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Classification of Corporate Psychopaths

Note: This is page devoted to all IT professionals who suffer from psychopathic bosses.  Only those who already suffered or still suffering from one of those types can understand the level of pain as well as stakes involved in dealing with such individuals.

Toxic managers is just a politically correct term for corporate psychopaths, really dangerous predators of corporate jungles in general and IT jungles in particular.  Psychopaths cannot be understood in terms of antisocial rearing or development. They are the "monsters" of the corporate  world not that different from ordinary criminals or, to be more precise, are "criminals without crime".  Psychopath is first of all the failure to recognize, much less to empathize with, the personal human dignity and rights of others. In a deep sense of this word they can be considered insane.

"Sanity" does not mean perfection; it merely means sufficient engagement with the real world and society to allow us to survive both day-by-day and in the long term – thus “sane” individuals usually tend to obey traffic laws, learn from their mistakes and practical experience and, in the case of moral sanity, they recognize in others their worth and their capacity for joy and suffering. Furthermore, sanity implies an ability of introspection: capacity to critically evaluate one’s experience, to distinguish fact from fiction, and to tune behavior, to adapt to the real world. Insanity, by implication, suggests a significant level of detachment from reality. For example, a psychopath can not recognize the human worth and the capacity for pleasure and pain in others. In this sense he/she is living in an "unreal" world.  It can also be combined with other psychological disorders like paranoia. 

Psychopath is often defined as someone who displays several distinguishing characteristics, such as deceitfulness, impulsivity and a lack of remorse. Such people often have a superficial charm, which they exercise ruthlessly in order to get what they want. In this sense women are more dangerous type of psychopath. That implies that working women, especially in IT have an enemy more formidable than men.  Female psychopaths usually see everything in terms of competition and female agression. They have no respect for their own gender. Just the opposite. Statistics suggest that a woman is the target in eight of every ten cases of bulling. But, paradoxically, in six of 10 cases, a woman is the bully. They despise and attack  female subordinates and try to undermine their more successful female peers. In the latter case they assume that they have achieved their success by using charm/sex/chicanery. They also use their gender as a bulletproof vest against males, claiming discrimination when it is convenient to them. This dirty trick of "fake victim" works wonders in modern bureaucratic organizations.  Female to female aggression is also observable in primates. Dominant female try to suppress reproductive success of competitor females in various ways including subjecting them to constant stress via harassment and intimidation and/or attacking offspring:  

Holmstrom (1992) summarizes his review by saying that indirect strategies were observed among female great apes during the following three circumstances:

1. In the power struggle among females, by cannibalistically feeding on the competitor's offspring;
2. against the male, in sexual contexts by refusal of cooperation to sexual access; also in competition for food, and feeding on the male's offspring;
3. through the offspring, by rearing the young and transmitting models of behavior from one generation to the next. The female thus prevents and restrains certain kinds of action in the offspring,p ermittinga nd favoringo thers. Accordingly, the social intelligenceo fhigher primates should not be underestimated. As Byrne and Whiten (1987) haves hown, chimpanzees are also fully capable of faking nonverbal signals, in order to deceive competitors.

See The psychopath in the corner office  page for the exploration of connection between corporate psychopaths and ordinary criminals. 

One needs to understand that being a target of a psychopath is a permanent position. One horrifying detail in the definition of personality disorders is rigidility and inflexibility of patterns of thought and action being a part of definition (Wikipedia ) :

Personality disorders form a class of mental disorders that are characterized by long-lasting rigid patterns of thought and actions. Because of the inflexibility and pervasiveness of these patterns, they can cause serious problems and impairment of functioning for the persons who are afflicted with these disorders.

Personality disorders are seen by the American Psychiatric Association as an enduring pattern of inner experience and behavior that deviates markedly from the expectations of the culture of the individual who exhibits it. These patterns are inflexible and pervasive across many situations. The onset of the pattern can be traced back at least to the beginning of adulthood. To be diagnosed as a personality disorder, a behavioral pattern must cause significant distress or impairment in personal, social, and/or occupational situations.

Related term Antisocial personality disorder  is defined as:

Antisocial personality disorder (abbreviated APD or ASPD) is a psychiatric diagnosis in the DSM-IV-TR recognizable by the disordered individual's impulsive behavior, disregard for social norms, and indifference to the rights and feelings of others.

The World Health Organization's ICD-10 diagnostic manual uses [term] dissocial personality disorder instead.

Such people distort and change meaning for the most ordinary social interactions: A simple difference of opinion, for example, can quickly escalate into a major and violent conflict.

There were several attempts to classify corporate psychopaths  into various categories. Most of them are naive and completely unscientific. Most of self-help books represent  Cargo Cult Science  and vastly underestimate/misinterpret the danger. That actually is applicable to this page too as by and large it is a summary interpreted through the prism of personal experience. While the author has training as a psychologist he never worked in this capacity. 

It goes without saying that good books on this topic are pretty rare. I have some book recommendations but they are of course far from being absolute. Still several classification categories, while being unscientific and overlapping, survived and represent at least what can be called "popular urban mythology" in this area that like any mythology is better then nothing if there is no science available.

Often the following non-orthogonal types (incarnations of a corporate psychopath)  are distinguished in the literature:

1. Bullies or aggressive psychopaths.

   Aggression in inherent in psychopath and to tell that a psychopath is a bully is just to tell that the water is wet. But for some of them this pattern of behavior serves as the most favorite tactics and they tend to use it more often and more systematically. Those psychopaths have a distinct a tendency toward sadism and derive perverse gratification from harming others. They like to hurt, frighten, tyrannize. They do it for a sense of power and control, and will often only drop subtle hints about what they are up to. At the same time they polish their aggressive, domineering manner in such a way to disguise any intimidation as legitimate corporate behavior. Such pathological personalities always seek out positions of power, such as teacher, bureaucrat, manager, or police officer. You can also distinguish several subtypes. One not very convincing subtyping was developed by the Workplace Bullying & Trauma Institute. It includes for subtypes:

   • The constant critic who uses put downs, insults, name-calling, and makes aggressive eye contact.
   • The two-headed snake who pretends to be nice while sabotaging you.
   • The gatekeeper is also known as the micromanager and control freak
   •  Screaming Mimi is emotionally out of control and explosive.

   Often bulling behavior is combined with paranoia tendencies (paranoiac self-defense).  Again this category is fuzzy.

   • Many if not all corporate bullies can simultaneously be classified as paranoid managers.
   • Many of them are also belong to the category of micromanagers.
   • Dominant part also falls into the category of narcissists.

   I would like to stress it again that direct or indirect aggression is inherent in psychopath and to tell that a psychopath is a bully is just to tell that the water is wet. 

   US National Center for Education Statistics suggests that bullying can be broken into two categories:
   •  Direct bullying,
   •  Indirect bullying which is also known as social aggression.

   The latter is characterized by forcing the victim into social isolation. This isolation is achieved through a wide variety of techniques, including refusing to socialize with the victim and criticizing the victim's communication manner or other socially-significant markers. 

   Indirect bullying is more subtle and more likely to be verbal, such as the silent treatment, arguing others into submission, manipulation, gossip, staring, and mocking. While women can be as aggressive or even more aggressive then men they usually are more indirect. I would like to stress that gender differences in aggression are subject to review; human society is too complex and direct projection from animal world, for example, from great apes is of limited value. See  important paper by Kaj Bjorkqvist  Sex Differences in Physical, Verbal, and Indirect Aggression: A review of recent reseach

   Accordingly, one should not expect women to develop and use exactlyt he sames trategiesfo r attainingt heir goals as men do. If strategies for aggression and conflict resolutiona relearned, not innate, then women are likely to learn different methods than men. Important aspects are power and capacity, not only physical, but also verbal, and social. Human beings have nonphysical powers which are far beyond those of any other animal. Accordingly, human aggression has faces and forms, inconceivable within the realm of animal aggression. Extrapolations from animal studies are, therefore, misleading. Aggressive styles are also subject to developmental change during the life course. As indicated, animal aggression is mostly physical. Also among young children lacking verbal skills, aggression is predominantly physical. Verbal skills, when they develop, are quickly utilized not only for peaceful communication, but also for aggressive purposes. When social skills develop, even more sophisticated strategies of aggression are made possible, with the aggressor being able to harm a target person without even being identified: Those strategies may be referred to as indirect aggression (Lagerspetz, Bjorkqvist, and Peltonen, 1988; Bjorkqvist, Lagerspetz, and Kaukiainen, 1992).

   There are good reasons to believe that, as far as adult interpersonal conflict is concerned, physical aggression is really the exception, not the rule. Other means are more likely to be used.

