersonal Style, Deficient Affective Experience and Impulsive and Irresponsible Behavioural Style . In the most recent edition of the PCL-R, Hare adds a fourth Antisocial behaviour factor, consisting of those Factor 2 items excluded in the previous model Hare, R. D. (2003). Manual for the Hare Psychopathy Checklist - Revised.. Multi-Health Systems. . Again, these models are presumed to be hierarchical with a single unified psychopathy disorder underlying the distinct but correlated factors.Cooke, D. J., Michie, C., & Skeem, J. L. (2007) (2007). "Understanding the structure of the Psychopathy Checklist - Revised: An exploration of methodological confusion". British Journal of Psychiatry 190 (suppl. 49): s39-s50.
Hare\'s PCL-R has allowed for a differentiation between individuals with psychopathy and antisocial personality disorder (APD).
In contemporary research and clinical psychiatric practice, the American Psychiatric Association use the DSM and European doctors use the ICD-10 and will use the term antisocial personality disorder. Psychopathy is most commonly assessed by those who subscribe to a separate idea of psychopathy with the PCL-R (Hare, 1991), which is a clinical rating scale with 20 items. Each of the items in the PCL-R is scored on a three-point (0, 1, 2) scale according to two factors. PCL-R Factor 2 is associated with reactive anger, anxiety, increased risk of suicide, criminality, and impulsive violence. PCL-R Factor 1, in contrast, is associated with extroversion and positive affect. Factor 1, the so-called core personality traits of psychopathy, may even be beneficial for the psychopath (in terms of nondeviant social functioning). A psychopath will score high on both factors, whereas someone with APD will score high only on Factor 2.Davison, G.C., Neale, J.M., Blankstein, K.R., & Flett, G.L. (2002). Abnormal Psychology. (Etobicoke: Wiley)
Both case history and a semi-structured interview are used in the analysis.
Psychopathy has quite separate legal and judicial definitions that should not be confused with the medical definition. The American Psychiatric Association is vigorously opposing any non medical or legal definition of what purports to be a medical condition "without regard for scientific and clinical knowledge".W. Lawrence Fitch (2003). Sexual Offender Commitment in the United States. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 989:489-501 (2003). Retrieved on 2007-12-16. Various states and nations have at various times enacted laws specific to dealing with psychopaths. In the United States approximately twenty states currently have provisions for the involuntary civil commitment for sex offenders or sexual predators, under Sexually violent predator acts, avoiding the use of the term "psychopath". These statutes and provisions are controversial and are being reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court as a violation of a person\'s Fourteenth Amendment rights. (See Foucha v. Louisiana for an example.Ralph Alexander, Jr. (Vol. 20, No. 4 1993). The Civil Commitment of Sex Offenders in Light of Foucha v. Louisiana 371-387. Criminal Justice and Behavior - American Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology. DOI:10.1177/0093854893020004005. Retrieved on 2007-12-17.)
According to Jay Ziskin any diagnosis that does not appear in DSM III is not a formal diagnoses for legal uses, as shown in a quote from Coping with Psychiatric and Psychological Testimony Vol II by Jay Ziskin which is a book for attorneys to shoot down psychiatric testimony in the United States.
{{{1}}}
Primary psychopathy was defined by those following this theory as the root disorder in patients diagnosed with it, whereas secondary psychopathy was defined as an aspect of another psychiatric disorder or social circumstances.Karpman, Ben, M.D. (1948). "The Myth of the Psychopathic Personality". The American Journal of Psychiatry 104 (9): 523-534. doi:10.1176/appi.ajp.104.9.523. Today, primary psychopaths are considered to have mostly Factor 1 traits from the PCL-R (arrogance, callousness, manipulativeness, lying) whereas secondary psychopaths have a majority of Factor 2 traits (impulsivity, boredom proneness, irresponsibility, lack of long-term goals).Lykken, David T. The Antisocial Personalities (1995).Secondary psychopaths show normal to above-normal physiological responses to (perceived) potential threats. Their crimes tend to be unplanned and impulsive with little thought of the consequences.Cleckley, Hervey. The Mask of Sanity Including to those using this theory, this type have hot tempers and are prone to reactive aggression. They experience normal to above-normal levels of anxiety but are nevertheless highly stimulus seeking and have trouble tolerating boredom. Their lifestyle may lead to depression and even suicide.
