Dr. Robert Hare, who did seminal work in identifying psychopaths, refers to them as “intraspecies predators.” This prompted questions from a Lovefraud reader who asked,
- If psychopaths are indeed natural predators (by implication, their design is part of nature’s plan to maintain some balance) then would we ever be able to weed them out of society?
- Do they have a purpose in the natural order of things?
In this article, I’m going to address the second question. Then, next week, I’ll suggest an answer to the first question.
I don’t know about a purpose, but there are researchers who believe psychopaths are around us today because they survived the natural selection process of human evolution.
These researchers call psychopathy “a nonpathological, reproductively viable, alternate life history strategy.” This theory is outlined in Coercive and Precocious Sexuality as a Fundamental Aspect of Psychopathy, a paper published in 2007 by Grant T. Harris, PhD; Marnie E. Rice, PhD; N. Zoe Hilton, PhD; Martin L. Lalumiere, PhD; and Vernon L. Quinsey, PhD.
Evolution
Let’s talk about the evolution idea first. The authors write that our distant ancestors probably formed stable groups, characterized by cooperation and adherence to rules, which enabled early mankind to survive and flourish. However, some humans survived through cheating and exploiting others—the alternative life strategy.
Grant et. al. write that from childhood, psychopathic personalities are fundamentally different from others, but the differences are not the result of a medical failure or injury. They point out that pregnancy difficulties can be related to schizophrenia and mental retardation, but not psychopathy. “While many adverse medical conditions and injuries lead to antisocial and violent behavior, our selectionist hypothesis suggests that they do not cause psychopathy,” they write.
The early psychopaths—cheaters then as now—put a lot of energy into acquiring sexual partners, and were willing to use deception and coercion to do it. As a result, they produced a lot of offspring. Even if early psychopaths died young because then, as now, they probably engaged in high-risk behavior, their liberal procreation was enough to get the hereditary train rolling.
Sex and criminal behavior
Psychopaths first have sex at a young age, have many partners, and are uncommitted in sexual relationships. Studies show that people who have this approach to sex also are more likely to engage in criminal and violent behavior.
Some people, called life course persistent offenders, Grant et. al. write, “begin aggressive and antisocial conduct at very young ages and persist at rates higher than any other offenders throughout the lifespan.”
People tend to think that their problem is poor social learning, that individuals who break laws against crime and violence also break social norms regarding sex. But research has also shown that delinquency and antisocial behavior are associated with early onset of puberty and sexual activity. Young people don’t learn, or decide, when to mature sexually. So why is there a connection between early onset of puberty and crime?
The study
Grant et. al. believe that “coercive and precocious sexuality” is not a result of the psychopathic personality, but a key to defining it. For the study described in the paper, the researchers predicted “early onset, high frequency and coercive sexuality would be a key, unique and diagnostic feature of psychopathy.”
The researchers studied the case histories of 512 male sex offenders. (Sex offenders were selected because their files generally contain detailed information about their sexual history.) They established the scores of the offenders on the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R). They also looked at the sexual histories of the offenders prior to age 15. A statistical analysis revealed correlations between early and frequent sexual behavior and sexual coercion with general antisocial behavior and elevated PCL-R scores.
“We propose that interpersonal sexual and nonsexual aggression are not best conceived of as the consequence of psychopathic personality traits, but as fundamental aspects of the condition itself,” the authors wrote.
Genetic history
The researchers’ expected that coercive and precocious sexuality were indicators of psychopathy because of their original hypothesis—psychopathy is an alternative life strategy.
“From a theoretical perspective, the present results lend some support to a selectionist hypothesis that psychopathy exists because it has been a heritable and reproductively viable condition during human evolution.”
Psychopaths, in other words, are not physically defective or medically ill. These researchers believe that they are just different, and, because they engaged in a lot of sex, were able to pass on their genes through the millennia.
Read the complete study:
Coercive and Precocious Sexuality as a Fundamental Aspect of Psychopathy
They are what they are
It’s shocking to think that there may be nothing medically wrong with these “intraspecies predators.” But in a way, the idea that psychopaths are pursuing an “alternate life history strategy” dovetails with what we often say here on Lovefraud. Psychopaths are what they are. They are cheaters and exploiters. They take advantage of others because that’s what they do.
Did nature intend this? I don’t know, but they survived.
