I plan to review for you a very recent paper: Psychopathy as a disorder of the moral brain. Dr. Robert Hare is one of the authors. But, before I can get to explaining the moral brain part, I have to get past the first paragraph, so the moral brain will be have to be discussed more next week. As I sat down to translate this paper into plain English, I got stuck at the fourth sentence:
“Antisocial behavior by itself is a nonspecific symptom common to many conditions, so psychopathy and antisocial personality disorder (ASPD, American Psychiatric Association, 1994) are not analogous constructs while most cases of ASPD (sociopathy) do not fulfill the interpersonal and affective criteria for psychopathy (Hare, 2003; Ogloff, 2006) the behavioral features observed in these individuals are best explained by their level of psychopathy (Forth et al., 1996).”
O.K. let me get this straight, psychopathy and antisocial personality disorder are not the same thing so a sociopath is not a psychopath BUT to the extent that a sociopath is a sociopath, it is because he/she is a psychopath! Now, how are we supposed to understand that so we can start discussing the important point—the moral brain?
The first sentence of the paper sheds light on what the author is really trying to say, “Psychopathy is a personality disorder defined by a constellation of interpersonal, affective, and behavioral/lifestyle features, including manipulation and deception, grandiosity, shallow emotions, lack of empathy and remorse, an impulsive, irresponsible lifestyle, and the persistent violation of social norms and expectations.” What he should have said in the fourth sentence is that many people psychiatrists diagnose with sociopathy using the DSM do not score above 30 on the psychopathy inventory (PCL-R), so that by a strict definition they are not psychopaths. To give you some background about why there is an argument here please read Psychopath and Antisocial Personality Disorder: A Case of Diagnostic Confusion by Dr. Hare. He reports that the interpersonal behavior and emotions of psychopaths best define them. He objects to the fact that these are not emphasized enough in the current definition of ASPD, which places too much emphasis on antisocial behavior.
These arguments took place some time ago before it was discovered that both sociopathy (ASPD) and psychopathy are a spectrum. Before that time Dr. Hare said that “psychopaths” were those who scored more than 30 on his scale. But since that time we have discovered that many people who score between 20 and 30 on the tests have the same physical and brain abnormalities as those who score over 30. So in reality a person is not a sociopath or a psychopath a person simply possesses traits of these disorders to a high degree. The higher the degree of psychopathy the more likely it is that a person will have an abnormal moral brain. If we look at a group of people and do a correlation between the degree of sociopathy as measured by the DSM criteria and the degree of psychopathy as measured by the PCL-R there is a high correlation between the two. So your worst sociopath is also your worst psychopath. Rather than being an argument over trying to separate apples and oranges, this is an argument over how to best define an apple (or a bad apple depending on how you look at it).
Psychopathy and sociopathy are really patterns of extreme brain and endocrine function that we infer from observing a person’s behavior. The real question is which behaviors are most indicative of this extreme physiology? If you read the scientific literature you will discover that many individuals who score between 20 and 30 also have aberrant brain and hormonal function. So the problem is not criteria, the problem is the cut off score of 30 which is in my opinion too high. There are a couple of studies indicating people with scores as low as 12 might have abnormal moral brains. If the cut off for psychopathy is lowered to 20 or 25 there is considerably more overlap between the PCL-R and the DSM.
I happen to agree with Dr. Hare that his scale is better at identifying individuals high in psychopathic/sociopathic traits. But I don’t think he should stop at the PCL-R which is a test only specially trained clinicians can administer. He has also developed the P-Scan which is a 90 item test that anyone can use to rate another person’s psychopathy. I have used this scale and believe that if this was accepted as the rating scale for psychopathy/sociopathy everyone would be able to identify those high in these traits. Isn’t that what we should do? Why should the identification of morally insane people be only reserved for highly trained clinicians?
I also think we should get away from assuming sociopathy and psychopathy are categories that people either do or do not belong to. There are many instances where just a few psychopathic traits can do serious damage. Damaging people can have some of psychopathic traits and not others.