Mealey uses the term "primary psychopathy" to differentiate between psychopathy that is biological in origin and "secondary psychopathy" that results from a combination of genetic and environmental influences.Mealey, L. (1995). The sociobiology of sociopathy:An integrated evolutionary model. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 18, 523–559. Lykken prefers sociopathy to describe the latter.
Sellbom and Ben-Porath (2005) describe the distinction succinctly:
This distinction closely resembles the distinction between instrumental and impulsive/reactive crime/violence in the field of criminology.
Joseph P. Newman et al, who use this concept of psychopathy, have validated David T. Lykken\'s conceptualization of psychopathy subtypes in relation to Gray\'s behavioral activation system and behavioral inhibition system.Newman JP, MacCoon DG, Vaughn LJ, Sadeh N (2005). "Validating a distinction between primary and secondary psychopathy with measures of Gray\'s BIS and BAS constructs". Journal of abnormal psychology 114 (2): 319-23. doi:10.1037/0021-843X.114.2.319. PMID 15869363. Newman et al. found measures of primary psychopathy to be negatively correlated with Gray\'s behavioral inhibition system, a construct intended to measure behavioral inhibition from cues of punishment or nonreward. In contrast, measures of secondary psychopathy to be positively correlated with Gray\'s behavioral activation system, a construct intended to measure sensitivity to cues of behavioral approach.
The difference between sociopathy and psychopathy, according to Hare, may "reflect the user\'s views on the origins and determinates of the disorder."Hare, Robert D. Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of Psychopaths Among Us, (New York: Pocket Books, 1993) pg 23.
David T. Lykken proposes that psychopathy and sociopathy are two distinct kinds of antisocial personality disorder. He holds that psychopaths are born with temperamental differences such as impulsivity, cortical underarousal, and fearlessness that lead them to risk-seeking behavior and an inability to internalize social norms. Sociopaths, on the other hand, he believes to have relatively normal temperaments; their personality disorder being more an effect of negative sociological factors like parental neglect, delinquent peers, poverty, and extremely low or extremely high intelligence. Both personality disorders are, of course, the result of an interaction between genetic predispositions and environmental factors, but psychopathy leans towards the hereditary whereas sociopathy tends towards the environmental.Lykken, David T. The Antisocial Personalities (1995).
The criteria for the Antisocial Personality Disorder were derived from the Research Diagnositic Criteria developed by Spitzer, Endicott and Robbins (1978). There was concern in the development of DSM-IV that there was too much emphasis on research data and not enough on the more traditional psychopathic traits such as a lack of empathy, superficial charm, and inflated self appraisal. Field trial data indicated that some of these traits of psychopathy derived from the Psychopathy Checklist developed by Hare et al., 1992, were difficult to assess reliably and thus were not included. Lack of remorse is an example. The antisocial person may express guilt or remorse or offer excuses and rationalizations. However, a history of criminal acts in itself suggests little remorse or guilt. Widiger et al., Thomas (1995). Personality Disorder Interview-IV, Chapter 4: Antisocial Personality Disorder. Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc., 47. ISBN 0-911907-21-1.
The American Psychiatric Association removed the word "psychopathy" or "psychopathic", and started using the term "Antisocial Personality" to cover the disorder in DSM-II.American Psychiatric Association (1968). DSM-II - Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorder, @nd Ed., Washington DC: American Psychiatric Association, p.43.
The World Health Organization\'s stance in its ICD-10 refers to psychopathy, sociopathy, antisocial personality, asocial personality, and amoral personality as synonyms for dissocial personality disorder. Further, the DSM was meant as a diagnostic guide, and the term psychopath best fit the criteria met for antisocial personality disorder.
The prototypical psychopath has deficits or deviances in several areas: interpersonal relationships, emotion, and self-control. Psychopaths lack a sense of guilt or remorse for any harm they may have caused others, instead rationalizing the behavior, blaming someone else, or denying it outright.Millon, Theodore; Davis, Roger D. "Chapter 11: The Five-Factor Model of Personality, pp. 173-177. Psychopathy: Antisocial, Criminal, and Violent Behavior. Psychopaths also lack empathy towards others in general, resulting in tactlessness, insensitivity, and contemptuousness. All of this belies their tendency to make a good, likable first impression. Psychopaths have a superficial charm about them, enabled by a willingness to say anything without concern for accuracy or truth.
