Lovefraud invites you to complete a survey about your experience with a sociopath/psychopath/narcissist in order to help professionals diagnose this disorder properly.
Two days ago, the American Psychiatric Association released a draft of the fifth edition its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM 5). This book is the standard classification of mental disorders used by mental health and other professionals. The revision has been underway for a decade.
A work group of 11 doctors and psychologists focused on the section about personality and personality disorders. They have recommended significant changes to the description of antisocial personality disorder, which is also referred to as sociopathy and psychopathy. In fact, one of the suggestions is to change the name of the personality disorder to “antisocial/psychopathic type.”
The new description of the disorder is much closer to what most of us at Lovefraud have experienced. You can read the description here:
Antisocial/Psychopathic Type
The American Psychiatric Association has invited public comment on the draft of DSM 5, and Lovefraud is taking the doctors up on their invitation. We thought the best way to do it would be to survey our readers, asking you how well the proposed description of antisocial/psychopathic type matches your experience with one (or more) of these individuals.
Please take the survey. This is serious, so be thoughtful and accurate in your responses. It will probably take you about 15 minutes, so please start it when you are sure you have time to complete it.
The survey will be open until March 3, 2010. After that, we will tabulate and analyze the data. We will prepare a report of the findings for the American Psychiatric Association. The results will also be published on Lovefraud.
Go to the survey:
I think the term “Antisocial/Psychopathic Type” is a very good one. Perhaps, by changing it, the public can get more educated on what the disorder really is. I hesitate using the term Psycho/Sociopath as I know from experience that it is very misused, misunderstood and a very bad label which can even backfire on the person using it. Once that term is used, the user is less likely to be taken seriously as it has become such a generic term to describe any type of abnormal behavior or any individual acting outside the expected norms. Changing the name of the disorder can make a great – and positive – difference in the way these individuals are perceived and shed more understanding on the subject.
I look forward to seeing the results of the survey.
Here is some inspiration on the need for education. Read this and fume! http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/02/11/jaycee.dugard.journal/index.html?hpt=C2
At least the prosecutors seem to get it….the defense attorney is letting herself be used as a tool.
I wish they were also considering, besides antisocial/psychopathic type:
Narcissistic/psychopathic type.
I think some who are far along on the psychopathic continuum fit the antisocial criteria well, where others, perhaps because of intelligence or upbringing or social class, fit more the narcissistic personality disorder traits than the antisocial. Compare OJ Simpson (more narcissistic/psychopathic) or the fictional character Thomas Crown to a …I dunno…guy who has been in and out of prison, never held a job for long, cheating widows out of money, always on the wrong side of the law, as well as ruthless and cold and unempathetic.
Maybe they are all antisocial, but some never really break a law. (I realize OJ did and so did Thomas Crown). But I’m thinking of the article Steve wrote on the narcissiopath, and am wondering if this new criteria will encompass those or not.
Glad to see the question on the survey that asks if they fooled the public most of the time!
The P I was involved with was very cunning, and while impulsive in many ways, was smart enough to have learned to really mask his anger and take on false modesty. Cold and calculating can describe some of the types, instead of angry. Though certainly anger is under there, but carefully, carefully hidden unless you are in an intimate relationship and they slip and the masks drops, even if just for a few moments. Like long enough to kill you, judging by the look in their eye!
Wheeeeeeeeee! Isn’t this fun? My S-ex, mother, father, conman brother and ex-boss have all been rated.
I wish the survey had been refined a bit further on the time frames. For example, the questions relating to when the S first exhibited certain behaviors should have a category 1-3 months. I make that comment since so many bloggers have commented on the fact that at month 3 it is like a bell goes off in a cluster-Bs head and their behavior undergoes a change. I also would have like a box to describe certain behavior exhibited by he S. For example, my boss would literally snap a pencil in 2 when you went into her office to discuss some problem. Absolutely nutsy behavior.
neveragain: I agree with your comment. The narcissistic/psychopathic types are a type unto themselves.
Neveragain,
A person can be a N without being a P, and there is a continuim of course, all Ps are Ns but not all Ns are Ps.
While this new DSM V isn’t perfect, it is SOOOO much better than what we had/have in the IV that it is a definite step in the right direction! (IMHO)
I think the new term Anti Social Behavior Disorder sounds too docile for what these people put their victims through. While sociopath has the more extreme sounding definition, I believe it is more accurate.
I think they should use N/P/S/A . . so that there is no confusion that these are narcissists, psychopaths, sociopaths, and anti-social. They are all wrapped in one.
Just as we are women/ladies/females/dames, they are N/P/S/A.
We should not give them any “wiggle” room, and stop quibbling.
N/P/S/A has worked quite well in this forum. We all know what we mean when we say he/she is a “N/P/S/A”!
Great article, Donna. I took the survey using my experiences with my bio father.
I mean, he was the very first psychopathic personality in my life and most definitely has had a decided influence on me not only in my childhood but all the years preceeding.