   Burbank (1987) reviews anthropological research on female aggression. She finds females of different cultures having a large potential of aggressive means to use in order to get even with their husbands, such as, e.g., locking them out of the house for the night: she regards this as an act of aggression. Burbank (1987) found females seldom to resort to physical aggression against their husbands, but they did so, occasionally. The most common reason was that their husbands had committed adultery. Burbank found, however, that women are much more often aggressive towards other women than towards men.

   Here is one type from popular literature that fits the pattern:

   The Fearmonger Boss. People do what a “fearsome” boss says because they’re afraid of him, which actually encourages further intimidation. He always has a threat, and he constantly follows through with that threat in order to keep his employees acquiescent.

2. Paranoids. Paranoid managers are psychopaths for whom continual mistrust and misjudgment of environment dominates other (often no less pathological) personality features.   Wikipedia defines paranoia in the following way:

   Paranoid personality disorder is a psychiatric diagnosis that denotes a personality disorder with paranoid features. It is characterized by an exaggerated sensitivity to rejection, resentfulness, distrust, as well as the inclination to distort experienced events. Neutral and friendly actions of others are often misinterpreted as being hostile or contemptuous. Unfounded suspicions regarding the sexual loyalty of partners and loyalty in general as well as the belief that one’s rights are not being recognized is stubbornly and argumentatively insisted upon.

   Paranoid managers are suspicious, touchy, humorless, quick to take offense and slow to forgive, self-righteous, argumentative, often litigious. They seldom show tenderness and may avoid intimacy; often they seem tense and brusque. Paranoid personalities find causal connections everywhere; for them nothing is coincidental.

   They are constantly on guard and are hypersensitive to critique. They may take offense where none is intended. Often have problems with understanding humor. They appear cold and, in fact, often avoid becoming intimate with others. Often pride themselves on their rationality, objectivity and fairness. Paranoid managers rarely come forward to seek help from subordinates.

   Often paranoia combines with "toxic incompetence" as they cannot make decision on time (analysis paralysis), insists of creating tons of useless documentation and due to this skip important project milestones, etc.  Fear of exposure of paranoid manager is blended into a pattern of pervasive distrust and suspiciousness. An inability to trust, doubts about others' loyalty, distortion and fabrication of personal histories, qualifications and facts, misinterpretation, and bearing grudges unnecessarily are generally hallmarks of the disorder. Pathological and instinctive aggressive counter-attack, the need to control others is also a prominent feature. They like to collect evidence of subordinates. Paranoid managers often can be classified as "raw bullies" as in relations with subordinates prefer to rely on brute force.
    

3. Micromanagers. Tendency to micromanages is often combined with paranoia and bulling but often demonstrate additional disorder: obsessive-compulsive disorder (OSD).  It is often connected with pathological neatness, especially in women. Especially dangerous are paranoid incompetent micromanagers (PIMM) that we will study in more detail on a separate set of pages that include but not limited to (remember that micromanager are just an incarnation of corporate psychopaths that got a special status in corporate mythology):
   • Understanding Micromanagers and control freaks
   • Slightly Skeptical View on Survival under Maliciously Incompetent Micromanagers and Control Freaks
   • Enemy at the Gate: Rules of Communication with Maliciously Incompetent Micromanagers and Control Freaks
   • Documenting Micromanager Behavior

   Micromanagers is one of the few areas were gender stereotyping might provide some survival benefits.  Women tend to be more detail oriented, and female corporate psychopaths more often tend to behave like micromanagers. Female PIMM can be mean, evil, vindictive and quite petty. If a female boss is insecure about her skills and abilities she is more likely to exhibit PIMM behavior.  Female PIMM are usually more skilled and use more often indirect aggression.

   Often micromanagers are simultaneously can be classified as paranoid managers. Among common  traits are complete absence of trust in the staff, pathological need for control, pathologic dissatisfaction with results,  and recurring "tantrums."

   Many of PIMM can be also classified as bullies but again they, especially female PIMM, prefer indirect aggression to direct.  Usually, female PIMM encourage "little birds" to rest on their shoulders and whisper all forms of gossip. This, these minions believe, ingratiates them to their bosses.
    

4. Narcissists. Narsisstic managers are not that different from other types and also suffer from compulsive need for control ("control freaks"). Narcissistic behavior (aka inventive personality type) is compulsive desire to project positive image and resulting in volatile unstable behavior with emotional outbursts caused by insecurity and weakness rather than any real feelings of confidence or self-esteem. Very sensitive to criticism and do not accept slightest criticism from below. They often can be simultaneously classified both as bullies and micromanagers. As they need to steal all the achievements of subordinates to built their image they are typically  "gatekeepers" who try tightly control all the communications channels with the superiors'.  Can be quite paranoid and react inadequately on any threat to their projected image.

   The narcissistic bosses are characterized by "a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and lack of empathy," often evidenced as envy, taking advantage of others, an exaggerated sense of self-importance and entitlement, and arrogant or haughty behavior. There is not much hope for the poor shmacs toiling for the narcissistic personality-disordered boss who demands perfection, absolute loyalty, and 24/7 devotion to the job.
    

5. Manipulator bosses or Machiavellian boss ("wolfs in sheep closing"). Manipulative psychopaths are probably the smoothest of corporate psychopaths. Here we will mean a class of  corporate psychopath who excels in manipulative behaviors including but not limited to flattery and seduction. All psychopaths use this to a certain extent but for this type this is a preferred tactic.

   When this feature is prominent their features typical for corporate psychopath are usually present too. They are very similar to paranoid managers in their behavior toward subordinates but unlike paranoids are capable sometimes using flattery and seduction.

   Also they prefer indirect aggression to direct. Often they have tendency to break rules and  exposit "grey" area in their favor.  This distinguishes them from paranoids, who other wise are very similar. They fear becoming less valued if their underlings get any recognition for exemplary work. Manipulator bosses are backstabbers who'll go to frightening lengths to look good to their superiors.

   Typically have a dual personality syndrome and behave completely differently with superiors then with subordinates.  Here is how they are described in one of Monster career self-help articles:

   The Manipulator Boss
   Also known as the Machiavellian boss, this type is extremely intelligent and one of the most dangerous. The manipulator boss is highly focused, very motivated, and always has a secret plan. He looks at people as a means to an end. The world is a giant pyramid and the apex is his. People he touches or runs over on the way to the top are casualties he writes off. If you work for a manipulator, watch your back. Your best bet is to be open and honest with him. Volunteer information. Your boss, who has long forgotten what truth is, will be left impressed by it.

Again this typology and characteristics listed ad defining each type are imprecise and unscientific; psychopath are very variable and it is often difficult to fit your particular psychopathic boss into any of those classes. And you generally should not.  This is exercise better reserved for modern "factories of illusion" (self-help books publishers) who are producing tons of low quality staff each year describing particular types although they are just facets of a generic psychopathic personality. In no way it should be blindly trusted either books or Web pages (including this one) in important career-affecting decisions.

Although you see manifestation of this personality disorder on your own skin, precise diagnostics is pretty difficult and you need to do your own leg work and collect evidence to understand what makes particular psychopath tick what are his favorite tactics.

You probably are better off consulting specialist and asking for a competent advice. At least you can enroll in community college and take course in criminal psychology: criminals and corporate psychopaths are just two sides of the same coin. Both this this page and relevant  books should all be taken with a grain of salt.  The author have spend more then seven years working as senior research associate in the psychology but like in programming that was  a different area and this experience  just ensured the knowledge of jargon, but does not guarantee talent or insight needed for this area.

Also few people have skills of  clinical psychologists to correctly identify often complex blend of features in toxic manager. But you should try you best. Mistakes are unavoidable though. For example sometimes it was looks like the manager is a bully, but more precise analysis of behavior can suggest that you are dealing with paranoid incompetent micromanager (PIMM) and the most prominent feature is not open aggression (bulling) but deep paranoia and obsessive control.  Documenting the psychopath behavior in your journal helps to view his behavior in historical perspective: suddenly you start to see patterns in attacks, outbursts and intimidation tactics used. 

Proper methods are well described in literature for psychological research. Limited amount of materials related to PIMM can be found at Documenting Micromanager Behavior page on this site.

But all you can do while staying is learn to cope. That's why you should stay only as long as absolutely necessary and should try to transfer to another department or other company. Remember you can't change this type of individual. Among possible defense moves we can mention to stick to your agenda, documenting every step and pointing abrupt changes of direction as well as providing feedback about projects you involved with.. Try to avoid getting sucked into his or her unreasonable demands. You don't want to end up being emotionally blackmailed.

No matter what is precise classification all toxic managers are cruel with subordinates and created out of the work environment "living hell".  Incompetent, dishonest but scheming they charm the higher ups and climb on the back of others to achieve power. But it is important to understand that toxic managers would never achieves their goals and climb up the ladder without the disorganization and willful ignorance of his supervisors typical for some large corporations (Enron is a typical example here).  Fish rots from the head.

