Now who do I know who sounds like that?

A constant interest in the world of the psychopath seems to characterize C&S (see here and here), possibly due to the fact that this contributor's better half has regular encounters in her professional life with such individuals. Yesterday's New York Times featured an article (see here, here, and here) on whether or not the term 'evil' can be meaningfully applied to the behaviour of some murderers and touched on defining qualities of the psychopath:

"As part of an extensive, in-depth interview, a trained examiner rates the offender on a 20-item personality test. The items include glibness and superficial charm, grandiose self-worth, pathological lying, proneness to boredom and emotional vacuity. The subjects earn zero points if the description is not applicable, two points if it is highly applicable, and one if it is somewhat or sometimes true.

The psychologist who devised the checklist, Dr. Robert Hare, a professor emeritus at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, said that average total scores varied from below five in the general population to the low 20's in prison populations, to a range of 30 to 40 - highly psychopathic - in predatory killers. In a series of studies, criminologists have found that people who score in the high range are two to four times as likely as other prisoners to commit another crime when released. More than 90 percent of the men and a few women at the top of Dr. Stone's hierarchy qualify as psychopaths.

In recent years, neuroscientists have found evidence that psychopathy scores reflect physical differences in brain function. Last April, Canadian and American researchers reported in a brain-imaging study that psychopaths processed certain abstract words - grace, future, power, for example - differently from non-psychopaths.

In addition, preliminary findings from new imaging research have revealed apparent oddities in the way psychopaths mentally process certain photographs, like graphic depictions of accident scenes, said Dr. Kent Kiehl, an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Yale, a lead author on both studies."

Harvey Cleckley's Mask of Sanity uses similar criteria to define psychopaths, and better half says these are classic features (in bold above). Interestingly, there is a class element to this, insofar as well-heeled psychopaths can spend most of their lives undetected and making a decent foot of things, even thriving in their chosen fields, whereas psychopaths from poorer families are more easily identified, often because frustration at the dissonance between the reality of their everyday life and their estimation of their own self-worth can lead to violent acts against those they hold responsible for their circumstances, usually close family.

But then I can think of so many people who fit the bill. I'm pretty glib myself. And only superficially charming.