This week “Sarah” commenting on Lovefraud wrote:
What is the biggest difference between Narcissists/Psychopaths/Sociopaths and us? The ability to love!
What is one of the over-riding characteristics of the N/P/S? They are they are extremely jealous & envious and must WIN! We have something they will never have . . i.e., the ability to love.
In the Mask of Sanity, the first book to describe psychopathy, Hervey Cleckley wrote:
The psychopath seldom shows anything that, if the chief facts were known, would pass even in the eyes of lay observers as object love”¦ In a sense, it is absurd to maintain that the psychopath’s incapacity for object love is absolute, that is, to say he is (in)capable of affection for another ”¦ He is plainly capable of casual fondness, of likes and dislikes, and of reactions that, one might say, cause others to matter to him. These affective reactions are, however, always strictly limited in degree. In durability they also vary greatly from what is normal in mankind. The term absolute is, I believe, appropriate if we apply it to any affective attitude strong and meaningful enough to be called love, that is, anything that prevails in sufficient degree and over sufficient periods to exert a major influence on behavior.
In my opinion, perhaps the only flaw in our current measures of “psychopathy” is their failure to assess “ability to love.” Fortunately, that may soon change thanks to Donald Lynam, Ph.D. , Professor of Clinical Psychology at Perdue University. In his presentation, Interpersonal Antagonism as the Core Feature of Psychopathy Dr. Lynam presented evidence that inability to love is at the core of psychopathy.
I have long admired Dr. Lynam’s work, and his rather renegade status in the world of psychopathy research. During his presentation, I sat next to an accomplished psychopathy researcher, who has become a friend. After Dr. Lynam finished, I offered a public thanks to him for his presentation and brought up the issue that no one else is trying to measure and assess “ability to love” in psychopaths. The researcher sitting next to me said “You can have him as your Guru if you like, but there are problems with his work.” I did not ask my friend to elaborate because I already knew why he said that.
Dr. Lynam has challenged the status quo of psychopathy research because he says, “Factor analysis of the PCL-R (the most widely used rating scale) are unlikely to reveal the core personality components of psychopathy.” His making that statement at the SSSP meetings is kind of like a minister at a meeting of Southern Baptists saying that The Bible doesn’t necessarily have all the answers for modern humans.
Dr. Lynam says (and I very much agree) that if you analyze the PCL-R to understand “the psychopath” you run into circular arguments. How do we know this person is a psychopath? Because he/she has a high PCL-R score. How do we know the PCL-R symptoms reflect the psychopathy personality type? Because they belong to “psychopaths” as identified by the PCL-R. The way to get around these circular arguments is to separate diagnostic measures from personality measures. This is what Dr. Lynam has done.
The most accepted model of general personality posits five basic traits called the Big Five (OCEAN: Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Neuroticism). Dr. Lynam has studied these traits in relation to psychopathy and he has found that “low agreeableness” explains a majority of individual differences in PCL-R scores. That means that the core of psychopathy is explained by low agreeableness.
What exactly is low agreeableness? Agreeableness has 6 parts to it: trust, straightforwardness, altruism, compliance, modesty and tender mindedness. The items on this list reflect a person’s tendency toward intimacy, needs balancing (ones own needs vs. other’s needs) and caretaking of others; core components of ability to love. Dr. Lynam also mentioned briefly that these are more than personality traits and instead seem to reflect “an ability.” I wrote about love as a developmentally acquired “ability” in Just Like His Father? nearly three years ago, and am glad to see this given more attention by scientists.
After I commented praising Dr. Lynam’s work, another researcher stood up and said, “There’s just something about this that bothers me”¦ my gut tells me it is off”¦ If psychopaths lack agreeableness, why do other people find them attractive?”
I talked with that researcher in private afterwards. Consider Dr. Cleckley’s statement about love and psychopathy. Since psychopaths appear to have fondness and affection, their inability to love is often hidden behind their “Mask of Sanity.” It is only when you really get to know them and you put yourself in a position of depending on them that you discover the importance of their inability to love. This is where victims have wisdom and understanding that many psychopathy researchers will never attain.
For more on Dr. Lynam’s work see: Are they just evil people?
I found this to be especially true! The VALUE of anything was limited to time, a very short time! And people where no different than possesions! Replaceable as the daily paper! No value! Their Parents are no different as long as they are supplying a need, home, money , food, help! Friends where non-existant because they held no value in them if they did not supply a need! Regardless of the past exploites.
To throw away relationships like used toilet paper!
I believe this is truely what they think of themselves, that they are CHIT and everything about themselves is made up to cover this belief!
Without Love the mind is open to influences of an EVIL nature! ie: their behavior
Sincerely Vic
Absoluetly! And what is love, but God.
They are evil and in need of exorcism.
http://holywatersalt.blogspot.com/search/label/exorcisms
There is a very old saying!
Do not judge a book by its cover! The Wisdom in this is profound!
We can take from it , Do not judge a Person by their Words! Like a book , there has to be solid content inside! So “Hopefully” I won’t Fall for the beauty and wait to see that there is Truth in the Words by Their behavior and deeds! Sometimes we need to read a little deeper into the person before we believe what we are hearing!