As insightful page The toxic manager in the office a guide to toxic managers and toxic management in a toxic work environment states "We've all encountered them. Moody, aggressive, unpredictable, incompetent, always blaming other people. A compulsive liar with a Jekyll and Hyde nature, the individual, male or female, is always charming and plausible when management are around."  Unpredictable outbursts of hostility, conflicting demands, inconsistent orders, random decision-making, inability to plan strategically, inability and unwillingness to communicate and co-operate, obstructive ... the list goes on.

Psychopathic managers prevent subordinates doing their jobs and prevent employees fulfilling their duties. Most employees in IT are competent and have both the desire and ability to do good work. What is missing in some organizations  is an environment that encourages and enables the expression of that competence. In his book, Hall (1988a) states,

If we are to achieve excellence in our organizations and communities, we must be willing to reorient
We must make a presumption of competence in  the workplace rather than incompetence, for high-level  performance rests on the simple, yet not widely  accepted, premise that people will behave competently  if we will but let them. (pp. 29-30)

After some conversations with corporate psychopath you feel like you left the ring after facing opponent twice heavier then you and not playing by the rules. Everything will be your fault. You have a "negative attitude", you're a "poor performer", you're "not up to the job", and so on. If you get as far as alerting personnel or human resources management, it'll be a "personality clash". In truth, this is a projection of the psychopaths own negative attitude, poor performance, and incompetence.

The problem is that "toxic managers" are really toxic: they instantly destroy trust and tend to infect their departments with bad attitudes. It's really like a disease: they spread despair, anger and depression, which show up in lackluster work, absenteeism and turnover. They are also a major course of workplace burnout: toxic burnout.  Coping with a toxic boss  can take a severe toll on your life. It is like living with an abusive parent or husband; there are periods of calm where they are happy and not picking on you, but you always know that at some point it will start again.

The price of putting up with it is high. Researchers in Finland found that workers who felt they were being treated fairly on the job had a lower incidence of coronary heart disease, the leading cause of death in Western societies. [ABC, Oct. 26, 2005]. Often there is little you can do except to keep your head down and stay away from that manager as much as possible.

The best is to understand your tradeoffs and work not so much for the company as for improving your marketability for the next job.  Forget about loyalty in such situation: set strict limits for yourself and stick to them. Stop working overtime, don’t take on extra tasks, never work through lunch. Have outside confidant: a person outside the company to listen to you, support you and, ultimately, to help you get out. The fact that they severely cripple the organization to which they belong is well known fact and does not require additional commentary.

Toxic behavior of superiors create level of anger when revenge became to sweet and pain that strips people of their self esteem and that disconnects them from their work too severe. Never go this road. Still for some people urge of revenge proves irresistible. That's why toxic managers are probably the leading causes of sabotage in modern organization (competing with outsourcing/Offshoring).  "Fish stinks from the head!" and the higher toxic managers is, the more widespread is the damage he/she causes. Often large badly managed companies and government agencies attract such managers  as due to their incompetence they simply would not survive out in the startup business community. 

I would like to stress that psychopaths completely lack empathy for other people. That means that their are oblivious to sufferings they courses. Absolutely oblivious.  They tend to be rigid and inflexible, have hidden agendas, and have an unusually hard time recognizing or respecting boundaries. They're weighed down by irrational beliefs such as "To be criticized means I'm a failure" or "If I follow orders, I'm weak". Disturbingly, individuals with personality disorders not only tend to dismiss the idea that they have a problem, but often see their unpleasant traits as strengths and take pride in them. For this reason, many such individuals respond poorly to therapy -- if they agree to seek treatment at all.

For example, do you have a manager who focuses so single-mindedly on rules, regulations, and productivity to the extent that actual real work grinds to a halt? Is she unsatisfied with any solution you proposed, work compulsively till all hours, avoid making decisions, and insist that her way of doing things is the only way? If so, your boss may be suffering from obsessive-compulsive personality disorder. This is not the same as obsessive-compulsive illness -- you're not likely to see her obsessively washing her hands. The best defense strategy: find a transfer or a new job. If you need to stay avoid arguments, keep a low profile, and steer clear of conflicts that you'll never win.

You also can shield yourself from your boss's unreasonable demands, the authors say, by finding out exactly what he expects from you and wants you to do. They suggest asking him what the most important project is (you may be surprised), and request guidance with detailed questions such as "Would it be all right for me to write out some ideas for you to review? Then you can let me know which ones to pursue further." Emphasize that there are only so many hours in a day, so he stops expecting superhuman achievements. And don't take personally your boss's lack of praise for a job well done: The problem is with him, not you.

Keep up your guard. Nitpicking may not only drive you crazy but could be harmful to your caeer as it expose to the treat of being fired for unsubordination.  To neutralize that threat, the authors advise that you set boundaries, making clear when it's inappropriate for to intrude on your work. You also may need to remind your boss of your accomplishments if you find an obsessive-compulsive boss is undercutting your work. You may want to divide up your work,  so your obsessive-compulsive boss can obsess freely over their parts of the job and leave you free to concentrate on the tasks at hand.

These white-collar psychopaths or sociopaths are "individuals who most often do not act out in a criminal way, yet can be just as manipulative and cunning" as a serial killer. Their personality attributes "typically include superficial charm, unreliability, untruthfulness, and insincerity, [a] lack of guilt, remorse, or shame, [and] a need to engage in thrill-seeking behavior," as well as pathological lying, egocentricity, selfishness, and rejection of authority and discipline, according to the authors. In short, they are corporate con artists. They're the tech administrators who over-order company laptops and hawk them on eBay, or employees who sabotage bosses' and coworkers' careers by appropriating their ideas and denigrating their performance to supervisors. They're the outgoing employees who act friendly to their colleagues only to stab them in the back at every opportunity. Middle management may be the natural habitat of the white-collar psychopath: Sub criminal psychopaths are known for their extroversion, their charm, and their polished social skills, and it's not unusual for these traits to be rewarded within many organizations.

If you think you work for one of these individuals, the authors say, don't be fooled by "props" like the ready smile and good eye contact. Instead, watch your back. The authors advise setting firm ground rules and picking your battles very carefully. Better yet, seriously consider switching jobs. Lock your desk, secure your computer password, keep your personal life private, and notify your coworkers and supervisors of any inappropriate behavior on the part of this colleague. As the authors caution, "Anything you say can and will be used against you." Keep notes of any indiscretions  and don't blame yourself or feel responsible for the sociopath behavior, the authors say. This is certainly handy advice for anyone who is in danger of being victimized by a white-collar con artist.

Corporate America is a veritable hive of white-collar crazies. Identifying, defining, and diagnosing exact personality disorders your boss suffers from can be a tricky business. Still one sign is universal: the workplace in such cases quickly becomes overflowing with tension. Avoid taking the toxic bosses actions personally and remind yourself that you are not stuck in a hostile work environment. Take actions for self-protection and establish personal boundaries rather than to change the other person.

Remember that all of them are "Mayberry Machiavelli" and are ready to stub you in the back.

Summary

• World is far from being perfect.  This trivial general observation actually can really help.  Consider this crazy jerk more of your maturity test  the God exercise on you in his infinite wisdom and withstanding him/her became much more easy. That helps to treat each other more realistically and thus in more psychologically mature way. Related behavior might include minimizing unrealistic expectations, viewing disagreements less personally, holding grudges more briefly, etc.
   
• Psychopathic bosses have significant differences from the normal human beings. What is important they see the world differently and interpret many innocent for normal people patterns as threatening.  Absurd reactions/over-reactions should be expected as they are "not normal" in a very profound way.

• Aggression in office environment is typically indirect. That's why female psychopaths are probably the most dangerous type of corporate psychopaths as they prefer and excel in indirect intimidation.  Woman inhumanity to woman in the working place often exceed anything done by men. A female psychopath often treat her female subordinate as if they are despised indentured servants -- hers to humiliate.
   
• The power of  psychopathic bosses comes from the way they can isolate you, intimidate you and/or can make you feel bad if you don’t give in to demands. Please note that cliques are female instrument of bulling. Cliques offer security to those who conforms and insecurity to those who don't. Indirect bulling can be achieved via exclusion from a peer group. Female gossip server the same goals.
   
• The best defense is finding a new, better job.  You should start working in this direction immediately as this increase your psychological comfort.  If job market is good it might be easier then you think.

