Suchergebnisse

Different personalities constitute modern workplaces. One of such personalities is the corporate psychopath, whose presence poses manifold threats to organizational existence. This study examines the personality of the corporate psychopath and specifically investigates the relationship between corporate psychopathy and employee burnout. A total of 104 respondents within a university setting in Nigeria completed measures of corporate psychopathy to establish the existence of the traits in their managers; a self-report measure of employee burnout was also completed. Corporate psychopathy correlates positively and significantly with emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and decreased personal accomplishment. Results indicate that corporate psychopathy is an underlying factor of employee burnout. Enhanced whistleblowing structures and ethical regeneration are proffered to mitigate the consequences of corporate psychopathy in the face of cultural complexes that fan its flames.

As the use of some psychoactive substances continues to be a global health risk, it is important to understand why people use them. We compared the predictive power of psychopathy and masochism with regard to lifetime recreational drug use and tested the underlying motives in a sample of 415 US-based adults. Psychopathy predicted use of illicit drugs, cannabis, and nicotine, while masochism predicted cannabis, alcohol, and caffeine use. Both traits were related to most motives, but the motives differentially predicted substance use. Expansion motivation was the sole motive for illicit drug use, whereas cannabis was predicted mainly by expansion and enhancement. Alcohol, nicotine, and caffeine were used to escape daily worries, and alcohol was further used for social reasons. Benign masochism is a newly identified predictor of popular drug use. Future research could investigate masochism and expansion motivation as predictors of potentially harmful substance use.

Abstract. The link between psychopathy and violence has been well documented. Estimates suggest psychopathic offenders are responsible for as much as 40% of violence-related crime, and that they show rates of violent recidivism up to five times higher than non-psychopathic offenders. Existing theories of the disorder argue that this violence stems from a core insensitivity to emotional/aversive information, or from a core inability to optimally allocate processing resources in complex environments. However, some newer findings have been difficult for existing theories to assimilate; moreover, successful treatment programs based off current conceptualizations have been slow to develop. With this in mind, the current paper proposes a new motivational framework for psychopathy, within which the disorder is conceptualized as stemming from more strategic, motivated processes. The paper begins by reviewing traditional theories of psychopathy and highlighting their explanatory strengths and limitations. The proposed motivational framework is then outlined, and a supportive rationale for the framework provided. Next, the paper undertakes a selective review of some of the most empirically supported features of the disorder, to highlight how these features may be productively reformulated within a motivational framework. Finally, the paper suggests several methods through which an empirical evaluation of the proposed ideas may be undertaken, and explores potential implications of a motivational framework for next-generation rehabilitation and treatment opportunities.

What are the principles that guide this return to indeterminacy? Taken at face value, rehabilitation would seem to be the goal of the civil commitment provisions that make avail- able a treatment program to cure and reintegrate sexual offenders. Of course, rehabilitation was unequivocally rejected by determinate sentencing reformers, who considered it both discriminatory and ineffective.6 An alternative interpretation is that the sexual predator provisions lead in an incapacitative direction-that is, they are designed to predict which offenders are so dangerous that they must be more or less permanently institutionalized to protect the society. Either way, the sexual predator legislation amounts to a repudiation of desert based, determinate sentencing based on the principle that sentencing has to do with past rather than future crimes. How are we to account for this retreat from the principles of determinate sentencing? The retreat may be viewed as an isolated exception or as an indication of a shift in sentencing philosophies. Regardless of which approach best describes the retreat from determinate sentencing, our objective is to under- stand the criminological assumptions and political forces that drive the sexual predator legislation. This Article focuses on the political process and, in particular, on the role of victim advocacy. We also want to situate the sexual predator provisions criminologically-that is, to understand the criminological argument in favor of these provisions and to explore the societal implications of moving sentencing in this direction.

Individuals high in psychopathy are interpersonally manipulative, exhibit callous affect, and have criminal tendencies. The present study examines whether these attributes of psychopathy are correlated with linguistic patterns present in everyday online communication. Participants' emails, SMS messages, and Facebook messages were collected and analyzed in relation to their scores on the Self-Report Psychopathy Test III. The findings suggest that psychopathic tendencies leave a trace in online discourse, and that different forms of online media sometimes moderate the association between a linguistic dimension and psychopathy scores. Consistent with previous studies and the emotional and interpersonal deficits central to psychopathy, participants higher in psychopathy showed more evidence of psychological distancing, wrote less comprehensible discourse, and produced more interpersonally hostile language. The results reveal that linguistic traces of psychopathy can be detected in online communication, and that those with higher traits of psychopathy fail to modify their language use across media types.

We surveyed evaluators who conduct sexually violent predator evaluations ( N = 95) regarding the frequency with which they use the Psychopathy Checklist–Revised (PCL-R), their rationale for use, and scoring practices. Findings suggest that evaluators use the PCL-R in sexually violent predator cases because of its perceived versatility, providing information about both mental disorder and risk. Several findings suggested gaps between research and routine practice. For example, relatively few evaluators reported providing the factor and facet scores that may be the strongest predictors of future offending, and many assessed the combination of PCL-R scores and sexual deviance using deviance measures (e.g., paraphilia diagnoses) that have not been examined in available studies. There was evidence of adversarial allegiance in PCL-R score interpretation, as well as a "bias blind spot" in PCL-R and other risk measure (Static-99R) scoring; evaluators tended to acknowledge the possibility of bias in other evaluators but not in themselves. Findings suggest the need for evaluators to carefully consider the extent to which their practices are consistent with emerging research and to be attuned to the possibility that working in adversarial settings may influence their scoring and interpretation practices.

Psychopathy has been shown to be a risk factor for antisocial behavior, aggression, violence, and criminal offending. Elucidating the variables that predict the likelihood of psychopathy, therefore, is important. The current study used the risk and resiliency approach to test the possible risk and protective factors of primary psychopathy using a noninstitutionalized college-aged sample. Of particular interest, we tested the individual and cumulative risk of several defining features of emerging adulthood (assessed using the Inventory of the Dimensions of Emerging Adulthood measure), sex of participant, and trait mindfulness. Participants ( N = 822) from various colleges and universities in the United States completed questionnaires used to assess the pertinent variables using a correlational design. Results showed that sex (i.e., male), low mindfulness, low identity exploration, and low other-focused orientation were risk factors for primary psychopathy. Results are discussed in terms of the importance of emerging adulthood development.

Aim: This study was performed to investigate relations between psychopathology and psychopathy in adolescent female and male detainees. Method: We examined 91 male and 123 female adolescent detainees (aged 14–19) for psychopathology -using the Youth Self Report, the Overt Aggression Scale-Modified and a Conduct Disorder Self Report Scale- and for psychopathic dimensions using the psychopathy checklist youth version (PCL:YV). Based on a linear regression analysis we compared the specific associations between psychopathology and psychopathy in both male and female delinquent juveniles. Results: Our results revealed higher scores for externalizing behavior and psychopathic dimensions in delinquent males, and higher internalizing problem scores in delinquent females. Furthermore, we found a positive relationship between suicidal behavior and the psychopathy total score as well as the affective, the lifestyle and the antisocial dimension only in girls. No association was found for suicidal behavior in boys. Regarding anxious-depressive behavior, we found a negative relation to the psychopathy total score and to the affective psychopathy factor for the boys. Conclusion: Expectedly, the population of incarcerated adolescents exhibited a high prevalence of psychopathology. At the same time our results referred to meaningful gender-related differences with respect to associations with psychopathy. The gender-related differences in psychopathological symptoms could indicate varied subtypes of psychopathy in boys and girls.