Psychiatrist Debunks The Biggest Psychopath Myths on Reddit

About 20 to 40% of violent crimes

are suspected to be done by psychopaths.

How can you tell if someone is a psychopath?

Psychopathic CEOs?

Psychopaths on screen?

Are psychopaths always dangerous?

There's a lot of chatter and confusion about this topic.

I'm a psychiatrist and a psychotherapist.

Let's take a deep dive

and set the record straight on psychopathy.

[keyboard key taps]

Let's start with the big question.

From the AskPsychology subreddit,

What the hell is psychopathy?

Psychopathy is actually not a diagnosis.

It's a collection of personality traits.

A psychopath is someone who lacks remorse.

They're callous.

They might lie pathologically.

Let's take a look at what people are saying.

Here's one of the most upvoted comments.

moss42069 says, I don't think psychopathy

is a very useful term,

but ASPD is a real mental disorder.

What moss42069 touches upon here is true.

Psychopathy is not in the DSM-5,

which is a diagnostic and statistical manual

of mental illness.

The closest we get

is a diagnosis called antisocial personality disorder.

It's a personality disorder in which someone

is often breaking rules, breaking societal laws.

There's the lack of concern for safety,

both for oneself and for other people.

Not everybody who has antisocial personality disorder

is a psychopath,

but most people who are psychopaths do meet criteria

for antisocial personality disorder.

Over on Explain Like I'm Five, [audio chirping]

Additional-Relief385 asks,

Are psychopaths always dangerous?

I never really met a psychopath myself,

but I always wonder if they're really that dangerous

as portrayed in movies and TV shows.

Psychopaths are not always dangerous.

There's an association with violence,

but that doesn't mean that they absolutely will be.

But you're right, they almost always are portrayed

that way in film and TV.

One Redditor asks on the HORROR subreddit,

In your opinion, what is the most realistic portrayal

of a psychopath you've seen in film?

A lot of the anti-heroes in our recent TV shows,

like Mad Men, even Don Draper,

might meet some psychopathic traits

that are personality traits.

When you consider the personality traits,

you think about someone who might feel

like they're a little bit superficial,

but they have a charm to them.

There's a lack of remorse, a lack of responsibility.

They might feel like they're a little bit grandiose

in terms of their self-worth.

Tony Soprano might be somebody

who's got psychopathic traits,

both in the personality side and in the behavioral side.

On the behavioral side, we think about antisocial behavior.

Has there been a history of juvenile delinquency?

Is there trouble with the law?

Is there criminal versatility,

meaning there are a lot of different acts

throughout different criminal realms?

One of the best depictions in film

was Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men.

He was cold, he was calculating,

he moved forward in life doing what he needed to do,

and he had no empathy for anyone.

And his haircut didn't help.

Another great depiction was Amy Dunne from Gone Girl.

What's interesting about female psychopaths,

the research and the literature suggests

that they're not necessarily as violent as male psychopaths.

Maybe they use non-aggressional means

in relationships to manipulate people.

She did a lot of things though that were violent.

She also showed a lack of empathy.

She didn't care about framing her boyfriend,

didn't care about the impact on her husband.

She had this way to charm everyone.

One of the traps that Gone Girl fell into a little bit

is that Hollywood trope of the evil genius psychopath.

We see psychopaths so smart,

that everything is perfectly done.

Now, I'm sure there's some people like that,

and maybe Amy Dunne is an example of that,

but for the most part,

psychopaths with their overconfidence

will end up getting caught in some way.

Walter White is a good example of someone

who I see as a sociopath,

and we'll get into the difference between a sociopath

and a psychopath in a little bit.

Let's hop over to the TooAfraidToAsk subreddit

for another series of questions here.

kawaiihusbando says, Why psychopaths sometimes

just called psycho?

Sociopaths are never just called socio.

I don't particularly like the term psycho.

I don't use it.

It can refer to different things,

but never in a nice way.