• Work harassment is a serious problem, severely affecting the lives of those who are exposed to it. In Sweden, a country with 9 million inhabitants, it is estimated that 100-300 people commit suicide yearly as a result of harassment by colleagues. Every 6th to 8th suicide is directly related to work harassment [Leymann, 1986]. Work harassment is thus a form of interpersonal aggression, which is at least as harmful as violence in the traditional sense. [ Sex Differences in Covert Aggression Among Adults ]
• It’s difficult and dangerous to fight back against psychopathic manager. Make sure you get help from people who know about ways of outsmarting them.
• Buying a couple of books and systematically studying the issue might help to fight psychopath. Especially helpful is the ability to detect the tricks; that significantly diminishes the level of stress.
• Try to document the behavior of the psychopath and share the problem with somebody whom you trust outside the office environment. Just periodic discussion of your records improves understanding of the problem and your preparedness to dirty tricks and intimidation
• Although everyone’s  psychopathic manager is different on the surface, their tricks are not. All of them are using fear and anxiety to make you feel bad. Learn typical patterns of attack both from experience and literature and soon you will notice that you recognize them. Here having daily log helps immensely as the ability going back and analyze previous similar episodes speed up learning.

Try to set red flags for upper management and HR indirectly, otherwise be ready that your boss will retaliate against you.

• Year questionnaires should be used to inform upper management about the problem. 
• Anonymous hotlines and email are helpful, as you can ask somebody to read you message or use free anonymisers to send complains. 

Protect your privacy:

• Lock your desk, secure your computer password, keep your personal life private. Learn some elements of computer security.  Encrypt sensitive files on your harddrive using compressing program like rar or WinZip. 
• Expect you WEB browsing patterns be scrutinized, unless the company has strict policy preventing managers from accessing this information without HR approval. Be especially careful protecting your job searches independently whether you are considering internal transferee or moving to the other company.
• If you need to speak by phone at the cubicle remember that walls have ears.  In somebody called you and the call in sensitive, excuse yourself and call back later using cell phone or from a conference room. Never talk to recruiters from your cubicle.

Create a plan to counter the damage to self-esteem:

• It's cool to be frugal. Even if you lose some money leaving the current and finding other job the mere elimination of stress will pay off in health benefits and part of the loss can be compensated by more frugal life. It's actually cool to be more frugal as youth trends (and gas prices) in USA demonstrate...
• Start working on relevant certifications
• Attend night classes in college.
• Intensify your job search.  But never take the decision to change job "on-the spot" no matter how humiliating the experience is. The best revenge is a better position in a different company not the questionable pleasure of being unemployed.

Old News ;-)

[Nov 21, 2008] U.S. suicide rate is up - Los Angeles Times

"I would not be surprised if a big factor was the despair that sets in by age 50 plus or minus when you realize your life has been wasted doing meaningless tasks for bosses who are essentially criminals.
The American way of prosperity leaves something out."

After falling for more than a decade, the U.S. suicide rate has climbed steadily since 1999, driven by an alarming increase among middle-age adults, researchers said Monday.

A new six-year analysis in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that the U.S. suicide rate rose to 11 per 100,000 people in 2005, from 10.5 per 100,000 in 1999, an increase of just under 5%.

The report found that virtually all of the increase was attributable to a nearly 16% jump in suicides among people ages 40 to 64, a group not commonly seen as high-risk. The rate for that age group rose to 15.6 per 100,000 in 2005, from 13.5 per 100,000 in 1999.

Susan P. Baker, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health and an author of the study, said she was baffled by the findings. Sociological studies have found that middle age is generally a time of relative security and emotional well-being, she said.

"We really don't know what is causing this," said Dr. Paula Clayton, research director of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, who was not involved in the study. "All we have is speculation."

One possibility, she said, is that the increase in suicides might be tied to a concurrent increase in abuse of prescription pain pills, such as OxyContin. Studies have shown that people who abuse drugs are at greater risk for suicide, she noted.

Another possible explanation, she said, was the drop in hormone replacement therapy after it was linked to health risks in 2002. Women who gave up the drugs or decided not to take them might have been more susceptible to depression and potentially suicide, she said.

Dr. Ian Cook, an associate professor of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences at UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, who was not involved in the study, said stresses of modern life, particularly worries in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, might have a role.

Untreated depression is the leading cause of suicide, he said.

"The bottom line is while we can't infer a lot of things about what is causing the trend, I think it cries out for better depression screening and treatment," he said.

Suicide rates declined 18% from 1986 to 1999, helped in part by a focus on prevention among teenagers and the elderly.

In the current study, researchers found little or no change in the suicide rates for three other age groups: 10 to 19, 20 to 29, and over 65.

Suicides for whites ages 40 to 64 rose 17% from 1999 to 2005, researchers said. For middle-age white men, the rate rose 16% to 26.9 per 100,000 in 2005, from 23.1 per 100,000 in 1999. For white women in that age group, the rate rose 19% to 8.2 per 100,000 from 6.9 per 100,000.

The suicide rate among middle-age African Americans rose 7% from 1999 to 2005, but it was not enough to drive up the overall suicide rate among blacks.

For black men ages 40 to 64, the rate rose 5% to 10.4 per 100,000 from 9.9 per 100,000, and for black women in that age group, the rate rose 14% to 2.5 per 100,000 from 2.2 per 100,000.

Baker said she had no idea why the increases among whites were higher.

Gellene is a Times staff writer.

Comments from Angry Bear Late Working-Age Suicides Rising

coberly,

The authors find an increase in the rate of suicide in a longitudinal analysis of the 40-64 cohort. This would already hold for an inherent acceleration in suicide as people move from an younger cohort to the one being discussed.

Greg

coberly: (despair over wasted life)

Isn't that what the stereotypical midlife crisis is mostly about? What you mentioned is just a particular aspect of the general phenomenon. And it usually doesn't start as late as 50. But I can imagine the despair escalates.

As for Greg's point, he has already followed up but what he says is essentially it's a boomer phenomenon -- whatever characteristics boomers have are strongest in the age group where the peak of the boomers is. That's how I read his claim.
cm

Really interesting, thanks for posting this. I'd also look to the increasing use of SSRI antidepressants, which have suicide as a side-effect. I understand some new allergy medicines also have depression and suicide as a side effect-Singulair?
Laurie

Yep, boomers. They died in their 20s and now in their 50s. There should be cheering all around.

But on a serious note, I wonder what the job loss is among this group. The stats on men/women increases work against this factor but it may play some role. Also, what about divorce. Are a greater number left alone in their 50s after children are grown with children moving elsewhere for jobs? A loneliness factor, perhaps?

Perhaps its just not anything in particular.
Anna Lee

[Nov 21, 2008] Rake (character) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A rake is defined as a man habituated to immoral conduct. Rakes are frequently stock characters in novels. Often a rake is a man who wastes his (usually inherited) fortune on wine, women and song, incurring lavish debts in the process. The rake is also frequently a cad: a man who seduces a young woman and impregnates her before leaving, often to her social or financial ruin. To call the character a rake calls attention to his promiscuity and wild spending of money; to call the character a cad implies a callous seducer who coldly breaks his victim's heart. These men are also known as heels. A bounder is an 'ill-bred, unscrupulous man', the social inferior of the cad.^[1][2][3][4] During the English Restoration period (1660–1688), the word was used in a glamorous sense: the Restoration rake is a carefree, witty, sexually irresistible aristocrat typified by Charles II's courtiers, the Earl of Rochester and the Earl of Dorset, who combined riotous living with intellectual pursuits and patronage of the arts. The Restoration rake is celebrated in the Restoration comedy of the 1660s and 1670s.^[5] After the reign of Charles II, and especially after the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the cultural perception of the rake took a dive into squalor. The rake became the butt of moralistic tales in which his typical fate was debtor's prison, venereal disease, or, in the case of William Hogarth's A Rake's Progress, insanity in Bedlam.^[6]

The rake is often portrayed as a heavy drinker or gambler. An earlier form of the word was rake-hell, a form reshaped by folk etymology to mean someone who stokes the fires of Hell, making them hotter. The actual etymology of the word is from the Old Norse reikall, meaning "vagrant" or "wanderer"; this was borrowed into Middle English as rakel (possibly via Dutch rekel, meaning "scoundrel").

Rakes are also very arrogant.^{[citation needed]}

Well known fictional rakes and cads include:

• Dorimant, the hero of The Man of Mode by George Etherege, based upon the historical Earl of Rochester mentioned below and above
• Compeyson, the man who jilted Miss Havisham in Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
• Alec d'Urberville, Tess's seducer in Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
• Rodolphe Boulanger, Madame Bovary's principal lover
• Harry Paget Flashman, chief character of a series of novels by George MacDonald Fraser
• Don Juan
• Mollie Flannigan
• Dorian Gray
• Tom Rakewell, the protagonist of William Hogarth's series of paintings, A Rake's Progress
• The Prodigal Son, one of Jesus' parables
• The Vicomte de Valmont, the consummate seducer of the novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses
• Rupert of Hentzau
• Angel (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) in his persona as Liam of Galway, before he was made into a vampire
• Caledon Hockley, Rose DeWitt Bukater's fiance in Titanic
• George Wickham, of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice
• Pechorin, the anti-hero of A Hero of Our Time by Mikhail Lermontov
• Harry Horner, from The Country Wife by William Wycherly
• Dmitri Karamazov sensualist elder brother of Doestyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov
• Lovelace, suitor to Clarissa in Samuel Richardson's novel. Lovelace (a pun on Loveless) is as much interested in power as seduction.
• Michael Moorcock's character Colonel Pyat presents one of the least appealing forms of the rake archetype, despite being historically a little too late for the classic definiton of a rake.