Holywatersalt
Trying to persuade Psychologists that a Sociopaths healing is going to require an Exorcism! ? Ain’t gona go well! Not that I don’t agree! Does the Catholic Church still do Exorcisms? It has got to be Cheaper than Institutionalization or Prision!
Oh I don’t think they’d ever PUBLICY admit it….no never, ever…but once you have delt with one of these creatures…I wonder what they really believe.
I don’t discount science at all, I think in many cases it just a proof.
And yes, the Church does do exorcisms. Every diocese must have an exorcist.
ps
Even traditional, conservative parishes are leery of exorcism….why?Well, because that’s the way the Devil works…think of the Screwtape Letters. We are too sophisticated, too educated, too evolved….really the same secular belief about psychopaths. You know if get them a program, more understanding etc. ….we can make the anew or heck most don’teven believe conscienceless people exist!
Few, secular or religious, believe psychopaths exist as everyday folks.
holywatersalt and Vic, you had me chuckling about your exorcism discussion. since I originally attended the Catholic church for the first half of my life (don’t ask me how old I am now (LOL), I wanted to insert my two cents how I saw what was meant exorcising demons (aka sin) from the inflicted (aka sinner).
It wasn’t anything like the movie, spinning one’s head and spitting pea soup. Very vivid imagination of the writer. It was the congregation coming together and correcting the sinner (aka explaining their sinful nature to them) and asking them if they were willing to repent (aka, work the person back through the process of breaking their sinful nature to where they were not sinning). The Catholics do this because they love all their brothers and sisters and realize that every one of is a sinner.
It also depends on what the sin is. Some sins (see the 10 commandments) are easy to work backwards to the beginning of not having this lust for an earthly affliction, others are more entangled and take years to work backwards.
Success depended mostly on the willingness of the sinner … and the church community who were willing to be there for the individual (sort of like the AA community were they have a sponsor).
It’s doable to work a person back through their sinful nature. Like I said, the sinner has to admit the sin bothers him (acknowledgment) and secondly, they have to be willing to work on this sinful nature.
The reason sin is so prevalent today is because people don’t even realize what sin is anymore.
Peace.
Dear Liane,
Thank you so much for this article! I think your friend is right, and I also think that the “mainstream” researchers may indeed think he is a rebel against “sicience”—-describing “love” much less measuring it is difficult, like “how high is UP?” LOL
Wini, Vic and HSW I agree, they are EVIL creatures, and as far as I am concerned, Satan has their hearts and minds, but they were given willingly to Satan, not unwillingly, and an UNrepentent “sinner” isn’t going to be helped by ANYthing.
It has been proven time and time again that “a man convinced against his will is of the same opinion, still.” (don’t know who said that but it is defintely true!)
I also agree with Liane that WE, former victims, probably know more about Ps than most of the “researchers”—and especially the ones who have never met a psychopath that they know of! LOL
The fact that there IS scientific researchh going on concerning Ps is a good thing! I would love to be around in 100 years to see the outcome of some of the research!
Oxy, what I find amazing is if you talk about Ps with people they want to stick their heads in the sand and blame the P on us. An attitude like there is something wrong with you … get away from me, like we are contagious. Yet, these same people will tell you about the show they saw the other night about a P or the book they read. It’s like if they see/read/hear about the P from the news media or a mental health professional it’s OK, but to actually talk with a person (us) that had first hand knowledge of the destruction is till a non issue with most people.
I hope I got my thoughts out on this.
Peace.
Interesting, but IMHO, I still think ability to love is lower on the list of priorities (for lack of a better word). By the time the victims of a sociopath discovers that they are just a source of supply and there never has been any love, way too much time has gone by.
I still think the manipulation and exploitation are the key elements in the toxic brew that is a sociopathy. Manipulation and exploitation manifest themselves far earlier than “love” or the lack thereof. Personally, manipulation and expliotation are the red flags that I’m looking for right up front.
We lost yesterday’s comments. someone posted about ignoring not just red flags but a 76 trombone big parade! Wanted to say the same was true for me too. In the words of the Betrayal Bond book, it was because we believed so strongly (or wanted to) in the person, the promise, the mission and the story. (And I would add, that it was also that we had no idea someone could be so evil to us, as an adult, and we weren’t on the look out.) And if we have had a bond like that before…where we loved or sought love from someone abusing us like a parent….then it is more likely to happen again. There are lots of things that the book lists that can make it more likely for us to believe the highly improbable and reject the obvious. But I always add, that the MAIN reason we got hurt was that we were with a BAD PERSON….and we can respond by learning ways to be stronger, learning situations to avoid, just like a victim of a physical rape….but we were emotionally raped (and sometimes that was just one aspect of what happened) and we are not to blame for that. But still, I can guarantee that NOW even a tiny red speck, let alone a flag, now gets my full attention and response and the particular type P who got to me wouldn’t even be able to buy me a cup of coffee now, and I hope I can spot most types now…though we know some are very slick.
I agree Matt….I look for that “WHAT!!” experience that Steve described in his post on radar for the wrong person. I had signs that my P COULD love…that is too easy to fake. But he couldn’t quite hide his willingness to exploit, so that is, I think, a better red flag. It seems the inability to love and the willingness to exploit are closely aligned, but the latter is easier to spot.