THE ESSENTIAL
- Psychopathy affects 2% to 3% of the world’s population.
- It is mainly men who are concerned, between 20 and 30 years old.
In a new study published in Evolutionary Psychology, researchers argue that psychopaths are not necessarily mentally ill, but rather the result of a natural evolution.
Meta-analysis
“Psychopathy has been conceptualized as a mental disorder, but there is growing evidence that it may instead be an alternative and adaptive strategy” development, they write in the preamble.
To try to see more clearly, scientists have compiled and cross-checked sixteen old studies that associated psychopathy with being left-handed (a long-demonized physical characteristic, Ed). “We meta-analyzed 16 studies that examined the association between psychopathy and being left-handed in various populations. Conclusion: There was no variation in the rate of left-handedness between high- and high-level participants. at low levels of psychopathy. Ditto for psychopathic and non-psychopathic offenders”, they report.
Survive in a hostile world
For them, the personality traits that characterize psychopaths – aggressiveness, insensitivity, inability to feel remorse – would therefore have developed to help human beings survive in a hostile and competitive world, constituting in fact an advantage over others.
If the methodology of this study is not very solid, it nevertheless refers to a debate which increasingly agitates the world of psychiatry: what is a mental illness, and can we really think in terms of of categories? For example, the inclusion in the latest DSM5 of a new disease called “pathological mourning” has caused many psychiatrists to react, who consider that no bereavement is “abnormal”.