Historical figures who have informed the stock character include:

• Cagliostro
• Lord Byron
• John Mytton
• Giacomo Casanova
• Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset
• John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester
• Sir Charles Sedley
• John Wilkes
• Charles Mohun, 4th Baron Mohun
• Colonel Francis Charteris
• Hellfire Club
• Marquis de Sade
• Francis Dashwood
• Beauchamp Bagenal

The stock character of the rake can be contrasted with some others. The town drunk is frequently intoxicated, and impoverished by heavy drinking, but here the focus is on the character's alcoholic state rather than on sexual excess; the town drunk is typically older than the rake.

[Nov 19, 2008] Bullying devastates lives -- until victims find ways to heal By Janet Kornblum

USATODAY.com, USA TODAY

Kathy Shedd had red hair. Meg Rafferty was shy.  And Jodee Blanco was just different. Those were their crimes.

The punishments for Blanco, Shedd, Rafferty, and others like them? Being kicked, punched and spit upon. They were yelled at, taunted and shunned. They spent hard time in isolation, crying themselves to sleep at night, sometimes wanting to die.

They weren't in prison. They were in school. And their tormenters were not adults, but other children. And yet, now as adults, the memories of childhood bullying still haunt their daily lives.

"I was relentlessly tormented from fifth grade until the end of high school simply for being different," says Blanco, a former public relations executive from Chicago. Blanco wrote about her experiences in Please Stop Laughing at Us. .. : One Survivor's Extraordinary Quest to Prevent School Bullying, which was published in the spring. "I was ambushed. I would find my belongings floating in the toilet. I was spat at and kicked and worst — ignored."

Blanco, a school consultant who talks to students and teachers about ways to prevent bullying — often cyberbullying — still bears the emotional pain of bullying, including raw flashbacks to childhood torment. But she's getting help and now also wants other adults who have been bullied to seek help as well.

Though cyberbullying has taken center stage among many in the psychological community, "adult survivors of peer abuse," as she calls her demographic, often suffer in silence, she says.

Rafferty, of Eden Prairie, Minn., 52, knew she was different and "that there was something wrong with me," she says. But like many adult survivors, "I tried to hide it."

Not everyone who is bullied has lifelong trauma. But there's no question that "unrelenting, daily hostilities that maybe escalate to threats or actual aggression can be on par with torture and child abuse," or that "repeated and severe bullying can cause psychological trauma," says Daniel Nelson, medical director of the Child Psychiatry Unit at the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center.

"There's no question that bullying in certain instances can be absolutely devastating."

The abuse that Kathy Shedd of Lafayette, Ind., endured more than two decades ago still affects her, even at age 42.

Shedd's crime? Being born with red hair — and having a name that unfortunately made rhyming taunts simple.

"Being bullied set me up as a mark," she says. "I don't fight back." It's so bad that she likes to have her husband with her when she goes out in public — although lately things have been improving for her, ever since she began focusing on the issue.

"I've always wanted to know: Why? Why do they bully?"

That's a simple question with many answers. Experts have different theories on why certain children get picked on, but most agree that being different — in even the smallest way — can lead to bullying.

As a teenager, Jenny Morsch, 28, of Hinckley, Ill., became the target of anonymous letters that called her fat and threatened her. She has her suspicions about the teens in town who might have written the letters. But even police couldn't identify the perpetrators, leaving Jenny ostracized, sentenced to sit alone at lunch with kids staring at her. The letters made her frightened, depressed and suicidal."

She did get help in college. But a decade after it happened, it still affects her.

"I feel like everything sucks and I can't do anything right. I feel like I have to be perfect."

Blanco is also still affected today, even though she spends her life counseling other victims. Recently she began therapy to help her put the pain behind her.

And she strongly believes that others who have survived years of abuse also need to find ways of healing.

"I want people who are victims, who are survivors like me, to know that if you're affected by it, you have to take it just as seriously as you would if you were abused in any other way as a child, and you need to incorporate it into whatever therapy you're doing," she says. " You have to acknowledge it."

READERS: Have you ever been bullied? How did you deal with it? Does it affect you now? Or have you ever been the bully? Why and is there anything someone could've done to make you stop? Share your experiences and opinions below, keeping in mind USA TODAY's community guidelines against personal attacks and hate speech:

A Reporter at Large Suffering Souls Reporting & Essays

The New Yorker

... ...

At thirty-eight, Kiehl is one of the world’s leading younger investigators in psychopathy, the condition of moral emptiness that affects between fifteen to twenty-five per cent of the North American prison population, and is believed by some psychologists to exist in one per cent of the general adult male population. (Female psychopaths are thought to be much rarer.) Psychopaths don’t exhibit the manias, hysterias, and neuroses that are present in other types of mental illness. Their main defect, what psychologists call “severe emotional detachment”—a total lack of empathy and remorse—is concealed, and harder to describe than the symptoms of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. This absence of easily readable signs has led to debate among mental-health practitioners about what qualifies as psychopathy and how to diagnose it. Psychopathy isn’t identified as a disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the American Psychiatric Association’s canon; instead, a more general term, “antisocial personality disorder,” known as A.P.D., covers the condition.

There is also little consensus among researchers about what causes psychopathy. Considerable evidence, including several large-scale studies of twins, points toward a genetic component. Yet psychopaths are more likely to come from neglectful families than from loving, nurturing ones. Psychopathy could be dimensional, like high blood pressure, or it might be categorical, like leukemia. Researchers argue over whether tests used to measure it should focus on behavior or attempt to incorporate personality traits—like deceitfulness, glibness, and lack of remorse—as well. The only point on which everyone agrees is that psychopathy is extremely difficult to treat. And for some researchers the word “psychopath” has been tainted by its long and seamy relationship with criminality and popular culture, which began with true-crime pulps and continues today in TV shows like CBS’s “Criminal Minds” and in the work of authors like Thomas Harris and Patricia Cornwell. The word is so loaded with baleful connotations that it tends to empurple any surrounding prose.

Kiehl is frustrated by the lack of respect shown to psychopathy by the mental-health establishment. “Think about it,” he told me. “Crime is a trillion-dollar-a-year problem. The average psychopath will be convicted of four violent crimes by the age of forty. And yet hardly anyone is funding research into the science. Schizophrenia, which causes much less crime, has a hundred times more research money devoted to it.” I asked why, and Kiehl said, “Because schizophrenics are seen as victims, and psychopaths are seen as predators. The former we feel empathy for, the latter we lock up.”

In January of 2007, Kiehl arranged to have a portable functional magnetic-resonance-imaging scanner brought into Western—the first fMRI ever installed in a prison. So far, he has recruited hundreds of volunteers from among the inmates. The data from these scans, Kiehl hopes, will confirm his theory, published in Psychiatry Research, in 2006, that psychopathy is caused by a defect in what he calls “the paralimbic system,” a network of brain regions, stretching from the orbital frontal cortex to the posterior cingulate cortex, that are involved in processing emotion, inhibition, and attentional control. His dream is to confound the received wisdom by helping to discover a treatment for psychopathy. “If you could target the brain region involved, then maybe you could find a drug that treats that region,” he told me. “If you could treat just five per cent of them, that would be a Nobel Prize right there.”

The four hundred and six prisoners in the Western New Mexico facility are serving sentences ranging from a year to life without parole. New Mexico uses a classification system that assigns each inmate a number from one to six, with six being reserved for the most violent offenders; Western has inmates of all levels up to five. Although not all psychopaths are violent, Kiehl told me, the majority are fours, fives, and sixes.

Unlike most academic psychopathy researchers, Kiehl has spent many hours in the company of his subjects. When he meets colleagues at conferences, he told me, “they always ask, ‘What are they like?’ These are guys who have spent twenty years studying psychopaths and never met one.” Although the number of psychopaths who are not in prisons is thought to exceed the number who are—if the one-per-cent figure is correct, there are more than a million psychopaths at large in the United States alone—they are much harder to identify in the outside world. Some are “successful psychopaths,” holding down good jobs in many types of industries. It is generally only if they commit a crime and enter the criminal-justice system that they become available for research.

