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Authors: M.E. Thomas
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managed to get out of scrapes, whether that meant begging for money from strangers, pleading for mercy from police, or spinning webs of lies to cover my tracks. Because I was always willing to go double or nothing and because my unlucky streaks never lasted for long, I always managed to come out okay. And precautions are expensive, either in terms of actual costs for safety or opportunity costs for risks that you could have taken but didn’t. I understand that for a lot of people precautions are worth the money for, as my friend put it, “peace of mind.” But my mind is almost always at peace no matter what I do. Which is why I never bothered to be more careful.
After a number of years of living as a self-diagnosed sociopath, even running a blog for sociopaths, I decided to get formally assessed. At first I wasn’t inclined to seek a professional diagnosis. I had read all of the criticisms of the diagnostic criteria. I trusted my own self-assessment as much as I would anybody who happened to have a degree in psychology. However, eventually I decided that the lack of formal diagnosis might lead some readers to discount my point of view. Without a formal diagnosis, how could they know that I was an actual sociopath? I figured that if I was going to risk outing myself as a member of one of the most hated subclasses of humans, I might as well ensure that people believed me.
My diagnostician was Dr. John Edens, PhD, a professor at Texas A & M and a leading researcher in the field of sociopathy,whose opinions have recently been solicited for articles in the
New York Times
and on NPR, among other media outlets. Dr. Edens worried that the test he intended to give me was strongly wedded to Hare’s criminal-oriented model of sociopathy. Given that I had no documented criminal record, Dr. Edens felt that the test score in my case might be somewhat questionable and might in fact understate my true level of sociopathic traits.
I underwent a form of the PCL-R, the PCL:SV (Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version), among other tests. The PCL:SV, as the name implies, is a checklist of criteria historically associated with Hare’s conceptualization of psychopathy. It was developed to assess for psychopathic features while relying less on the extensive file and criminal-history data required to complete the PCL-R. The PCL:SV is comprised of twelve individual criteria scored from 0 to 2 points, which are summed to form a total score from 0 to 24. The test is divided equally into two parts. Part 1 includes the personality traits typically associated with sociopathy, including lack of remorse and empathy for others, and interpersonal behaviors, including deceitfulness and grandiosity. Part 2 taps more socially deviant behaviors and activities, including irresponsibility, impulsivity, and adult antisocial behavior.
During the interview, I was asked about my significant history of impulsive, aggressive, and generally irresponsible conduct—things like fistfights and theft—that, while perhaps not having resulted in criminal charges, easily could have led to various encounters with the criminal justice system under different life circumstances. Dr. Edens noted in my report that these actions appear to have been almost entirely for thrill-seeking purposes rather than for any type of economic gain or other instrumental purpose. He noted: “Whether Ms. Thomas’s lack of police contact has been due to her successfullymanipulating her way out of ‘jams,’ various protective factors evident in her life (e.g., high intelligence and educational success, generally supportive family structure, and other socioeconomic advantages), random luck, or some combination of all of the above is unclear at this time.” I talked about my family, my reckless teenage years, my inability to stick with my jobs after law school, and my subsequent self-analysis that had led me to his office, telling Dr. Edens stories that I had all but forgotten.
I scored a
After a number of years of living as a self-diagnosed sociopath, even running a blog for sociopaths, I decided to get formally assessed. At first I wasn’t inclined to seek a professional diagnosis. I had read all of the criticisms of the diagnostic criteria. I trusted my own self-assessment as much as I would anybody who happened to have a degree in psychology. However, eventually I decided that the lack of formal diagnosis might lead some readers to discount my point of view. Without a formal diagnosis, how could they know that I was an actual sociopath? I figured that if I was going to risk outing myself as a member of one of the most hated subclasses of humans, I might as well ensure that people believed me.
My diagnostician was Dr. John Edens, PhD, a professor at Texas A & M and a leading researcher in the field of sociopathy,whose opinions have recently been solicited for articles in the
New York Times
and on NPR, among other media outlets. Dr. Edens worried that the test he intended to give me was strongly wedded to Hare’s criminal-oriented model of sociopathy. Given that I had no documented criminal record, Dr. Edens felt that the test score in my case might be somewhat questionable and might in fact understate my true level of sociopathic traits.
I underwent a form of the PCL-R, the PCL:SV (Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version), among other tests. The PCL:SV, as the name implies, is a checklist of criteria historically associated with Hare’s conceptualization of psychopathy. It was developed to assess for psychopathic features while relying less on the extensive file and criminal-history data required to complete the PCL-R. The PCL:SV is comprised of twelve individual criteria scored from 0 to 2 points, which are summed to form a total score from 0 to 24. The test is divided equally into two parts. Part 1 includes the personality traits typically associated with sociopathy, including lack of remorse and empathy for others, and interpersonal behaviors, including deceitfulness and grandiosity. Part 2 taps more socially deviant behaviors and activities, including irresponsibility, impulsivity, and adult antisocial behavior.
During the interview, I was asked about my significant history of impulsive, aggressive, and generally irresponsible conduct—things like fistfights and theft—that, while perhaps not having resulted in criminal charges, easily could have led to various encounters with the criminal justice system under different life circumstances. Dr. Edens noted in my report that these actions appear to have been almost entirely for thrill-seeking purposes rather than for any type of economic gain or other instrumental purpose. He noted: “Whether Ms. Thomas’s lack of police contact has been due to her successfullymanipulating her way out of ‘jams,’ various protective factors evident in her life (e.g., high intelligence and educational success, generally supportive family structure, and other socioeconomic advantages), random luck, or some combination of all of the above is unclear at this time.” I talked about my family, my reckless teenage years, my inability to stick with my jobs after law school, and my subsequent self-analysis that had led me to his office, telling Dr. Edens stories that I had all but forgotten.
I scored a
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