NCJ Number
202016
Journal
Agression and Violent Behavior Volume: 8 Issue: 5 Dated: September-October 2003 Pages: 513-546
Editor(s)
Vincent B. Van Hasslet,
Michel Hersen
Date Published
September 2003
Length
34 pages
Annotation
This article attempts to refine promising theories and research on potential etiological and symptomactic variants of psychopathy or antisocial personality disorder (APD) to focus future investigations and advance the understanding of the broad psychopathy construct.
Abstract
Even though psychopathy has typically been construed as a relatively uniform construct, several scholars have hypothesized the existence of specific variants of psychopathy. If variants of psychopathy can be identified reliably and supported empirically, they may improve the ability to understand, treat, and manage a class of individuals who have largely been seen as dangerous and incurable. This article takes the promising literature and extracts from it to distinguish among potential variants of antisocial personality disorder (APD) that can be derived from and informed by, modern conceptions of psychopathy. In this article the modern construct of psychopathy to disaggregate and clarify the heterogeneity of antisocial personality disorder (APD) is used. The article begins by examining the debate concerning how psychopathy and its variants should be classified. Then, a review is conducted of the early clinical literature on, and seminal theories of, secondary psychopathy. After summarizing existing typological research, specific variants that may exist and the dimensions that may discriminate among them are discussed. Lastly, a discussion is presented on the possible implications of these variants for violence risk assessment, management, and treatment. Variants were seen as being distinguishable based on their etiology, degree of neuroticism, pattern of traits across the Psychopathy Checklist (PCL) facets, and degree of borderline and narcissistic personality traits. Future research will determine whether these variants exist and the extent to which distinctions among them are clinically useful. References