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:
Frank Lee Speaking
I also am perfectly happy with the term “Sociopath”. The issue is that they need to De-Serial Killer the term.
Genevieve79
Frank Lee Speaking says:
“Excellent. Finally they ask the victims for their input. Delighted to see this real step forward”
_____________
Absolutely, I actually found it very healing. For me it’s not just an opportunity to contribute to helping deal with these people, I also felt a feeling of ‘answering back’ like finally it’s our turn to score their behaviour on a psychiatry scale and expose them to the profession, even if it was anonymously.
It was healing on that sort of weird level lol! Not revenge, just balancing the scale….our turn now…. =) xx
Genevieve79
“Frank Lee Speaking says:
I also am perfectly happy with the term “Sociopath”. The issue is that they need to De-Serial Killer the term.”
__________
Yep I agree that would be the best way forward ultimately. The way things stand at the moment give me Antisocial but definitely they need to be working towards demystifying the term Sociopath and having people wake up and realise that there are more of them around than they think. Definitely xx
Genevieve79
“Sarah999 says:
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”! ”
___________
Actually yeah I think that is a cool idea too – NPSA. I can totally see that working on diagnoses sheets etc. Maybe they should put them all together in one category.
Some great ideas on here! =D xx
one/joy_step_at_a_time
NPSA on a diagnostic sheet, with room to highlight to the letter related to the MOST exhibited traits.
I do like ‘cluster b’ though – ’cause it speaks to *Behavior*, delineates behavior, and doesn’t shoot out a term people THINK they understand the meaning of.
i tried to slip ‘sociopath ‘ casually into a conversation the other day. i was in a social situaion with a group of people and thought i’d take the opportunity.
was a bit of a party killer. 🙂
vm0209
Dear ‘Duped’…thank you for that statement…YES! I’ve never been with anyone that incites me or frustrates me as much as my husband and yet he blames me for my reactions.
Frank Lee – I would say my husband is a score of 22 out of the 33 you’ve listed.
I think that someone else mentioned ‘evil’…when he’s angry or stressed or on edge…his eyes change and I tell him he’s in ‘evil-name’ mode. His kids describe him as the Hulk when they were growing up. He blamed them for becoming that mean.
He’s on the extreme end of narcicisstic and manipulative. A pathological liar.
I just want out, but he’s got me right where he wants me. I feel trapped.
vm0209
Actually ‘Duped’…we may be talking about the same person??
My husband has convinced our family, friends and his co-workers that he’s Mr. Wonderful so that if I were to mention anything negative about things in our life (such as moving 5 x’s in 3 years or bankruptcy), they all look at me like “what possibly could be your problem with Mr. Wonderful?”
I’m drained.
johnsully44
I don’t like the parameters of this survey. I think that, although a relatively small proportion of psychopaths are NPD’s, virtually all NPD’s are psychopaths. After all, it is not much of a leap from “no empathy” to “no conscience”.
NPD/psychopaths are vastly different from non-NPD psychopaths. In fact, I think that it is Narcissistic Personality Disorder that keeps many psychopaths sub-criminal. However, more “evil” resides in NPD/psychopaths. These are really nasty creatures.
kim frederick
John, I have to disagree. I think it’s the other way around…all P’s are N’s, but not all N’s are P’s, with criminality on the high end of the scale….:)
Thanks for your input, however, and I hope you’ll post again.
slimjim
I think neither sociopath nor psychopath or anti-social disorder really captures it. The first two are too often misunderstood to mean serial killer and the last one conjures up images of someone who is an introvert… which there are plenty of introverts who do not come even close to being a sociopath.
I’d say “con” or “parasite” or “user” or “criminal mind” is closer to an accurate description… yet those sound too “angry at my high school boyfriend for cheating on me” childish kind of words.
Maybe something like “non-empathy” or “habitual taker” or “bait and switch artist”.
Basically I think 2 concepts should be incorporated into the word. 1.) that it is systematic and a mind-set and goal the same no matter who the relationship target is 2.) that the person uses deceit to take without any concern for the well being of the host