In the conference room where Western’s warden, Anthony Romero, greeted Kiehl, there was a framed tableau of illegal items confiscated from inmates, including handmade shivs and crude tattooing devices. Romero explained that Kiehl was using the scanner not only to study psychopathy but also to measure the level of craving in the brains of substance abusers as they go through a treatment program, also run by Kiehl, which is funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The volunteer rate among the inmates is more than ninety per cent (although some are too muscle-bound to fit inside the scanning tube). As a “collateral benefit,” Kiehl throws in a free clinical examination of their brains. (He has discovered previously undetected tumors in about five per cent of the volunteers.) In addition to the pay they receive for their time (a dollar an hour, Western’s standard rate for prison labor), inmates get pictures of their brains that they can post in their cells. “There’s a lot of joking among the prisoners about who’s got the biggest brain,” Romero said.

The scanner was housed in a tractor-trailer parked behind the prison’s I.D. center. We followed a correctional officer through an internal courtyard to the rehab wing, which consisted of a large common area surrounded by two-man cells. The prisoners were standing at attention outside their cells, some holding mops and brooms. I entered a vacant cell and saw the occupant’s brain, a grainy black-and-white image on a piece of a paper, its edges curling, tacked up over the desk.

Then we walked through the common room and out a door at the other end, passing under a large poster with lines that read, “I am here because there is no refuge, finally, from myself.” The officer led us along a corridor of offices in which students from the University of New Mexico, where Kiehl is on the faculty, conduct psychopathy interviews and also counsel participants in the drug-treatment program. Carla Harenski, one of Kiehl’s postdocs, was interviewing a beefy guy with a tattoo on his neck. Her office, like those of all the researchers in the lab, is equipped with a button she can press to call for help if an interview gets out of hand.

In order to distinguish psychopaths from non-psychopaths among the Western volunteers, Kiehl and his students use the revised version of the Psychopathy Checklist, or PCL-R, a twenty-item diagnostic instrument created by Robert Hare, a Canadian psychologist, based on his long experience in working with psychopaths in prisons. Kiehl was taught to use the checklist by Hare himself, under whom he earned his doctorate, at the University of British Columbia. Researchers interview an inmate for up to three hours, and compare the inmate’s statements against what is known of his record and his personal history. The interviewer “scores” the subject on each of the twenty items:

• parasitic life style,
• pathological lying, conning,
• proneness to boredom,
• shallow emotions,
• lack of empathy,
• poor impulse control,
• promiscuity,
• irresponsibility,
• record of juvenile delinquency,
• criminal versatility,

among other tendencies—with zero, one, or two, depending on how pronounced that trait is.

Most researchers agree that anyone who scores thirty or higher on the PCL-R is considered to be a psychopath. Kiehl says, “Someone who scores a thirty-five, a thirty-six, they are just different. You say to yourself, ‘Aha, here you are. You are why I do this.’ ”

Harenski recently interviewed a Western inmate who scored a 38.9. “He had killed his girlfriend because he thought she was cheating on him,” she told me. “He was so charming about telling it that I found it hard not to fall into laughing along in surprise, even when he was describing awful things.” Harenski, who is thirty, did not experience the involuntary skin-crawling sensation that, according to a survey conducted by the psychologists Reid and M. J. Meloy, one in three mental-health and criminal-justice professionals report feeling on interviewing a psychopath; in their paper on the subject, Meloy and Meloy speculate that this reaction may be an ancient intraspecies predator-response system. “I was just excited,” Harenski continued. “I was saying to myself, ‘Wow. I found a real one.’ ”

... ... ...

Psychopaths are as old as Cain, and they are believed to exist in all cultures, although they are more prevalent in individualistic societies in the West. The Yupik Eskimos use the term kunlangeta to describe a man who repeatedly lies, cheats, steals, and takes sexual advantage of women, according to a 1976 study by Jane M. Murphy, an anthropologist then at Harvard University. She asked an Eskimo what the group would typically do with a kunlangeta, and he replied, “Somebody would have pushed him off the ice when nobody else was looking.”

The condition was first described clinically in 1801, by the French surgeon Philippe Pinel. He called it “mania without delirium.” In the early nineteenth century, the American surgeon Benjamin Rush wrote about a type of “moral derangement” in which the sufferer was neither delusional nor psychotic but nevertheless engaged in profoundly antisocial behavior, including horrifying acts of violence. Rush noted that the condition appeared early in life. The term “moral insanity” became popular in the mid-nineteenth century, and was widely used in the U.S. and in England to describe incorrigible criminals. The word “psychopath” (literally, “suffering soul”) was coined in Germany in the eighteen-eighties. By the nineteen-twenties, “constitutional psychopathic inferiority” had become the catchall phrase psychiatrists used for a general mixture of violent and antisocial characteristics found in irredeemable criminals, who appeared to lack a conscience.

In the late nineteen-thirties, an American psychiatrist named Hervey Cleckley began collecting data on a certain kind of patient he encountered in the course of his work in a psychiatric hospital in Augusta, Georgia. These people were from varied social and family backgrounds. Some were poor, but others were sons of Augusta’s most prosperous and respected families. Cleckley set about sharpening the vague construct of constitutional psychopathic inferiority, and distinguishing it from other forms of mental illness. He eventually isolated sixteen traits exhibited by patients he called “primary” psychopaths; these included being charming and intelligent, unreliable, dishonest, irresponsible, self-centered, emotionally shallow, and lacking in empathy and insight.

“Beauty and ugliness, except in a very superficial sense, goodness, evil, love, horror, and humor have no actual meaning, no power to move him,” Cleckley wrote of the psychopath in his 1941 book, “The Mask of Sanity,” which became the foundation of the modern science. The psychopath talks “entertainingly,” Cleckley explained, and is “brilliant and charming,” but nonetheless “carries disaster lightly in each hand.” Cleckley emphasized his subjects’ deceptive, predatory nature, writing that the psychopath is capable of “concealing behind a perfect mimicry of normal emotion, fine intelligence, and social responsibility a grossly disabled and irresponsible personality.” This mimicry allows psychopaths to function, and even thrive, in normal society. Indeed, as Cleckley also argued, the individualistic, winner-take-all aspect of American culture nurtures psychopathy.

The psychiatric profession wanted little to do with psychopathy, for several reasons. For one thing, it was thought to be incurable. Not only did the talking cure fail with psychopaths but several studies suggested that talk therapy made the condition worse, by enabling psychopaths to practice the art of manipulation. There were no valid instruments to measure the personality traits that were commonly associated with the condition; researchers could study only the psychopaths’ behavior, in most cases through their criminal records. Finally, the emphasis in the word “psychopath” on an internal sickness was at odds with liberal mid-century social thought, which tended to look for external causes of social deviancy; “sociopath,” coined in 1930 by the psychologist G. E. Partridge, became the preferred term. In 1958, the American Psychiatric Association used the term “sociopathic personality” to describe the disorder in its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. In the 1968 edition, the condition was renamed “general antisocial personality disorder.”

Cleckley’s book fell out of favor, and Cleckley described himself late in life as “a voice crying in the wilderness.” When he died, in 1984, he was remembered mostly for his popular study of multiple-personality disorder, written with Corbett Thigpen, “The Three Faces of Eve.”

In 1960, Robert Hare took a job as the resident psychologist in a maximum-security prison about twenty miles outside Vancouver. On his first day, a tall, slim, dark-haired inmate came into his office and said, “Hey, Doc, how’s it going? Look, I’ve got a problem. I need your help.” Hare later wrote of this encounter, “The air around him seemed to buzz, and the eye contact he made with me was so direct and intense that I wondered if I had ever really looked anybody in the eye before.” Hare asked the inmate, whom he called Ray in his account, to tell him about his problem. “In response, he pulled out a knife and waved it in front of my nose, all the while smiling and maintaining that intense eye contact,” Hare wrote in his 1993 book, “Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us.” Ray said he was planning to use the knife on another inmate, who was making overtures to his “ ‘protégé,’ a prison term for the more passive member of a homosexual pairing.” Ray never harmed Hare, but he successfully manipulated him throughout Hare’s eight months at the prison, and two and a half years later, after Hare had joined the faculty at the University of British Columbia, Ray, now paroled, tried to register there with a forged transcript.

Hare wasn’t familiar with the psychopathy literature when he was working at the prison. Later that year, he moved with his family to London, Ontario, where he pursued a Ph.D. at the University of Western Ontario. (When his brakes failed at the first steep hill on the trip east, he recalled that Ray had worked on his car in the prison garage.) His dissertation was on the effects of punishment on human learning and performance. One day in the library, he came across “The Mask of Sanity.” Reading Cleckley’s case histories put Hare in mind of Ray, and of other types he had encountered in the maximum-security prison. Were these men psychopaths? Over the next year, Hare read not only Cleckley but also the early literature Cleckley had synthesized. After receiving his doctorate, in 1963, and returning to Vancouver, he set about what would be his life’s work: the study of psychopathy, and the creation of the Psychopathy Checklist, the twenty-item diagnostic instrument that Kiehl is using at Western.