While researching this story, I came across another paper with an interesting perspective on what to do about it, which I’ll discuss next week.
Yeah we did that too…!
goodnight…….
pollyannanomore says:
“…autistic souls ”“ tell me about your plants ” in the house and outside ””
my house has a garden inside and out. outside we have plants everywhere. vegetables growing everywhere, even some fruit trees.
we loved the house because it was L-shaped and there were glass screen doors everwhere so all rooms except one, (but even that one had a hallway view) look out into the back yard and viewed each other.
in the school room there is one complete wall that is all glass screen door looking out. the adjoing hallway, the living room, dining room, and the master bedroom all of them have huge glass doors with a view to our back yard.
i can look out from the master bedroom glass screen door and see the dolphin, Des and nurse from here. with just plants sheilding the view at times, ferns and more. outside we grow tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, and all kinds of herbs. then there are also buckets of flowers growing all year long. inside we have all sorts of indoor plants that are effective in pulling away pollutants and carbon dioxide and clearn the air in our home.
i never thought i could have plants with my allergies and asthma but now i’m completely surrounded. our inside looks alot like outside. being that everywhere you look outside is seen inside. we have a small three bedroom home but five glass doors that overlook outside and each other.
on all the glass doors there is hanging from crocheted pots ferns that reach nearly to the ground. like Rapunzel her green leafy hair drapped down all over, down to little IKEA shelves where several other plants are perked.
it’s like our little oasis. being surrounded by living things and bringing outside inside is soothing. the office desktop desk alone has seven plants perched on it amidst cd’s and the printer and other office supply.
after a draining day at work i can either sit outside or inside and just refresh and reboot myself. i quit my job but i’ve been called back but i’m taking a week off to reorganize myself and sort out what happened and how to best be able to handle things, if i were to return. so i’m taking a break. i’ve been offered a job elsewhere which in this economy is pretty good with unemployment being what it is. so that feels reassuring.
at night we have year round christmas lights on the beams of the patio which you can see inside or outside. Des and the Dolphin often sit on the floor staring outside. it’s very soothing. i always need to get away from all the noise of everyday stresses. i’m not shutting down or off either, which i often do, i’m interacting socially still, making new friends. this still counts as friendly social interactions. we don’t have to sit and have coffee, or live in the same city to develop positive interactions with each other. the internet has opened a new access of interactions and connections between people.
Mike
What I notice from my relationship with the p is that he was extremely primitive. He looked for all kind of gratification: sex, food, drugs..He was intelligent and used this as a tool to “survive”, and actually his view of “surviving” is very different from us. He saw women as animals, females who could satisfy him but changed partners if that female was not feeding him with what he needed anymore or thought another one would give him more than the present one. I think he had primitive instincts with very developed inteligence. It’s crazy. He lookd like an animal who could think.
Would their sexual impulse be an unconscious way to spread genetic material? From my point of you, this is another feature of them: no impulse control, no limits. I don’t know with you guys, but from my experience, it seems that my ex reacted a lot more sexually than other man I had sexual relationship. His libido seemed to be much higher than “common” men.
icanseeclearlynow says:
I just read your article from January 18th and I completely agree with you.
Overcoming,
Most S/P/N s feel very entitled. That entitlement includes how they interact with people. Like we are possessions that they own rather than “feeling” human beings. This can also often be seen with how they treat their own children. That “ownership”. There isn’t even substance in their relationships with their children.
overcoming – i am not sure about the unconscious impulse – i haven’t looked at this issue deeply. definitely there seems to be an affect of seeing children as nothing more than ‘collateral damage’ from their compulsion to use sex.
Actually when I ask about this “genetic pursue” I am also wondering if this is true. My ex loved sex, but hated the idea of having children. He had one with his ex girlfriend, but didn’t care about her, even moved to another country. When I thought I was pregnant he wanted me to miscarry. So there isn’t a relation here. Once he told me he could control himself because he was seeing me, because before he would have acted “as a dog”. In my opinion he was only trying to gain confidence. He had never stopped acting “like a dog” (having sex with anyone)
overcoming – your description of him as an animal who could think was pretty chilling. but because they CAN speak, they LIE.
it’s amazing how telling they are about who and what they really are in the world, we just have to understand spath speak – the projection on to others and on to themselves, ‘if only i wasn’t with you’.