Are Psychopaths Born, or Made?

It turns out it’s a combination of both

Photo by Natasha Connell on Unsplash

I wish I weren’t personally interested in this question. I wish I’d never heard the term psychopath. I wish I didn’t know the things I know. I wish that certain images from my past didn’t occasionally percolate through my busy brain to linger there, raising dark questions about one of my family members. But wishing doesn’t make it so.

Forbes defines a psychopath this way:

A psychopath typically is a person who is callous, manifests antisocial behaviors, does not see other people as human beings, manipulates them, betrays them, uses them and has total disregard of the law.

Psychopathy isn’t an official a part of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), yet it’s considered to be a personality disorder marked by several hallmark features. As reported to Forbes,

A psychopath typically is a person who is callous, manifests antisocial behaviors, does not see other people as human beings, manipulates them, betrays them, uses them and has total disregard of the law. And at the same time, [they] are perceived by people as charming and affable, easygoing and loveable,” says Igor Galynker, M.D., a professor of psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York and associate chairman for research in the department of psychiatry at Mount Sinai Beth Israel.

Psychopaths can be further divided into two categories based on their impulsivity, says Dr. Galynker. “You can roughly divide psychopaths into impulsive and deliberate. Deliberate psychopaths have control over their behavior, and they quite often can be very successful…Impulsive psychopaths are less successful and do things that could endanger them on the road to success.

Individuals can be assessed for psychopathic tendencies using the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R). Made up of 20 items, each rated from 0 to 2, regarding an individual’s tendencies toward “emotional detachment and antisocial behavior.”

Broadly, Psychopathy, or Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD), falls under the umbrella of personality disorders, which also include histrionic personality disorder (HPD, narcissistic personality disorder (NPD, and borderline…