Thanks to the checklist, scientists working in different places can be confident that the subjects they are studying are taxonomically similar. The PCL also has a wide variety of forensic applications. It is employed throughout Canada in parole-board hearings and is gaining popularity in the U.S. In the thirty-seven states that allow the death penalty, a high psychopathy score is often used by prosecutors as an “aggravating factor” in the penalty phase of capital cases. Psychopathy scores have also been used in child-custody cases; a high score may result in one parent’s loss of custody. Hare’s influence on the field of psychopathy is profound. Today, Hare’s former students hold important administrative positions throughout the Canadian prison system, and are prominently represented in the next two generations of psychopathy researchers around the world.

One day when Kent Kiehl was eight years old, his father, Jeff, a copy editor at the Tacoma News Tribune, came home talking about a local man named Ted Bundy. “This was a guy who had grown up just down the street,” Kiehl told me, “and he had supposedly killed all these women.” Bundy, whose family moved to Tacoma when he was a child, is known to have sexually assaulted and murdered at least thirty women in the nineteen-seventies. But to outward appearances he was an exceptionally promising young man. He had received glowing letters of recommendation both from a psychology professor at the University of Washington, where he was an undergraduate (“he is exceedingly bright, personable, highly motivated, and conscientious”), and from the Republican governor of Washington, Dan Evans, for whom he worked. His good looks, charm, and verbal skills—qualities that made him such an effective predator—convinced many in the Tacoma community that he was innocent, up until the time he was convicted of murder and sentenced to death, in 1979. Bundy was executed in Florida in 1989.

... ... ...

Another hypothesis is that psychopaths lack fear of personal injury and, more important, moral fear—fear of punishment. David Lykken pioneered this theory in the nineteen-fifties, and it has been taken up by James Blair, Christopher Patrick, and others. The updated version of this model posits that psychopathy is a result of a dysfunction of the amygdala, the almond-shaped bundle of gray matter situated in the midbrain, which is another area instrumental in emotional processing.

... ... ...

Today, Kiehl and Hare have a complementary but complicated relationship. Kiehl claims Hare as a mentor, and sees his own work as validating Hare’s checklist, by advancing a neurological mechanism for psychopathy. Hare is less gung ho about using fMRI as a diagnostic tool. “Some claim, in a sense, this is the new phrenology,” Hare said, referring to the discredited nineteenth-century practice of reading the bumps on people’s heads, “only this time the bumps are on the inside.” (Hare himself is a “strong proponent” of brain-imaging technology, but he noted that scans in isolation will always be insufficient.) Hare sees himself as a generalist, and Kiehl as “more of a data-driven guy.” Hare added that, while Kiehl’s brashness sometimes puts people off, “that’s why Kent gets things done.”

Robert Hare is bearded and slight, and has a detached, feline manner. He is in his early seventies, and his position at the University of British Columbia is emeritus. I met him in May, at a Homewood Suites hotel in Albany, where he was conducting a two-day seminar in psychopathy and the use of the checklist, sponsored by the New York State Office of Mental Health’s Bureau of Sex Offender Education and Treatment. A substantial percentage of sex offenders are psychopaths. New York State recently began creating special programs housed in psychiatric facilities for sex offenders who have completed their prison terms but are judged too dangerous to release.

Hare’s Psychopathy Checklist now exists in three variations. (There’s one for juveniles, the PCL-YV, and one designed for the general population—the “screening” version.) He collects a royalty fee every time the official PCL scoring sheet is used. The complete psychopathy kit, which includes a book-length manual on how to administer the checklist, costs two hundred and sixty-three dollars. It has been translated into more than twenty languages. The Albany seminar was one of roughly half a dozen that Hare conducts each year. He was giving a talk on psychopathy and culpability in Las Vegas the following week; then he was off to Rome, to instruct the carabinieri in the use of the checklist, and in profiling psychopaths. In Albany, his audience was composed mostly of psychologists and other mental-health professionals.

Hare sees himself as continuing the work that Cleckley started—warning society of a devastating and costly mental disorder that it mostly continues to ignore. Hare’s forensic experience has taught him that psychopathy is of vital concern to mental-health workers in prisons as well as to people in law enforcement and on parole boards; people who come into daily contact with dangerous and destructive individuals need an instrument that will allow them to identify psychopaths and make risk assessments based on their predictive behavior. (According to several national and international studies, psychopathic criminal offenders are three times more likely to return to prison within a year of their release.) Mary Ellen O’Toole, one of the F.B.I.’s top criminal profilers, whose job is “to investigate the most extreme and violent crimes from all over the world, including serial murders, serial rapes, child abductions, school shootings, workplace violence, domestic homicides, and other crimes of extreme and/or bizarre violence,” told me that she uses her psychopathy training, some of which came under Hare, when she is investigating crime scenes. She looks for evidence of, “for example, lack of remorse, thrill seeking, or impulsivity that could be consistent with the traits and characteristics of psychopathy.” This information, in turn, can be useful in “the investigation, the interview, even the prosecution of the offender.”

Hare wants to disassociate psychopathy from the DSM’s catchall diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder. “It’s like having pneumonia versus having a cold,” he said. “They share some common symptoms, but one is much more virulent.” Before the fourth edition of the DSM came out, in 1994, Hare published several articles pointing to field research that showed a difference between psychopathy and A.P.D. John Gunderson, the psychiatrist who chaired the personality-disorders work group for the revision, told Hare that, intellectually, he had “won the battle,” Hare recalls; even so, in DSM-IV “psychopathy” appears only as a synonym for A.P.D. (Gunderson says this was a function of institutional inertia.) Hare has continued to follow preparations for the next edition, due out in 2012, and recently sent an e-mail to a senior member of the task force inquiring about what revisions, if any, were planned for A.P.D. The reply, Hare said, was noncommittal.

Hare has published two books that translate some of the concepts of psychopathy for a general audience and attempt to teach people how to identify the “successful psychopaths” in their midst. In the introduction to “Without Conscience,” he writes, “It is very likely that at some point in your life you will come into painful contact with a psychopath. For your own physical, psychological, and financial well-being it is crucial that you know how to identify the psychopath.” Among the professions likely to attract psychopaths, he writes, are law enforcement, the military, politics, and medicine, although he notes that these have norms and are self-policing. The most agreeable vocation for psychopaths, according to Hare, is business. In his second book, “Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths Go to Work,” written with Paul Babiack, Hare flirts with pop psychology when he points out that many traits that may be desirable in a corporate context, such as ruthlessness, lack of social conscience, and single-minded devotion to success, would be considered psychopathic outside of it.

On the evening of the first day of the seminar, Hare and I went out for dinner at Smokey Bones, a rib joint. As I sped along Wolf Road, a traffic light ahead turned yellow. I momentarily thought about flooring it, and probably would have, if not for my passenger; instead, I slowed down and stopped. But the car on my left went flying by, through what was now a red light.

“Wow, look at that,” Hare said. “Now, that man might be a psychopath. That was psychopathic behavior, certainly—to put others in the intersection in danger in order to realize your own goals.”

But the problem is that “psychopathic behavior”—egocentricity, for example, or lack of realistic long-term goals—is present in far more than one per cent of the adult male population. This blurriness in the psychopathic profile can make it possible to see psychopaths everywhere or nowhere. In the mid-fifties, Robert Lindner, the author of “Rebel Without a Cause: A Hypnoanalysis of a Criminal Psychopath,” explained juvenile delinquency as an outbreak of mass psychopathy. Norman Mailer inverted this notion in “The White Negro,” admiring the hipster as a “philosophical psychopath” for having the courage of nonconformity. In the sixties, sociopathy replaced psychopathy as the dominant construct. Now, in our age of genetic determinism, society is once again seeing psychopaths everywhere, and this will no doubt provoke others to say they are nowhere, and the cycle of overexposure and underfunding will continue.

Hare is urbane and well read, and during dinner he seasoned his clinical descriptions of the psychopath with references to characters from film and literature. Harry Lime, the villain played by Orson Welles in “The Third Man,” is one example. “Iago was a classic psychopath,” he added. “The way Shakespeare wrote him. In films and plays he is portrayed as evil-seeming, but he isn’t written that way.” Hare was friendly but wary of me—several times he said, “I have to see your eyeballs before I can tell you that.” We talked about the checklist. “Am I happy about the way the checklist can be used?” Hare asked rhetorically. “No, not always. Am I happy it is used to help condemn people to death? No, I am not.” Nor does he approve of its use in child-custody cases. However, he believes that, when properly used as a predictor of risk in forensic settings, the social benefits of the checklist far outweigh its drawbacks. Hare rejects the notion that a distinction ought to be made between a violent psychopath, like Ted Bundy, and a nonviolent one who commits financial crimes. Both, he said, are willing to do whatever it takes. He went on, “Can you say Ted Bundy caused more disaster than the guys at Enron? How many destroyed lives and suicides followed as a result of so many people losing their savings?”