When psychopathic traits interact with a specific situation or opportunity to do harm there is likely to be trouble. An example of a trait-situation interaction is when a highly psychopathic person is a parent or spouse, or a boss. If the highly psychopathic person has low power and low situational opportunities for harm, he/she is less of a problem to society. Similarly society needs leaders and parents to be low in psychopathic traits because in these situations just a few traits bring out harmful behavior. If we focus on traits we can begin to discuss situation and trait interactions. If we focus on the traits, we will avoid making the mistake of saying, “He/she isn’t a sociopath, so he/she is O.K.” The authors are correct in saying that evil behavior is best predicted by the presence of psychopathic traits, irrespective of whether there is a “formal diagnosis” of psychopathy.
What I would like to see is studies of physiology using the P-Scan completed by relatives who know the subject well as an assessment. Although the question of what is different about the physiology of psychopaths/sociopaths is very important, it is not the only or even most practically important question. If psychopathy can only be identified by a few highly trained people, what good is the construct? But if we had a behavioral or psychological test that nearly anyone could use, and that test was related to abnormal physiology then it would be highly useful to humanity.
Furthermore, there are numerous hormonal and brain findings associated with psychopathy and sociopathy. It is likely that these findings relate to specific traits. For example, high testosterone is related to unrestricted sociosexual orientation, power motivation and impulsivity but is less related to low affection. In this regard, the P-Scan is very good because the 90 items examine psychopathic traits in detail. Next week, psychopathic traits and the moral brain.
OxDrover:
I have a question to pose to you:
It appears from my reading and research both that 1) S’s have an agenda and 2) they are very impulsive and/or spontaneous.
On the surface those seem mutually exclusive or incongrous but since you have a wealth of experience with these people, how does one explain this?
It’s all about power, deceit, lies, manipulation, attention, etc…I’m pretty sure he’s planning his way back to this blog as a sympathizer for Mr. Green. I dealt with a “P” -(the worst kind) for five years….I’m glad to be alive to tell my story.
bookworm:
I believe you are probably right about Mr. Green. However, I think we will be able to identify him regardless of what name he uses, and still use NC. Since S’s require stimulation, and are easily bored, I cannot imagine he will find this site amusing for very long when he is ignored.
Absolutely, Bookworm, I agree with you 100%–every blog I have ever read or been on has had the same problem, some P discovers it and gets on trying to cause trouble and distract us from our purpose…I just assume there are ALWAYS one or two either lurking or posting. It’s what they do after all.
IN this group though, I sincerely doubt that they will go too long without being spotted but if they do, so what? It isn’t like they are gonna “get a virgin” (to Ps) on this spot. LOL
The agenda (such as it is) is what it is that they want. MOney, power, control, public acclaim, worship, sex, adoration, fear in their victims, to be able to gloat to the victim and see the victim squirm (or ALL of the above + anything else you can think of) Some want more some less. Like the Thread was talking about the other day with guys like Spritzer, they want power and to appear to be “important.” Some Ps like my son, went to prison before he was able to mature enough frontal lobe to see past the end of his nose. He went for the short term gains of stealing (fun) more for the fun of it than because he wanted what he stole. It was the “stepping out of the circle” defying authority, etc.
Because he was not willing to look at the long term goal (if he had any) he got caught because of his adolescence impulsivity.
Spritzer, on the other hand, didn’t stoop to “low life theft” as far as we know, but got an education, put up a mask/front as much as possible, got a job in a profession where power is exerted (law) allied himself with other Ps in politics, etc.
But again, even his WELL PLANNED AND EXECUTED mask and bad deeds were brought down like a house of cards by him pandering to his own baser instincts for “risky sex” and high dollar call girls. Seeing the photograph of that one I am not really sure why she would command thousands of dollars an hour, to me I would think that kind of bread for a hooker would be for someone who looked like Miss America or a Rock Star. LOL
I think her main allure was the high price. I think if her price had been $100 he wouldn’t have touched her—is a Rolex any “better” than a Timex? They both keep good time.
