Correlation Between First And Secondary Psychopathy And Cognitive Empathy Essay

When asked what to define a Psychopath people will often respond with descriptions such as “remorseless”or “lacking in empathy”. However due to the results of studies from the past 20 years there may now be reason to believe that this is not always true. This study investigates the relationship between Primary and Secondary Psychopathy and Cognitive Empathy.

Eiseberg (1995) examined the structure of sociopathy and found that the role that emotions play in the psychopathic mind is problematic and complex. In his evaluations, Eisenberg established that the study in sociopathy an understanding into the roles of anxiety, love, and sympathy, or lack thereof, as factors contributing to psychopathy. In his findings, Eiseberg (1995) suggested that low anxiety, neuroticism, and absence of love and empathy characterize emotional traits leading to psychopathy. However, the unanswered question that remains from this research is how such emotions are triggered to begin with.

There are two types of psychopathy the first one is known as primary psychopathy which is caused by ones biology. Primary psychopathy characteristics are negative emotions, particular anxiety and instrumental or predatory antisocial behavior. The second form of psychopathy gives us the characteristics of severe trauma exposure which indicates antisocial behavior.

the results calculated from the Levenson Self Report Psychopathy scale studying specifically Primary and Secondary Psychopathy (reference) , and “The Theory of the eyes mind reading test” (reference) among non-psychopathic / sub/non clinical individuals. Primary Psychopathy is the term to describe individuals who do not possess empathy, are detached from all morality, believe they are of higher importance or significance than other people, and are willing to go to great lengths to pursue their own needs, even if it means hurting others. (Reference) Secondary Psychopathy is the less extreme version of primary psychopathy, sufferers (is that a word?) do have the ability to emit empathy in situations, but would still commit crimes, it is just that unlike primary psychopaths, they contain the capacity to ‘emotionally breakdown.’ The Levenson Self Report Scale of (Primary and Secondary??) Psychopathy (Reference) measures an individuals capacity for empathy, (is it?) through the test conducted by … Levenson (Reference)

The Oxford English dictionary defines a sociopath as,“A person with a personality disorder manifesting itself in extreme antisocial attitudes and behaviour.” There is another well known word that people might use to describe someone bearing these characteristics; psychopath.While some may be inclined to use the terms interchangeably, expert Dr. Scott Bonn, professor of sociology and criminology at Drew University, would be more careful. He contends that there are a variety of differences between the two, but perhaps most important here is the way they come to be. Psychopathy is related to a physiological defect that results in the underdevelopment of the part of the brain responsible for impulse control and emotions. Sociopathy, on the other hand, is more likely the product of childhood trauma and physical/emotional abuse. Because sociopathy appears to be learned rather than innate, sociopaths are capable of empathy in certain limited circumstances but not in others, and with a few individuals but not

The point of this investigation was to determine if there is a relationship between the two subtypes of psychopathy and cognitive empathy. A correlation design was employed, in which Levenson, Kiehl and Fitzpatrick’s (1994) Levenson Self-Report Psychopathy Scale and Baron-Cohel, et al’s (2002) Reading the Mind in the Eyes tests were given to 452 Victoria University Psychology students. Calculations were made, and resulted in the results to being a significant, negative correlation between primary psychopathy and cognitive empathy, but no significant correlation between secondary psychopathy and cognitive empathy. This concludes that not all psychopathy is correlated with cognitive empathy, but there is a relationship.

As there have been ongoing studies, which go on to, suggest that there are two distinct subtypes of psychopaths. According to a study (Vassileva, Kosson, Abramowitz, & Conrod, 2005),” identified four subgroups of offenders, including primary and secondary psychopaths”. As there have been many psychopaths which help to predict both violent and non-violent recidivism and in many cases it was due to a lack of treatment. The primary subtype of psychopathy is based on personality and emotions. Primary psychopaths exhibit traits consistent with Cleckley’s (1976) “conceptualization of the psychopath, such as lack of remorse, lack of empathy, and shallow emotions”(p. 954). Secondary subtype of psychopathy is based on their behavior and lifestyle. “Secondary psychopaths are reportedly characterized by greater anxiety and negative affectivity, a higher level of substance abuse, and lower scores on PCL-R Factor 1 than primary psychopaths”(Blackburn, 1998). This, in psychopath results in behaviors such as impulsive, irresponsible, aggressive and life of

The term psychopathy is described as a ‘disorder characterized by callousness’ (Richell et al, 2003) and is more of a personality trait than a stereotype. Within the term psychopathy, there are different subtypes that divide both a primary and secondary psychopath. A primary psychopath is characterized by traits such as lack of remorse and manipulative. Secondary psychopaths are ‘also associated with social anxiety and low self esteem’ (Ali, 2010), known to be more emotional.