This extends into their pathological lying and willingness to con and manipulate others for personal gain or amusement. The prototypical psychopath\'s emotions are described as a shallow affect, meaning their overall way of relating is characterized by mere displays of friendliness and other emotion for personal gain; the displayed emotion need not correlate with felt emotion, in other words.
Shallow affect also describes the psychopath\'s tendency for genuine emotion to be short lived and egocentric with an overall cold demeanor. Their behavior is impulsive and irresponsible, often failing to keep a job or defaulting on debts.Millon, Theodore; Davis, Roger D. "Chapter 11: The Five-Factor Model of Personality, pp. 173-177. Psychopathy: Antisocial, Criminal, and Violent Behavior.
Most research studies of psychopaths have taken place among prison populations. This remains a limitation on its applicability to a general population.
It has been shown that punishment and behavior modification techniques do not improve the behavior of what Hare and other followers of this theory call a psychopath. They have been regularly observed to respond to both by becoming more cunning and hiding their behavior better. It has been suggested by them that traditional therapeutic approaches actually make psychopaths if not worse, then far more adept at manipulating others and concealing their behavior. They are generally considered to be not only incurable but also untreatable.Harris, Grant & Rice, Marnie (2006), "Treatment of psychopathy: A review of empirical findings", in Patrick, Christopher, Handbook of Psychopathy, pp. 555-572
Psychopaths also have a markedly distorted sense of the potential consequences of their actions, not only for others, but also for themselves. They do not, for example, deeply recognize the risk of being caught, disbelieved or injured as a result of their behaviour.[citation needed]
No clinical definition of psychopathy indicates that psychopaths are especially prone to commit sexually-oriented murders, and scientific studies do not suggest that a large proportion of psychopaths have committed these crimes,What is Psychopathy - Sexual Psychopath. Retrieved on 2007-12-15. Although some claim a large proportion of such offenders have been classified as psychopathic, this evidence comes from single, unrepeated research study using the Rorschach Inkblot Test, an invalid test for psychopathy and for sex offendersGacono, Meloy, Bridges (200), A Rorschach Comparison of Psychopaths, Sexual Homicide Perpetrators, and Nonviolent Pedophiles: Where Angels Fear to Tread. JOURNAL OF CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY, Vol. 56(6), 757–777 (2000), references not considering psychopathy Michael H. Stone (2001), SERIAL SEXUAL HOMICIDE: BIOLOGICAL, PSYCHOLOGICAL, AND SOCIOLOGICAL ASPECTS. Journal of Personality Disorders, 15(1), 1–18, 2001, and studies concerning sexual homocide, a somewhat different population that the general class of sex offenders.Porter et al. (2003), Characteristics of Sexual Homicides Committed by Psychopathic and Nonpsychopathic Offenders. Law and Human Behavior, Vol. 27, No. 5, October 2003 and not from meta studies combining repeatable results.
Psychopathy is not normally diagnosed in children or adolescents, and some jurisdictions explicitly forbid diagnosing psychopathy and similar personality disorders in minors. Psychopathic tendencies can sometimes be recognized in childhood or early adolescence and, if recognised, are diagnosed as conduct disorder. It must be stressed that not all children diagnosed with conduct disorder grow up to be psychopaths, or even disordered at all, but these childhood signs are found in significantly higher proportions in psychopaths than in the general population. Conduct disorder, as well as a related disorder, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, can sometimes develop into adult psychopathy. However, conduct disorder "fails to capture the emotional, cognitive and interpersonality traits - egocentricity, lack of remorse, empathy or guilt - that are so important in the diagnosis of psychopathy."Hare, Robert D. Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of Psychopaths Among Us, (New York: Pocket Books, 1993) pg 159.
Children showing strong psychopathic precursors often appear immune to punishment; nothing seems to modify their undesirable behavior. Consequently parents usually give up, and the behavior worsens. Ramsland, Katherine, The Childhood Psychopath: Bad Seed or Bad Parents?
