PSYC 3402 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Magnified, Heritability, Psychopathy

• School: Carleton University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 3402
• Professor: Shelley Brown

Document Summary

Committed horrific acts of violence repeatedly: cold and calculating, no empathy/ no remorse, extremely deceitful and manipulative. Appears normal: some very charismatic, charming, loving fathers and husbands, no psychoses evident. Historical context: term dates back to (cid:883)8(cid:882)(cid:882)"s, psychopathy vs. psychosis. Cleckley"s psychopath: appears normal, no remorse or empathy, lack of emotional response. Impulsive, deceptive, grandiose: know the words but not the music. Pcl-r in detail: not a risk assessment tool, designed to measure the construct of psychopathy. Emotional deficits: cant experience emotions, cant recognize emotions in others. Cognitive deficits: response modulation deficit (once started down one path, impossible to switch, cant learn to inhibit their behaviours. Study: startle reflex: reflex when something occurs unexpectedly, magnified if person feels negative affect, smaller if person feels positive affect. Evolutionary hypothesis: psychopathy is an evolutionary adaptive, cheater strategies enhanced reproductive success but only when present in a small % of the population.