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Originally Posted by New Era
Good comment. We see one in the White House. I think it would be of value to recognize the difference between the sociopath and psychopath, as many times they are used interchangeably. There are some major differences.
Off the top of my head, because my DSM-5 is busy awaiting my marching orders, sociopaths tend to be loaners and socially awkward. They can develop relationships and attachments to people, but they struggle to adapt to cultural standards and norms, struggling with the rules associated of such structures. Sociopaths are disorganized and erratic in behavior, which makes them stand out in the crowd and why they prefer the fringe of society and staying in the shadows.
Psychopaths tend to be aggressive and predatory in nature. They can be very engaging and charming but unable to form emotional attachments. They lack empathy but are manipulative and can easily gain people’s trust. Psychopaths learn to blend in and gain access to social circles through mimicking emotions, even though they lack an ability to actually feel emotion themselves. Psychopaths are often well-educated and hold steady jobs.
Psychopaths are normally extremely high functioning and plan every detail of things they do in advance.
Both psychopathologies affect men more often than women with sociopaths accounting for about 3% of the population.
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Thanks for this, you actually changed some of my understandings of sociopaths vs psychopaths.
I always thought sociopaths were the more powerful social chameleons able to fit in everywhere.
I always thought that psychopaths were disconnected from emotions and empathy, but not easily spotted because of their ability to charm and blend in and had average or higher IQs.