The following childhood indicators are to be seen not as to the type of behavior, but as to its relentless and unvarying occurrence. Not all must be present concurrently, but at least a number of them need to be present over a period of years[citation needed]:
The three indicators—bedwetting, cruelty to animals and firestarting, known as the MacDonald triad—were first described by J.M. MacDonald as indicators of psychopathy.J. M. MacDonald (1963). "The Threat to Kill". American Journal of Psychiatry 120 (2): 125-130. Though the relevance of these indicators to serial murder etiology has since been called into question, they are considered irrelevant to psychopathy.
The question of whether young children with early indicators of psychopathy respond poorly to intervention compared to conduct disordered children without these traits has only recently been examined in controlled clinical research. The findings from this one research finding is consistent with broader colloquial evidence - pointing to poor treatment outcomes.Hawes DJ, Dadds MR (2005). "The treatment of conduct problems in children with callous-unemotional traits". Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 73 (4): 737-41. doi:10.1037/0022-006X.73.4.737. PMID 16173862.
As part of the larger debate on whether personality disorders are distinct from normal personality or extremes on various dimensions of normal personality is the debate on whether psychopathy represents something "qualitatively different" from normal personality or a "continuous dimension" shading from normality into severely psychopathic. Early taxonometric analysis from Harris and colleaguesHarris GT, Rice ME, Quinsey VL (1994). "Psychopathy as a taxon: evidence that psychopaths are a discrete class". Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 62 (2): 387-97. PMID 8201078. indicated that a discrete category may underlie psychopathy, however this was only found for the behavioural Factor 2 items, indicating that this analysis may be related to Anti-social Personality Disorder rather than psychopathy per se. Marcus, John, and Edens more recently performed a series of statistical analysis on previously attained PCL–R and PPI scores and concluded that psychopathy may best be conceptualized as having a "dimensional latent structure" like depression.Marcus DK, John SL, Edens JF (2004). "A taxometric analysis of psychopathic personality". Journal of Abnormal Psychology 113 (4): 626-35. doi:10.1037/0021-843X.113.4.626. PMID 15535794.
In contrast, the PCL–R sets a score of 30 out of 40 for North American male inmates as its cut-off point for a diagnosis of psychopathy, however this is an abitrary cut-off and should not be taken to reflect any sort of underlying structure for the disorder.
In a 2002 study, David Kosson and Yana Suchy, et al. asked psychopathic inmates to name the emotion expressed on each of 30 faces; compared to controls, psychopaths had a significantly lower rate of accuracy in recognizing disgusted facial affect but a higher rate of accuracy in recognizing anger. Additionally, when "conditions designed to minimize the involvement of left-hemispheric mechanisms" were used, psychopaths had more difficulty accurately identifying emotions. This study did not replicate Blaire, et al. (1997)\'s findings that psychopaths are specifically less sensitive to nonverbal cues of fear or distress.Kosson DS, Suchy Y, Mayer AR, Libby J (2002). "Facial affect recognition in criminal psychopaths". Emotion (Washington, D.C.) 2 (4): 398-411. PMID 12899372.
In a 2002 experiment, Blair, Mitchell, et al. used the Vocal Affect Recognition Test to measure psychopaths\' recognition of the emotional intonation given to connotatively neutral words. Psychopaths tended to make more recognition errors than controls with a particularly high rate of error for sad and fearful vocal affect.Blair RJ, Mitchell DG, Richell RA, et al (2002). "Turning a deaf ear to fear: impaired recognition of vocal affect in psychopathic individuals". Journal of Abnormal Psychology 111 (4): 682-6. PMID 12428783.
A 2004 experiment tested the hypothesis of overselective attention in psychopaths using two forms of the Stroop color-word and picture-word tasks: with color/picture and word separated and with color/picture and word together. They found that in the separated Stroop tasks, psychopaths performed significantly worse than controls; however, on standard Stroop tasks, psychopaths performed equally well as controls.
When split into low-anxious and high-anxious groups, low-anxious psychopaths and low-anxious controls showed less interference on the separated Stroop tasks than their high-anxious counterparts; for low-anxious psychopaths, interference was very nearly zero. They conclude that the inability to integrate contextual cues depends on the cues\' relationship to "the deliberately attended, goal-relevant information."Hiatt KD, Schmitt WA, Newman JP (2004). "Stroop tasks reveal abnormal selective attention among psychopathic offenders". Neuropsychology 18 (1): 50-9. doi:10.1037/0894-4105.18.1.50. PMID 14744187.
Look up Psychopathy in
Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from Wikipedia