I think the bottom line (and Liane is better qualified to answer this than I am) is that it is all about them CONTROLLING their envionment and everything/body in it.
Sometimes though, because of their arrogance and willingness (almost compulsion I think) to be riskk takers I think they sometimes leap before they completely look in some of their schemes.
As far as their traits being mutually exclusive–let me illustrate it this way. I have a friend who is an artist. He makes chairs. NO two are alike, except possibly the number of legs, though some have 4 aand some have 3, but if you have EVER seen even one of his chairs, you would instantly recognize any other chair he has made as “one of his” chairs. I can’t put my finger on exactly why, though I have seen literally dozens of his chairs, and each is absolutely unique.
I think that someway Ps are sort of like that…each is actually unique but there is “something” about them that makes each one somehow recognizable as a P–a unique, but nasty piece of work!
As far as my “wealth” of experience, I think POVERTY OF EXPERIENCE IS MORE CORRECT! lol I have done all the wrong things, and done them at least twice, and sometimes 3 or 4 times wrong before I got the LESSON. (smile)
Happy Easter.
Peggy, we posted over each other. LOL
OxDrover:
I guess in a nutshell then (or should I say nutcase?) LOL…S’s desire to control their environment and everyone/everything in it, (but) sometimes they behave impulsively and/or compulsively without considering the big picture (agenda) or the long-term consequences thereof. Does this sound right?
I am having extreme difficulty focusing on my job (anxiousness, difficulty focusing, procrastinating); is this part of PTSD?
LOL about your poverty of experience! I can relate to that. I tell my kids that we learn more from our mistakes than from the things we do right.
Peggy:
Mine wasn’t spontaneous or impulsive, really. Well, he didn’t make plans, wouldn’t make plans…but that doesn’t seem spontaneous, to me. More like waiting for a better opportunity. Not to be too cynical.
Do you, or anyone else here, think maybe that if the S is all those things: craving power, control, ownership, mastery and have an agenda (that Secret-named guy who used to post here and posted his blog on here called his games with women…something…i can’t recall exactly what he called them, schemes? Exploits? Something along those lines)…that maybe we are the opposite type…we don’t seem to want power, control and don’t have an agenda?
I often see myself as being someone with a healthy sense that all of us humans have no real control over anything, because life can take away in an instant whatever we have. I also know I’ve never wanted power or control over anything, because I grew up feeling powerless. That’s unfortunately my natural state, and I hate competing for things. Would rather just do without.
Those qualities are the antithesis of my ex-P’s. Even when he asked me where I wanted to go at night, he would always end up choosing the plan he created and we’d do that. A total control freak and it felt like I was being moved around his Life game board, just another interchangeable pink peg in the plastic car.
Just wondering how you ladies see yourselves in terms of those desires for power, control, etc.
LilOrphan:
My S was extremely patterned, always on time, and seemed to need structure. However, he was simultaneously defrauding people and cheating (big time, I’m talking a million dollars or more) on his taxes. Then he had an affair and cheated on me (lied about this of course, although I have proof), and he would still occasionally get into shouting matches and/or physical and violent confrontations at work (he’s not a kid, he’s 54), and ride his Harley without a helmet nor a motorcycle endorsement. So although he appeared stable, he sometimes, and seemingly impulsively, would act out…for sex, risk-taking, or out of anger.
You’re right, they are opportunists. As soon as they have met a woman who has more to offer, they’re gone and never give you a passing thought (and are extremely cruel and nasty in the process, accusing us of the things they did/do). They also speak of us with the greatest disrespect (and lies).
Yes, I do think the S is all of those things you listed, “craving power, control, ownership, mastery and have an agenda”. My S controlled me, but I didn’t realize it at the time; I thought I was acquiescing to him for the sake of peace and harmony, and letting him be the “man” in the family. I also think OxDrover is right that they want “Money, power, control, public acclaim, worship, sex, adoration, fear in their victims, to be able to gloat to the victim and see the victim squirm”. I most definitely believe they exploit women with malice aforethought which I would say equates to “agenda” or intent. (This term specifically appies to murder, but I suggest that S’s do, in fact, plan to murder our spirits and/or our souls).
