Psychopathy

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So I am not an expert, read half a book and went to 2 conferences about AS. I hang out at the local food bank with some of the volunteers there (I volunteer as well but today was not my day) and they were talking about Psychopaths of all things. I told them I did not know much about them except it sounds like someone who commits alot of crimes. They said it is someone who masks their true feelings, manipulates, lacks empathy and intimidates. All but intimidate stuck to me and I said, "that is me, and that sounds like alot of people with AS." So I hop on good ol' wiki and search psychopathy and under it says "autistic psychopathy" I click and I'm directed to Asperger's Syndrome.

So when you all say, "the NT's are trying to correct us and abolish this syndrome!" Is that why?!

I'm a little shocked about this so be nice please.

Pretty sure "autistic psychopathy" was only the early term used for AS before it was better understood. A genuine psychopath would be almost entirely superficial; and while people with AS can, and do, from time to time "put on a face", they do it (in most cases) for genuine comunication.

Autistic Psychopathy translates to Autistic Personality Disorder (for the most part).

Psychopathy has a lack of guilt and remorse; these are usually intact in people with an ASD. Also, the deficits in empathy are a little different between the two: ASD is more naivety of others and their feelings, but when they know them they usually respond in a caring way, whereas Psychopathy is a lack of care for their feelings even when they know them.

I don't think manipulation and intimidation apply to AS at all. We typically don't lie well enough to manipulate much and if we were intimidating we wouldn't get bullied and manipulated so often.

I think the term psycopathy is (especially in this case) mitigated by the qualifying term (Autistic) that precedes it.

Psychopaths are EVIL. Avoid them as soon as you find them out.

They are so evil that they will do everything in their power to destroy you
as soon as they realize that you found them out. They will not only victimize
people but set them up or accuse them of serious things and even "prove"
their big lies. They will even threaten you and tell you their plan to destroy
you and then turn to the authorities crying about awful things you haven't
done to them. They have friends in very high places too.

I recognized this (was threatened) by a successful electrician and it scared
myself and my friend and we had to file restraining orders and stuff, get a
lawyer, just because this guy threatened me that way while estimating a job
for my friend, and it happened within an hour. He was the only psychopath
I certainly ever met. I must have met them before and learned how to avoid
them, because I wouldn't have encountered this guy unless my friend tried
to hire him, without the benefit of my sense of danger. The electrician had
no idea who I was but I was smarter than he was about electricity and he
threatened to harm my friend or myself (to me) "if he didn't get hired to do
the work".

Psychopaths will thus tell one thing to one person and another thing to
another, to divide them due to each others disbelief in what was told to
the other person. In this particular case, probably since I have very close
friendships, this tactic didn't work for the psychopath and neither of us
had any doubt that he was the biggest troublemaker we had ever met.

They are behind every conspiracy that is easily dismissable as "conspiracy theory".
That is how evil they are.
Yes, beyond all shadow of a doubt, I say 9/11 was the work of a Psychopath.

^^^ I THINK I WAS TALKING ABOUT "SOCIOPATHS" OR "SOCIAL PSYCHOPATHS".
I think that may clarify things if there are other kinds that aren't so EVIL.

Masks their true feelings:
Autists are more likely to have difficulty expressing their feelings, and thus come off as having no / little emotions. A psychopath would act like they love someone, just to get close enough to hurt them.

Manipulates:
I don't see AS being good at this at all. You need to use body language, predict their reactions etc, all of which we suck at.

Lacks empathy:
At least for me, that's more of a not knowing how to express it / not getting why it's a big deal, since I have different values. I do care if I can identify with them. A psychopath would know and still not care.

Intimidates:
What Willard said.

I not sure i have ever known anybody who was one but i do believe that sociopathic traits lie in a spectrum in a similair fashion to autism. there are plenty of manipulative people who are not sociopaths that can be just as dangerous.

Supposedly some sociopaths do actually recognise their failings and do want to do good. obviously this would be hard for them. From what i understand about sociopathy it often stems from childhood and poor parenting. In my opinion i would say sociopaths etc. are best avoided unless you know how to deal with them. It is unfortunate because these people are not evil and i'm sure it is not an easy existence.