... ... ...

Schadenfreude - Definition from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary

Main Entry:

scha·den·freu·de

Pronunciation:

\ˈshä-d^ən-ˌfrȯi-də\

Function:

noun

Usage:

often capitalized

Etymology:

German, from Schaden damage + Freude joy

Date:

1895

: enjoyment obtained from the troubles of others

Schadenfreude - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A very apt word describing sociopath sadism. 

Schadenfreude (IPA: [ˈʃaːdənˌfʁɔʏ̯də] Audio (German) (help·info)) is enjoyment taken from the misfortune of someone else. The word referring to this emotion has been borrowed from German by the English language^[1] and is sometimes also used as a loanword by other languages.

Philosopher and sociologist Theodor Adorno defined schadenfreude as “largely unanticipated delight in the suffering of another which is cognized as trivial and/or appropriate.”^[2]

Spelling, etymology, and English equivalents

In German, Schadenfreude is capitalized, as are all nouns in the German language. When used as a loanword in English, however, it is not, unless the origin of the word is meant to be emphasized. The corresponding German adjective is schadenfroh.

The word derives from Schaden (damage, harm) and Freude (joy); Schaden derives from the Middle High German schade, from the Old High German scado. Freude comes from the Middle High German vreude, from the Old High German frewida, from frō, (happy). A distinction exists between "secret schadenfreude" (a private feeling) and "open schadenfreude" (Hohn, a German word roughly translated as "scorn") which is outright public derision.

Little-used English words synonymous with schadenfreude have been derived from the Greek word ἐπιχαιρεκακία.^[3][4] Nathan Bailey's 18th-century Universal Etymological English Dictionary, for example, contains an entry for epicharikaky that gives its etymology as a compound of epi (upon), chaira (joy), and kakon (evil).^[5][6] A popular modern collection of rare words, however, gives its spelling as "epicaricacy." ^[7]

A more common English expression with a similar meaning is 'Roman holiday', a metaphor taken from the poem "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" by George Gordon, Lord Byron, where a gladiator in Ancient Rome expects to be "butcher'd to make a Roman holiday" while the audience would take pleasure from watching his suffering. The term suggests debauchery and disorder in addition to sadistic enjoyment.^[8]

Another phrase with a meaning similar to Schadenfreude is "morose delectation" ("delectatio morosa" in Latin), meaning "the habit of dwelling with enjoyment on evil thoughts".^[9] The medieval church taught morose delectation as a sin.^[10][11] French writer Pierre Klossowski (1905-2001) maintained that the appeal of sadism is morose delectation.^[12][13]

The Buddhist concept of mudita, "sympathetic joy" or "happiness in another's good fortune," is cited as an example of the opposite of schadenfreude.^[14][15] Alternatively envy, unhappiness in another's good fortune, could be considered the counterpart of schadenfreude.

Literary and philosophical discussion of the emotion of schadenfreude

Aristotle

In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle used the term epikhairekakia (alternatively epikairekakia; ἐπιχαιρεκακία in Greek) as part of a triad of terms, in which epikhairekakia stands as the opposite of phthonos, and nemesis occupies the mean. Nemesis is "a painful response to another's undeserved good fortune," while phthonos is "a painful response to any good fortune," deserved or not. The epikhairekakos person actually takes pleasure in another's ill fortune.^[16][17]

Seventeenth Century

During the 17th century, Robert Burton wrote in his work The Anatomy of Melancholy, "Out of these two [the concupiscible and irascible powers] arise those mixed affections and passions of anger, which is a desire of revenge; hatred, which is inveterate anger; zeal, which is offended with him who hurts that he loves; and ἐπιχαιρεκακία, a compound affection of joy and hate, when we rejoice at other men's mischief, and are grieved at their prosperity; pride, self-love, emulation, envy, shame, &c., of which elsewhere."^[18]

Scientific studies of schadenfreude

A New York Times article in 2002 cited a number of scientific studies of schadenfreude. Many such studies are based on social comparison theory, the idea that when people around us have bad luck, we look better to ourselves. Other researchers have found that people with low self-esteem are more likely to feel schadenfreude than are people who have high self-esteem.^[19]

One recent (2006) experiment suggests that men, but not women, enjoy seeing "bad" people suffer. The study was designed to measure empathy, by watching which brain centers are stimulated when subjects inside an MRI observe someone having a painful experience. Researchers expected that the brain's empathy center would show more stimulation when those seen as "good" got an electric shock than they would if the shock was given to someone the subject had reason to consider bad. This was indeed the result for their female subjects, but for male subjects the brain's pleasure centers also lit up when someone else got a shock that the male thought was well-deserved.^[20]

[Jun 18, 2008] Bad guys really do get the most girls by Mason Inman

NewScientist.com

NICE guys knew it, now two studies have confirmed it: bad boys get the most girls. The finding may help explain why a nasty suite of antisocial personality traits known as the "dark triad" persists in the human population, despite their potentially grave cultural costs.

The traits are the self-obsession of narcissism; the impulsive, thrill-seeking and callous behaviour of psychopaths; and the deceitful and exploitative nature of Machiavellianism. At their extreme, these traits would be highly detrimental for life in traditional human societies. People with these personalities risk being shunned by others and shut out of relationships, leaving them without a mate, hungry and vulnerable to predators.

But being just slightly evil could have an upside: a prolific sex life, says Peter Jonason at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces. "We have some evidence that the three traits are really the same thing and may represent a successful evolutionary strategy."

Jonason and his colleagues subjected 200 college students to personality tests designed to rank them for each of the dark triad traits. They also asked about their attitudes to sexual relationships and about their sex lives, including how many partners they'd had and whether they were seeking brief affairs.

The study found that those who scored higher on the dark triad personality traits tended to have more partners and more desire for short-term relationships, Jonason reported at the Human Behavior and Evolution Society meeting in Kyoto, Japan, earlier this month. But the correlation only held in males.

James Bond epitomises this set of traits, Jonason says. "He's clearly disagreeable, very extroverted and likes trying new things - killing people, new women." Just as Bond seduces woman after woman, people with dark triad traits may be more successful with a quantity-style or shotgun approach to reproduction, even if they don't stick around for parenting. "The strategy seems to have worked. We still have these traits," Jonason says.

This observation seems to hold across cultures. David Schmitt of Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, presented preliminary results at the same meeting from a survey of more than 35,000 people in 57 countries. He found a similar link between the dark triad and reproductive success in men. "It is universal across cultures for high dark triad scorers to be more active in short-term mating," Schmitt says. "They are more likely to try and poach other people's partners for a brief affair."

Barbara Oakley of Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, says that the studies "verify something a lot of people have conjectured about".

Christopher von Rueden of the University of California at Santa Barbara says that the studies are important because they confirm that personality variation has direct fitness consequences.

"They still have to explain why it hasn't spread to everyone," says Matthew Keller of the University of Colorado in Boulder. "There must be some cost of the traits." One possibility, both Keller and Jonason suggest, is that the strategy is most successful when dark triad personalities are rare. Otherwise, others would become more wary and guarded.

Related Articles

• Narcissists brilliant workers, but terrible colleagues 15 March 2002
• Overconfidence is a disadvantage in war 21 June 2006

Weblinks

• Peter Jonason, New Mexico State University
• David Schmitt, Bradley University
• Christopher von Rueden
• Barbara Oakley of Oakland University
• Matthew Keller, University of Colorado

From issue 2661 of New Scientist magazine, 18 June 2008, page 12

[May 23, 2008] Amazon.com The Resiliency Advantage Master Change, Thrive Under Pressure, and Bounce Back from Setbacks Al Siebert Books

A practical book the provides valuable tools for confronting life's difficult challenges!!!, December 29, 2006
 

By	Stephen Pletko "Uncle Stevie" (London, Ontario, Canada) - See all my reviews

+++++

Self-rate yourself on a scale from 1 (meaning little agreement) to 5 (meaning strongly agree) on the following ten items:

(1) In a crisis or chaotic situation, I calm myself and focus on taking useful actions.
(2) I'm usually optimistic, seeing difficulties as temporary and believe things will eventually turn out well.
(3) I can tolerate high levels of uncertainty and ambiguity.
(4) I'm good at bouncing back from difficulties and quickly adapt to new developments.
(5) I'm self-confident and have a healthy concept of w