Psycho can refer to psychotic, [keyboard tapping]

which means that someone is having a break from reality.

They're actually hearing voices or maybe seeing things.

They're having delusions.

They might really feel like people are out to get them.

There's a paranoia.

There might be this idea that people are persecuting them.

The voices that they hear

can be very, very scary and demeaning.

Very rarely do those individuals

actually kill for psychotic reasons.

In fact, the data shows you're more likely to be hurt

or taken advantage of as someone with mental illness

than you are to be violent toward other people.

Someone who's psychotic is not the same

as someone who's psychopathic.

I use the classic example of Joker from Dark Knight.

That is a psychopath,

someone who's calculated, uncaring,

lacks empathy, lacks remorse.

He was not psychotic having a break from reality,

hearing things, seeing things, delusional, paranoid,

and he didn't belong in a forensic hospital,

where his mental illness would be treated.

So, I don't like the term psycho

'cause it's not clear what you're referring to.

Let's go back to our original question.

What are the signs that someone might be a psychopath?

A top-voted comment is from travishingrabbit,

Pathological liars.

Learned that the hard way.

Yes, pathological lying might be a sign

that someone is a psychopath, but remember,

psychopathy is a collection of personality traits.

If someone is simply pathologically lying,

but they lack other traits,

they're not necessarily a psychopath.

Let's speak of the comment [audio chirping]

Redditors deem most controversial.

Eiffel-Tower-777 says, MAGA merch.

I'm not touching that one.

AaronKClark suggests that psychopaths catch animals

and dissect them to see how they work.

Okay, so this is an old idea.

In the 1960s, a forensic psychiatrist named J. M. MacDonald

came up with his triad. [audio chirping]

People who had a history of bedwetting,

firesetting, and cruelty to animals

were more likely to have homicidal tendencies or behaviors.

There's no evidence that suggests

that with these three things in someone's history,

they're more likely going to be homicidal.

If someone actually over age 10 is being cruel to animals,

there's a two to three times more likelihood

that that person is being abused.

And when animal cruelty shows up,

about a quarter of those individuals

might have conduct disorder.

It's telling you something is disturbed somewhere

in this person's environment.

When you see something like firesetting,

you need to consider are they seeking stimulation

in some way because they actually have

an attention deficit disorder?

When you evaluate bedwetting, that can be a sign of trauma.

It can be a sign of abuse.

It can be a sign of a biological issue.

Certainly, there can be some people who do these things

that become psychopathic or that turn out psychopathic,

but this is not a predictor.

This comment from GalFisk [audio chirping]

actually provides an important insight.

There's this story about a doctor

who looked at a brain scan and explained that this person

would be a dangerous psychopath,

only to learn that it was his own brain scan.

The doctor that this commenter is referring to,

he was a neuroscientist who wrote a book

about his brain scan, in fact,

matching the brain scans of psychopaths.

He was not violent, but he talked

about how he recognized some psychopathic traits in himself.

That neuroscientist looking at imaging of his own brain

and those of psychopaths did see some differences

in structures and functioning in certain brain areas.

There are areas that are cortical,

meaning it's in the cortex, [audio chirps]

the top of the brain that are different,

and then some that are subcortical, lower in the brain.

In the brains of people who have psychopathy,

the prefrontal cortex and the insula,

different parts of the brain. [audio chirps]

The prefrontal cortex is up here,

above your right eye socket,

and then the insula, [audio chirps]

which is kinda inside the brain,

but still on the outer edge of it,

those are the cortical areas that are different.

The subcortical areas

include the amygdala, [audio chirps]

which is where you process emotion,

and also the ventral striatum, [audio chirps]

another area where you understand rewards.

When these things are different,

it seems as if people don't necessarily feel the reward

you would for pro-social behavior.

Again, just because you have these differences,

it doesn't mean you're going to be a psychopath

or act in a violent way,

as this doctor has shown us.

