This past week I was talking on the telephone with my student and research assistant when he was mugged by a group of 5-7 thugs. One hit him from behind, knocking him down and another punched him in the abdomen. Ironically, among the items stolen was a copy of “Without Conscience” by Robert Hare.
Yesterday, my student asked me, “Those guys in the group who do have empathy and guilt, how do they feel about doing this? What makes them do it?” To which I replied, “I don’t think they feel a thing. They are likely all psychopathic (sociopaths). No one wants to admit just how many of them there are. So they draw an artificial line based on the PCL-R (a psychopathy test) and say these thugs are psychopaths and these thugs are non-psychopaths. They call them non-psychopaths even though their scores on the test are far from normal. They do this because they want to hold on to hope that most of them can change.”
Dr. Reid Melloy, a forensic psychologist with years of experience working with criminals has a method of classifying them that I think is more correct. He has four groups, not two, based on the PCL-R, non-psychopaths, and mild, moderate and severe psychopathy. I do concede that the thugs that assaulted my student likely had the syndrome to varying degrees; and we know the ring leader is likely severely affected.
That gets me to a recent article that received a great deal of news coverage. In one Fox News article were comments from experts who in the past I have criticized for irresponsible public comments. The article discusses data from a study published in a top journal, it doesn’t give the title but it is, The Antisocial Brain: Psychopathy Matters a Structural MRI Investigation of Antisocial Male Violent Offenders.
The title should say, “the degree of psychopathy matters”. When you see stories like this you have to watch out because my colleagues have rotating definitions of psychopathy that they pull out depending on what they need to fit their data. In some studies like this one, they use a cut-off high PCL-R score. In other studies they separate offenders into groups depending on whether or not they show empathy and remorse. So groups may contain the same PCL-R score but be defined in terms of differing symptoms.
The study basically showed that higher scores on the PCL-R are associated with a higher likelihood of finding a shrunken “emotional brain”. Before you go writing me asking that your ex be forced to undergo an MRI which will prove the presence of psychopathy, let me tell you what is not in the news article. You cannot use an MRI scan to diagnose psychopathy.
A diagnostic test has to be sensitive, meaning that it picks up your ex and everyone else with the condition. Well we already know that there is mild, moderate and severe. So do we want the test to pick up the mild or the severe group? That will depend on what your ex actually scored on the PCL-R. I am sure that a “mild” case of psychopathy, does not make for a good life partner. That is why for the purposes of Love Fraud any comparison between “ASPD” and psychopathy is meaningless.
A diagnostic test also has to be specific meaning that only psychopaths show the abnormality. There is no test for psychopathy that is sensitive and specific enough to be useful. This article only shows us the obvious, that very high levels of psychopathy are more likely to be related to observable changes in the brain than are lower levels of psychopathy.
Since the brain produces behavior, their brains have to be different. The behavior they produce is different. All of the thugs who attacked my student to steal “without conscience” have something wrong with their brains.
OneJoy, Grace and Dupey,
he is a guy who occassionally works for BF. I suspect that he was involved in a robbery a few years ago. Not that he did it himself, but that he sent his “friends”, because he just disappeared right afterwards, for about a year.
Thing is, there’s nothing and no reason for me to suspect anything except for his relationshit with his wife and the fact that he’s sooooo charming. These are red flags, imo, about other possible disordered attitudes.
But they are such little things and he’s soooo nice, that I feel bad thinking this way. BF refuses to believe that he’s anything but a “good guy”.
sky – YOU know better. i can hear the sing-song of ‘fall asleep and don’t mind meee while i slit your throooat’ in what you just wrote.
and AHEM, when is disrespecting ones partner not enough to brand one as bad news? ask bf that. his standards need to be raised up.
OK everybody answer me this:
If their paranoia comes from the nasty stuff they do to others then what does that say about them being “without conscience”???
Skylar,
I don’t think the things that you described are little things. I think they are Big Red Flags.
One/joy is so right – when is disrespecting one’s partner not enough to brand one as bad news? And your BF is OK with that?
Grace,
he gets conned all the time. It’s cognitive dissonance.
He knows just as much about spaths as I do, but for that reason, (I guess) he thinks he can see it (like 2 horns and a tail), but as soon as the love bombing starts, he goes completely blind.
For me, it’s become second nature to suspect anyone who is always “on”, like an actor.
Dr. Leedom
I am not a clinician, I can just tell you what I think.
Spaths are very very shallow and selfish. We all agree on that.
I think the paranoia is also rooted in shallowness and selfishness. They tend to think that other people are like they are – which means, people who lie, cheat, steal, and hurt others. My spath had food rations and barrels of water in his basement “just in case”. He also had a large stock pile of weapons and guns. He had a house alarm and used it constantly. All drapes were closed. All windows were locked. He would tell me all the time that I am too trusting because I trust people and I don’t lock everything. He lies constantly, and he thinks other people are lying constantly. It’s nuts. I believe TRUSTWORTHY PEOPLE TRUST PEOPLE and the REVERSE IS ALSO TRUE.
Spaths think other people are just as nasty as they are and they’re trying to protect themselves.
It has nothing at all to do with having a conscience.
Athena
One Joy
I love what you said!!!
“Get out of here”! That’s a re-quote and keeper!
Athena
Liane,
They are fully aware that what they do is evil. They just feel entitled to do evil. My spath sister said, “Skylar, everyone is evil, you’re evil, I’m evil, A is evil, D is evil. Everyone is evil except mom.” (she’s an idiot, btw)
Then my spath neighbor said, “Skylar EVERYBODY lies.”
And my spath frienemy said, “Skylar everybody uses everybody. I use you, you use me, D uses you and you use him.”
All three of these encounters left me in a WTF? moment.
Now I understand that these people like wallowing in the mire of shit they create. It’s a game to them. Conscience is not one of the rules, except to say that anyone WITH a conscience is fair game to them. Paranoia is just a side effect of playing the game in which there can only be one winner.
Liane
My two cents is that the paranoia is just a direct result of them being “so full of themselves” all the time.
After all the evil deeds and wrong doings they have done to so many, it is kind of an expected thing at some point to become paranoid and be looking over your shoulder all the time…
It has nothing to do with conscience. It isn’t about others or concern about what they have done wrong. It is all about them.
Their minds are always working in SCAM mode. They envy others, and feel entitled to anything/everything that doesn’t belong to them.
Chances are that because they hold themselves in such high regard, they think others WANT what they have.
It is a delusional “frame of mind” of self preservation.
I agree Liane: it’s not conscience based. It’s from a fear that they are going to have something done nasty to them for all the stuff they have done to others. That’s what that paranoia is all about. They are always looking over their shoulder because they know what they did was wrong but they just don’t care. Unless it starts to hurt THEM, then they care.
They know what evil lurks inside them. Believe me, they are totally in touch with their ugly selves and it makes them nervous because they discard people without straightening anything out before they move on and try damaging the next person. They would rather evacuate than deal with their responsibilities.
No, everybody does not use everyone else. That is not what life and/or friendship or love is about. Right, their minds are ALWAYS in ‘scam mode’. ALWAYS. Just my opinion from my experiences. There is no conscience to it at all.
Dupey