The other end of the stick is when someone assumes you are a sociopath etc. aspies are often accused of being sociopaths etc. whether the accuser knows the real definition or not i do not know.
Imagine being called that when you are already confused about yourself. really not helpful to label people like that whether it is true or not.

Thanks for assuring me that this is not in AS traits, I appreciate all your posts.

psychopathy is not recognised by the DSM IV or the ICD 10. There is a criteria for it, but usually, the individual concerned has to meet the criteria for antisocial personality disorder first.

I know at least one 'professional' who does believe that some people with aspergers are 'autistic psychopaths'. but as far as I know, there is no real basis for overlap.

People with autism do not recognise what other people are saying nonverbally. Psychopaths do, and use this knowledge to their advantage.

Historically speaking, "psychopathy" just meant a personality disorder of some kind - literally "soul illness" in Greek. It was a generic term for any mental illness, other than conditions with an obvious physical cause (like brain damage). My "Shorter Oxford Dictionary", which tends to be rather old-fashioned, does not even list any other meaning.

In more recent English, we use the term "psychopath" to mean a particular type of personality disorder - a person who is incapable of feeling empathy with others, and who often commits criminal acts without remorse. Along with sociopath, it is a form of "anti-social personality disorder". Unlike Aspies, who often just want to be left alone (unsociable) and tend to lack social and emotional skills, psychopaths often want to harm the world around them (anti-social), perhaps in socially skillful and manipulative ways. Aspies may appear rude, but psychopaths can be cruel.

In German, when Dr Asperger referred to "autistic psychopathy", he was not referring to these anti-social people at all, he just meant people with an autistic personality who experienced clinical problems as a result. He was using the older meaning of psychopathy as a generic term for personality disorder or mental illness.

Last edited by one-A-N on 28 Mar 2010, 4:04 am, edited 1 time in total.

^^^THIS, but they can occur together. A psychopath who happens to be autistic is, like a conventional psychopath, a deeply controlling individual who sees other human beings as mere pawns that they are entitled to use and manipulate for their own gain. Unlike a conventional psychopath their social skills are lacking, so they'll stick to certain strategies and pick out people they know these strategies are likely to work on.

For example, my mothers first husband was adept at manipulating certain women but could not manipulate men and had trouble socialising with them. His strategy with women was to present himself as well off and successful, and then reveal some sort of vulnerability once he got to know them a little bit. If she was susceptible, the woman would attempt to poach what she saw as a desirable yet emotionally vulnerable mate or try to nurture her new friend in need. This would enable him to exploit her. He was assessed by a very well regarded psychiatrist when my mother was in the process of leaving him and his severe impulsive/narcissistic/psychopathic traits, including his manipulative tendencies were noted, but it was a mystery why his ability to manipulate was so restricted. He was completely incompetent with other men, would walk out of jobs when they threatened his delusions of grandeur, and was frequently manipulated by those who could clearly perceive his social deficits (after my mum left he lost a lot of his money to a succession of con artists). Now we know about autism it all makes a great deal more sense.

Scientifically there is some debate about whether the co-occurrence of autism and psychopathy occurs as a "double hit" and that the two are unrelated (i.e. http://eprints.ucl.ac.uk/11879/) or whether having identifiable autistic/ADHD traits as a child predisposes people to psychopathy as adults (i.e. http://www.psy-journal.com/article/S016 ... 1/abstract). It wouldn't surprise me if the latter was sometimes the case given the frustrations and cruelties people with pervasive developmental disorders are frequently subject to throughout life. It's an interesting topic.

The problem is one of similar words used for different things.

Psychopathy in autism meant psychological pathology, not the current meaning of psychopath.

Lacking empathy in autism, even though probably not even true, refers to lack the ability to take others perspectives. Lacking empathy in sociopathy/psychopathy means not caring. Studies have been done proving autistics care.

They're not the same thing at all.

Like everything else related to culture, psychiatric diagnoses change with the passage of time and with the changing of public conceptions of right and wrong.

A lot of HFA people would, 150 years ago, be considered to be well-functioning individuals - back in the days when our culture actually placed value on knowledge, proper speech, aversion to chit-chat and dedication to work/interests.

Who knows what psychiatry will deem 'normal' or 'abnormal' 150 years from now?