Let's go down deeper into this Reddit hole.

First, I wanna debunk the comment here.

Top comment with 221 votes from GroundhogDayLife,

They get pleasure from watching others suffer.

I really [beep] hate that trait in someone, a sadist.

Not all psychopaths are sadists.

Sadists get pleasure from watching other people suffer,

but most psychopaths just are indifferent

toward the suffering that they cause other people.

Many people feel a real goodness

when they have helped other people.

There's that reward for being pro-social.

In psychopathic brains,

oftentimes, people don't get that same reward.

Some actually get a reward from doing something

that does cause someone else some suffering.

Let's move over to the SerialKillers subreddit.

Why not?

Do serial killers without psychopathy exist?

That's a good question.

They do tend to have some psychopathy,

but there are different types of serial killers.

Some of them have some psychotic beliefs.

They actually believe that they might need

to kill someone for a reason.

They need to do this because this is going to save humanity.

One example historically that comes to mind

is the serial killer David Berkowitz,

or the Son of Sam Killer in the 1970s in New York.

At the time of his trial,

his defense team was saying that he was psychotic

and he had these stories as to why he killed.

That is a plea that occurs in less than 1% of legal cases.

David Berkowitz pled guilty and later, in fact,

he admitted that the story he made up

was, in fact, something he made up.

Some serial killers might enjoy the power dynamic,

being able to control someone else.

Going from historic records,

it's believed that Ted Bundy

was, in fact, very psychopathic.

He would in fact pretend at the side of the road

that he would have an injury,

he would lure young women to try to help him,

and then he would capture them

and he would end up killing them.

Most serial killers,

when the research has been done on them,

they are psychopaths,

but the overwhelming majority of people

who do have psychopathy,

they are not serial killers.

If psychopaths are typically not violent,

how do they function in society?

Well, this thread might help paint a good picture here.

mayowithchips asks, Is the cliche

of psychopathic CEOs accurate?

In fact, this is more of a cliche than a reality,

although I'm sure most people out there are saying,

Nope, there are plenty of psychopaths where I work.

When you look at the leadership qualities of people,

the one that overlaps most with psychopathy

is this idea of fearless leadership

or fearless dominance even,

that idea that someone has less anxiety than others,

that they're gonna push forward.

When you pair that idea of fearless dominance

and moving up the ladder with maybe more

of the behavioral traits that are psychopathic,

that can cause havoc in the workplace.

Sometimes, I even see patients who have come to me

because situations at work are this awful.

In other words, true psychopathy in the workplace

is not good leadership.

Is there a test [keyboard keys tapping]

to look at psychopathic traits?

There is a test, and this thread

allows us to start looking at it.

Professional_Push147 says,

Has anyone taken Robert Hare psychopathy test?

Apparently, I'm 35% more psychopathic

than the general population, though not a psychopath.

So, the PCL-R, or the Psychopathy Checklist,

there are 20 questions on this checklist,

which is used in clinical, forensic, and research settings,

meaning it's not meant for you to take by yourself.

It's not a self-administered test.

The 20 questions are each valued at zero to two points.

If your total at the end is 30 or more in North America,

we say that pretty much says someone's psychopathic.

In Europe, it's 25 or higher.

Psychopathy affects roughly 1% of the adult population

when you take the PCL-R results

and look at it that way.

PCL-R was also mostly developed on males, not females,

so there are some nuances in whether or not

this is actually the accurate number.

There's another Redditor who took the test

and reported their results.

You are 78.13% sociopathic, 72.73% impulsive,

which makes you 50.56% more psychopathic

than the population average.

IDK, what to think.

If you had this done in a forensic or clinical setting,

maybe you'd be concerned if you administer this yourself.

These results are not gonna tell you

something about yourself.

One very interesting part of this

is the way the person uses the word sociopathic.

We should talk about the difference

between sociopath and psychopath.

