Could I Be A Psychopath?

We ask Mark E. Olver, researcher on criminal behaviour.

- Courtney Shea

Could someone be a psychopath and have no clue?

Probably not. I think most people on the spectrum of psychopathy know on some level that they’re different from others—they likely realize they don’t have a conscience or feel remorse, and can do bad things and usually still sleep fine at night.

That said, it is possible. In 2013’s The Psychopath Inside, neuroscientist James Fallon writes about how he was looking at brain scans of psychopaths and realized that his own brain had similar patterns of neuro activity. He was shocked, but recalled that, in his youth, he’d been adventurous, reckless and thrill seeking—psychopathic traits that often taper off with age. And he was still good at lying and could talk his way out of tight situations. The difference with Fallon is that he was able to reign in these attributes and channel them prosocially.

How does that positive adaptation happen? Is psychopathy more nurture than nature?