Psychopathy Flashcards
Psychopathy
personality disorder defined by collection of interpersonal, affective and behavioral characteristics
- including manipulation, lack of remorse/empathy, impulsivity and antisocial behaviors
Hare 1993
psychopaths are “intraspecies predators”
- who charm, manipulate, intimidate, and use violence to use others for own needs
- lack conscience and remorse
- cold blooded
Murphy (1976)
descriptions exist across cultures
Inuit in Alaska
- kulangeta
- individual who repeatedly lies and cheats and steal things, takes sexual advantage of women and doesn’t pay attention to reprimands
Hervey Cleckley (1941)
mask of sanity
- 16 features
- positive (superficial charm and good intelligence, absence of delusions and anxiety)
- emotional interpersonal (lack of remorse, untruthfulness, unresponsive in interpersonal relationships)
- behavioral problems (inadequately motivated antisocial behavior, unreliability, failure to follow life plan)
PCL-R
Hare Psychopathy checklist - Revised
- by Robert Hare at UBC
-20 item rating scale that uses semi-structured interview and file review information
- 3 point scale (0,1,2) (2 applies definitely), scores 0-40
- score of 30 is cutoff
factor 1: interpersonal/affective
- grandiosity, manipulative, superficial charm/ glibness, pathological lying, lack of remorse/guilt, lack of empathy, failure to accept responsibility
factor 2: unstable/antisocial life/socially deviant
-impulsive, irresponsible, stimulation need, poor behavioral control, juvenile delinquency and early behavioral problems
other factors: ex criminal versatility, promiscuous sexual behavior, many short term marital relationships
PCL-R factor correlations
factor 1- related to instrumental violence, emotional processing deficits, dropping out of treatment and poor treatment response
factor 2- strongly related to reoffending, substance abuse, lack of education, poor family background
3 factor model of PCL-R
1- arrogant and deceitful interpersonal style
2- deficient affective experience
3- impulsive and irresponsible behavioral style
PCL:SV
screening version focuses less on criminal behavior good for general public 12 items, 2 parts 1- interpersonal/affective 2- unstable/antisocial
self -report on Psychopathy
advantages:
-measure attributes/emotions not easily observed by –others (low self esteem etc.)
-easy to administer and quick to score, inexpensive
-no concern of interrater reliability
limitations:
- lying/manipulating “duping delight”
- lack of insight
- difficulty reporting emotions never experienced
Psychopathic personality inventory revised - PPI-R
self report psychopathy scale - SRP
Psychopathic personality inventory - revised
a self report measure of psychopathic traits
- 154 item
- 8 content scales and 2 validity scales
- 2 factors; fearless dominance and self centered impulsivity
Self report psychopathy scale
a self report measure of psychopathic traits
- 64 items to assess in community samples
- 4 factors: erratic lifestyle, callous affect, interpersonal manipulation and criminal tendencies
short form - 28 items
duping delight
lying just for the fun of it
Patrick, Fowles, Krueger (2009)
triarchic model of psychopathy
- 3 main components: boldness, meanness, disinhibition
Wheeler, Book and costello, 2009
detecting vulnerable victims
- students with higher SRP scores more accurate at detecting victim vulnerability
Book et al., 2015
faking remorse
- higher story tellers scored on factor 1 traits (PPI-R), more genuine their fake stories were rated by others
Paulhus, Williams, Nathanson, 2002
defrauding a lottery
-students scoring higher on SRP were more likely to try and defraud experimenter and claim they were the true winner
Nathanson, Paulhus and Williams, 2006
cheating on exams
- psychopathic traits measured on SRP were strongest predictors of cheating
antisocial personality disorder
personality disorder characterized by a history of behavior in which the rights of others were violated
- starts in childhood and continues into adulthood
- 3-5% adult general population, 1% psych
-90% of psychopaths also have APD but only 15-20% APD have psychopathy
-50-80% of inmates
constructs are related, high correlation
- 7 symptoms including engaging in criminal behavior, risk taker, failure to be truthful, having little guilt for ones actions
sociopathy
label used to describe a person whose psychopathic traits are assumed due to environmental factors
- first coined by Patridge in 1930 for ppl who refused to adapt to society
Lykken (2006)
sociopaths manifest similar traits to psychopaths but develop these traits as result of poor parenting and other environmental factors, whereas psychopaths are predisposed to a temperament
Zinger and Forth (1998)
reviewed cases in which an expert testified about psychopathy, sociopathy or APD
- psychopathy used in Canadian courts sentencing decisions - to support youth transfer to adult court, contribute to dangerous offender hearings, determine parole eligibility and to asses mental state at time of offense hearings
- psychopathy plays a role in diverse range of criminal cases with majority of testimony regarding psychopathy being associated with increased severity of disposition
- along with Dematteo and Edens, Walsh and walsh, and Viljoen and et al.
Dematteo and edens (2006) and Walsh and Walsh 2006
reviewed cases in which PCL-R was used by expert
- PCLR use is on the rise
- introduced more by prosecution
- most often in sexually violent predator (SVP) cases
Viljoen et al, 2010
reviewed 111 American and Canadian youth offender cases of psychopathy
PCL-R and US courts
used in sexual violent predator evaluations
- death penalty sentencing - aggravating factor
- civil cases of child custody
psychopathy and insanity defense
fulfills disease of mind requirement but not the second of not appreciating the nature or quality of act or knowing that it is wrong
Psychopathy and criminal behaviour
significant predictor for future criminal behavior, particularly violence
- critical risk factor for future violence
- frequency of offending
- twice number of offenders reoffend faster, and start younger - versatility of offending
- criminal diversity/ generalist - nature of offending
- more likely to be violent and instrumental violence - stability of criminality
- persist longer
- high recidivism
- more likely to fail release conditions
sub-criminal psychopaths
no criminal behavior or contact with the CJS
- lawyers, corporate business people - high percentage
Salekin et al (1996)
meta analysis, significant relationship between psychopathy and criminal recidivism
larger relationship between psychopathy and violent recidivism
Hemphill et al (1998)
significant but equal relationship with general and violent recidivism (psychopathy)
Adversarial allegiance
tendency for experts to be biased or drift from objective findings to ratings that support the party that hired them
- scores from expert hired by prosecution are higher than those hired by defense
- with workshops on how to complete PCLR scores more accurate
Dematteo et al, 2014
defense experts reported PCL-R scores on average 7 points lower than prosecution experts
Murrie et al., 2013
showed adversarial allegiance in lab like setting
Hare (2016)
adversarial allegiance may be related to lack of training, improper use of PCLR, or “hired gun”
hired gun effect
an expert who adapts their assessment to the side that hired them ( adversarial allegiance possible explanation)
PCL-R and aboriginal offenders
moderately predictive of reoffending in both ethnic groups
- aboriginal offenders score around 3 points higher
Hart (1998)
“The two are so intimately connected that a full understanding of violence is impossible without consideration of the role played by psychopathy”
instrumental violence
perused with a clearly defined goal or is planned
- ex murdering spouse to collect insurance money
- more likely to victimize strangers
Reactive violence
perpetrated out of emotion
- ex in fit of rage
- non-psychopaths use this most