You’re right about the Life board game, I believe we talked previously about “life is a chess game”, and we are their pawns.
We also have an agenda (i.e. something we want) we want to be LOVED in the same way we love. There is nothing wrong with having an agenda, unless you are willing to use and abuse to realize it.
Websters defines agenda as “a plan of things to be considered or done.”
The things we do are focused on achieving our agenda. The things they do are focused on their agenda. But our agendas are NOT the same as theirs. In a healthy relationship there is give and take and INTER-dependence, not a parasitic relationship.
A relationship starts off with us thinking their agenda is the same as ours (love) but ends up with them in CONTROL which was their agenda to start with. I think too, that BECAUSE they can control us, it makes them DESPISE us all the more for being so “weak” that they were able to control us.
Some seem to want to keep a victim around forever, and others suck one dry and move on to the next one, and still others want multiple victims at the same time. I am not sure what makes one one way and another the other way–maybe Liane can answer that one.
MY P-bio father reserved his special hatred for those of us that stood up to him and didn’t back down. Then he would institute the smear campaign. I think he was so afraid that we might tell someone what he was or how he was and he wanted to make us look bad before we did that. I have been in correspondence with a well known world figure that we worked with when we were over seas, and I had heard rumors that my P-bio father had been thrown out of that country because he tried to bribe that man, and in some writings of my P-bio F he blasted this guy, so I finally got the man’s confidence enough that he told me what had gone on and that after an attempted bribe failed, he had threatened to shoot the man, and the man stood up to him and said “OK, go ahead” and of course P backed down.
My late husband had worked with my P-bio father for a short time, and also would not back down from him, and his threats (they weren’t all empty threats either) and P-F hated my husband with a powerful rage because he could not scare him. P-F was a great coward really, he was much bigger at beating up women and children than grown men. LOL
Peggy, I have written a book about m P-F, and his “interesting life” of crime, rage, hate, and money (he eventually did get the big money) made the Forbes 400 one year, well before the age of the Billionaires like Gates, but enough money to be really really rich. But it is not for publication just for my kids and some friends and my step kids. I wrote it too, just because I am probably the last person who knows the real truth. If the kids want to publish it after I am gone, they can, but I doubt by that time unless I die tomorrow, there will be anyone who cares a whit about him. 15 minutes of fame is about it. LOL
Even in his obit, there was more about his next to last wife, who has in her own right made a very good public career as a model and real estate developer than there was about him. When he married her, she was 15 and sort of a Priscilla Presley clone, big hair and all, and after she left him, she like Priscilla, had done a remake of herself. She is obviously very bright and charismatic as well as quite pretty. I am glad that she went on to a good life with a new husband and lots of money. She EARNED every cent of it. As far as I know, she is the only wife out of 6 or 7 that left with more than the clothes on her back and her life.
LilOrphan:
I missed an important part of your inquiry, “that maybe we are the opposite type…we don’t seem to want power, control and don’t have an agenda?” I believe there is truth in that. In interpreting this, the word is laissez-faire comes to mind (although it relates to economics) which means, simply, “let do”. I see this as your preferred methodology or view of life and the interactions thereof, to “let do” as opposed to control.
S’s must have someone they can con, and someone they can overpower. They seem to select women who are vulnerable and/or who are very loving, caring, nurturing, kind, and I would say (since reading the blogs on this site), highly intelligent (and don’t have an agenda or want to control people). Frankly, I was initially surprised by the brilliance of the people who post here…I previously had the mistaken perception that “victims” were most generally undereducated; but I have rethought this. (I apologize if I have offended anyone by this revelation).
So yes, essentially your S used the most beautiful parts of you personality and essence against you for his own personal benefit. It’s like a rape of the spirit.