Let's jump over to the Ask subreddit.

monklovebanana asks, What's the difference

between a sociopath and a psychopath?

Sociopathy and psychopathy

have different meanings originally.

The idea of psychopathy, someone is innately this way.

They're born this way.

Sociopathy implies that society or the environment

has actually created in someone this psychopathic tendency.

Let's go down deeper [audio chirping]

into this Reddit hole.

These two commenters seem to be at odds.

MintFootspace says, Psychopath is sick

in the psycho, the mind.

Sociopath is sick in the social interaction part.

And the response from Majestic-Love-9312,

And completely wrong.

Psychopaths are born

as they're born without the capacity for empathy.

Sociopaths are made through childhood trauma,

abuse, et cetera.

I side a little bit more here with Majestic-Love-9312

for an upvote. [upvote button chimes]

The idea was that sociopathy was created by society,

meaning that psychopathic traits

were kinda developed or nurtured in this individual.

A psychopath, the idea is that

they were innately born this way.

There are some nuances to it as well.

Psychopaths reportedly are very calculating.

They've planned things.

Sociopaths might be more spontaneous in their actions.

They might be more disorganized.

Sociopaths might actually have the ability

to show some empathy at some point,

whereas psychopaths tend not to.

Walter White, I mentioned earlier, as an example

of someone who's a sociopath on TV

and depicted well in that form,

he starts out as this mild-mannered teacher,

and then becomes this way.

He develops this whole meth lab and meth empire.

Same time you might argue, Well, wait a minute.

Maybe he had this innately in him,

and something revealed it.

Yes, that is possible, and this is one reason

that sociopath and psychopath are used interchangeably

because we're saying,

Are there really these distinctions?

Now, let's jump over to NoStupidQuestions,

where one Reddit user asks,

Does a psychopath know they are one?

I understand that narcissists

don't recognize that trait in themselves,

but what about psychopaths?

Are they oblivious?

There's a lot in this Reddit post.

Narcissistic personality disorder

is another personality disorder.

In narcissism, someone might have a grandiose sense

of self-importance.

They might demand respect from lots of people.

They also might lack remorse.

In the more extreme cases,

that's heading and trending towards psychopathy,

but not all narcissists are this way.

Narcissism is a spectrum.

Let's take a look at one [audio chirping]

of the most downvoted comments in the thread.

One Reddit user posts,

Will keep you posted.

Working on that right now with my psychiatrist, LOL.

Narcissists and psychopaths both know what they're doing.

They choose to be asshole that they are.

Narcissists don't necessarily

recognize the traits in themselves.

Some people who are narcissists are incredibly vulnerable.

They actually call it vulnerable narcissism,

and there is a sadness inside

or a feeling of not being good.

Anytime someone pushes the buttons of a narcissist

in a way that makes that sadness

or that lack of confidence come up,

they really get upset,

and you might feel a narcissistic wrath

or they might feel their ego is bruised,

and they do things that make other people uncomfortable.

It's actually incredibly sad when you think about it

that someone would feel that badly about themselves.

A psychopath might not have an understanding

of what's going on inside of them,

but it's really more about the indifference

that they don't care about how it affects other people.

In one research study, psychopaths rated themselves

and other people rated their behaviors,

and they pretty much matched.

In another research study,

psychopaths actually rated their own behaviors

and rated them higher than other people thought.

There are psychopaths who recognize,

The way I function is different than other people,

and they learn what is acceptable and what is not acceptable

and they can follow those guidelines,

but that doesn't mean that they've learned empathy

or that they have learned how to care for other people.

Some make the argument that evolutionarily,

psychopaths exist in our culture

because it allows us to be on our toes.

It allows us to thrive

because we're aware of our environment

and how someone might take advantage of us.

So, is it Darwinism at work?

That's up to you.

That's enough Reddit for me today.

Thanks for joining me down the rabbit hole.

[enigmatic ambient music]