Empathy is defined as the ability to share another’s emotional state or context (Eisenberg and Strayer, 1987). This construct has been found to increase prosocial behavior and reduce aggression in children and adolescence (Eisenberg and Miller, 1987). A growing body of research exists in the field of empathy development, but relatively less studies have been done which focusses on individuals with a history of antisocial behavior and aggressive conduct. Earlier researches on empathy and antisocial behavior in offender populations (e.g., Aleksic, 1976; Ellis, 1982; Rotenberg, 1974) often differed in the operational definitions of empathy, with emphasizing on cognitive components and others on affective

controls (Richell, et al. 2003). However from here each of the two subtypes of psychopathy

Within the reviewed article, Blair (2013) explains, in depth, the two leading cognitive problems seen in youths with psychopathic traits. The two main issues being: the inability to have empathetic feelings for another and the inability to make certain decision throughout life. The author expands with empathy by distinguishing the difference between cognitive and emotional empathy. He goes further to analyze emotional empathy because the damage is seen here, as opposed to cognitive empathy. The driving factor with psychopathic diagnoses is a lack of emotion. This is also found in that of decision making and learning, which the author takes time to break down and decipher the implications from types of decisions made. Associated brain regions and pathways are explained within the article with each issue analyzed. Nature and nurture can both be contributing factors to these traits forming in youths; therefore the author explores how each can play a role. Lastly, current treatments for patients are discussed, as well as future directions that may be taken for possible cures.

Raine, Lee, Yang, and Colletti (2010) investigated whether individuals with a particular neurodevelopmental marker would have greater levels of psychopathy and antisocial personality disorder than controls. There are numerous hypothesis of the origin of psychopathy and antisocial personality including neurodevelopmental, genetic, brain injury, and impaired bonding, to name a few. This novel study sought to provide support for the hypothesis that antisocial personality disorder and psychopathy has a neurodevelopmental basis.

Throughout our study we investigated the relationship between secondary and primary psychopathy and cognitive empathy. Psychopathy is a mental disorder which can cause an individual to have behavior seen not normal to society. It causes the individual to be antisocial towards others, and they can become egocentric (Richell, Mitchell, Newman, Leonard, Baron-Cohen, & Blair, 2003). Primary psychopathy and secondary psychopathy both show the traits of being impulsive, angry and very antagonistic however secondary psychopathy also shows the individual to have social anxiety, doubt themselves and to have swings in their emotions often which is unseen in primary psychopaths (Ali & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2010). Cognitive empathy is someone’s ability to be able to relate to another individuals emotions and their mental state (Ali & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2010). Cognitive empathy and psychopathy are related as someone who is a psychopath has few emotions and therefore will not show empathy, we are investigating to what extent psychopaths show a lack of cognitive empathy. We are conducting this experiment to see if our results are similar or different to previous studies. Previous

This study investigated the association between psychopathy (primary and secondary) and cognitive empathy among 452 first-year psychology university students. A correlational design was used where the Reading the Mind in the Eyes test (Baron-Cohen, 2001, cited in Richell et. al., 2003) and the Self-Report Psychopathy Scales (Levenson et. al. 1995) were delivered online to each participant individually. Raw responses were totalled to achieve a total score for each predictor variable where means and standard deviations were then calculated. We found Primary psychopathy was negatively correlated with cognitive empathy whereas we found no significant correlation between secondary psychopathy and cognitive empathy.

In psychological science and in everyday life, empathy can be a powerful tool for increasing prosocial behavior in humans. Several studies have pointed towards increased empathy leading to increased positive attitudes, prosocial behavior, self esteem, helping behaviors, and decreased aggression (Pinzone-Glover, Gidycz, & Jacobs, 1998; Pacala, Boult, Bland, & O’Brien, 1995; Feshbach, 1989, all as cited in Stephan & Finlay, 1999). Even in the absence of empathy, negative behaviors arise. Stephan and Finlay discuss several studies which indicate that a lack of empathy in individuals can lead to these negative behaviors, especially among males, such as general and sexual aggression (Lisak & Ivan, 1995; Feshbach & Feshbach, 1969; both as cited in Stephan & Finlay, 1999). One study by Letourneau (and cited in Stephan & Finlay, 1999), discusses how decreased empathetic responses in parents can lead to greater instances of child abuse. Letourneau found that when comparing populations of abusive mothers versus non-abusive mothers, a lack of empathy rather than increased stress can indicate a greater propensity for mistreating one’s kid, because the child is a dependent individual (Letourneau, 1981).