As I wrote before on here, the dude literally eminated wrongness, evil. I just stayed away from him. I detested, loathed him as a little girl. Still do although he’s dead and gone from the material realm having died in prison. Where he belonged. Good riddance to bad rubbish, wot wot!
I don’t know about you folks, but I consider malignant narcissism to be in the same category as antisocial/psychopathy. Only technicalities separate the two. Their both damn evil exploiters and predators.
The creep I was shortly involved with 3 years ago is someone I would believe to be rather low-medium on the Narcissists’ continuum. No, I wouldn’t define him as evil just incredibly deluded, stingy, selfish and totally immature. A big, stupid adult-baby is what I call him.
But, what do I know. The Holy Bible lists descriptions of evil acts and many of them would apply to how he behaved. And I observed him closely quite often and it’s a fact that he had created a fantasy self in which he never did wrong, was perfect in every way. Can I hear a resounding NOT?!
Anyway, I’m rambling. Great comments also, lovely people. Gives me food for thought constantly. Thank you.
Janie,
The problem with any diagnosis that is not diagnosed by a blood test or an MRI or whatever that is OBJECTIVE is gonna have some problems because “impulsiveness” is SUBJECTIVE, like “how high is UP?” or “how tall does a person have to be to be called TALL?”
Of course there is someone who to me is tall at 6 ft, but others might say that it is 6’2″ or 6’9″ or whatever.
Unfortunately psychological diagnoses are SUBJECTIVE.
Even the law makes a difference in taking someone’s life.
It is not a crime if you are in fear of your own life. Self Defense. But if you plan a killing, and then do it, it is MURDER. One person goes free without any legal problems and the other one (should) go to jail for ever. And, there are degrees in between. There is no differences except motive and intent, someone is STILL DEAD.
In going through some boxes of my P-son’s letter to me, going back to 1990, when he was in prison for robbery, I found all kinds of interesting things, including a newspaper article I had saved about the GENE for risktaking being identified. The last sentence of the article (no paper noted or date) but by Malcolm Ritter says “About 15 percent of people in Israel, Europe and the US carry the novelty-seeking form of the gene. But just why it would encourage novelty-seeking is still a mystery, Ebstein said.”
Of course we know that most P’s have a “novelty-seeking” gene because they cannot STAND BOREDOM and have to mix things up to not be bored, but if 15 % of the people named have this gene, why are they not all Ps?
It also says that “people who are above average in novelty-seeking are impulsive, fickle, excitable, quick tempered, and extravagant while those socring below average tend to be reflective, rigid, loyal stoic, slow to anger and frugal.”
Now if you look at the people HIGH IN THIS NOVELTY-SEEKING GENE, that sound pretty P-ish, doesn’t it?
And if you look at the people in the “below a verage” group, does that sound like VICTIMS or what?
One of the researchers mentioned was Richard Ebstein in Israel, and also a guy named Brian Gladue, Ph.D psychologist at Uni of Cincinnati.
Of course there is some environmental concerns as well, but the genes are definitely there to start with. I hope that one day there will be a TEST that can show a person who is genetically prone toward P-ness, and that there is either a medication or some other treatment that will deflect this when he/she is a child. They have come a long way in treating Bi-Polar and other serious mental illnesses that adversely effect behavior so maybe it will eventually happen.
I’m almost through filing the letters and other documents and about ready to get on with the next step. I have pulled out some of the letters that I perused as I filed and found some “damning” comments in his own hand writing so hopefully, I will succeed in getting him at least another five year set off, and I also flashed on the fact that the preparation I am doing for this parole hearing will also help me in working against him inheriting anything from my mom when the time comes due to “undue influence” he had on her, I do not intend to get this money for myself, but for the charity that is most dear to her heart! So, no one can accuse me of being greedy for myself. I am so alturistic it makes me want to puke sometimes! LOL I can’t wait for the results of this survey I think it will be veryyyyyy interesting!
Hi everyone,
Widiger and Lynam translated the various PDs into the “langage” of the Five Factor Model (the “big five”) personality structure as defined by Costa & McRae (1992). Then they studied (2001) the relationship between prototypical psychopathy (Hare/Cleckley) and other PDs based on the DSM IV.
The facet overlap is as follows : Paranoid : .10 ; Schizoid : -.42 ; Schizotypal -.25 ; Antisocial : .88 ; borderline : .41 ; histrionic : .54 ; Narcissistic : .85 ; Avoidant : -.72 ; Dependent : -.84 ; Obsessive-compulsive : -.36.
A perfect overlap would give a score of 1.00. Negative scores show that there is no overlap.
So there is a strong overlap with Narcissists (.85) and Antisocials (.88), a moderate overlap with Histrionics (the extrovert/attention seeking dimension) and Borderline, and a mild overlap with paranoid individuals (the dog-eat-dog world concept).
I think they are right to reduce the number of personality types.
Anyway, it’s better to think of personality as a pluridimensional continuum.