i am looking at a list of traits for being a psychopath. now what does this mean?

Question

General poverty in major affective reactions

this too

Specific loss of insight

Answer 1

psy·cho·path (sk-pth) Pronunciation Key
n.
A person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse

Answer 2

affective is from the word affect. Affect is the emotional part of a person. Poverty means lack of. A psychopath does not have much of an emotional life.

Interestingly though, psychopaths do not come across that way to regular people because psychopaths have studied the emotional lives of others and know how to act.

Sometimes you can identify a psychopath because the pieces of the puzzle don't fit or it doesn't all add up. To me, Scott Peterson was a psychopath as I thought he faked various emotional reactions, but behind the scenes he was unknowingly filmed showing no reaction to his wife's disappearance.

Specific loss of insight - The psychopath operates according to his own mind rather than what society dictates. He has to bridge this huge gap between his unusual thinking patterns and society's expectations. To me, the psychopath does this more or less successfully, but can't always keep up the charade. When the psychopath opts for behavior in accordance with his character, there is a loss of insight in that he doesn't function realistically but either believes he is or that he can get away with it. In other words, these people become dumb in a way.

Answer 3

Psychopaths don't react to anything as would normal people. A tragedy may elicit nothing or a inappropriate response such as laughter. They learn reactions by watching others and therefore they react a bit behind most because they have to consciously decide which reaction was correct for the event. This is what is meant by a general poverty in major affective reactions. After all a person able to disembowel a child and then being able to sit down to a rare roast beef dinner is a person not all together human.

Answer 4

a lack of emotional ability to respond normally. Affective Disorder

Answer 5

Answers come from the strangest of places, sometimes! From Chris Barr [e-mail] 11 Mar 1999:

"Let me outline briefly the classic description of the psychopath from a short piece I wrote recently and called, somewhat tongue in cheek, "How to Spot a Psychopath, a Voters' Guide." It draws heavily on Hervey Cleckley's ground breaking work, "The Mask of Sanity."

"General poverty in major affective reactions."

The psychopath, Cleckly says, "always shows general poverty of affect. Although it is true that he sometimes becomes excited and shouts as if in rage or seems to exult in enthusiasm and again weeps in what appear to be bitter tears or speaks eloquently and mournful words about his misfortunes or his follies, the conviction dawns on those who observe him carefully that here we deal with a readiness of expression rather than a strength of feeling."

Cleckly describes the "emotional poverty, the complete lack of strong or tragic feeling universally found in all the psychopaths personally observed...." He expresses bewilderment at some literature that ascribes to them "powerful instinctual drives and passions.... Although weak and even infantile drives displaying themselves theatrically in the absence of ordinary inhibitions may impress the layman as mighty forces," he chooses to be charitable to experienced psychiatrists and suggests that they must be referring to some other type of disorder. The irony is thinly veiled.

"Specific loss of insight."

Cleckly asserts that the psychopath "lacks insight to a degree seldom, if ever, found in any but the most seriously disturbed psychotic patients." [I]n the sense of realistic evaluation, the psychopath lacks insight more consistently than some schizophrenic patients. He has absolutely no capacity to see himself as others see him.... [H]e has no ability to know how others feel when they see him or to experience subjectively anything comparable about the situation. All the values, all of the major affect concerning his status, are unappreciated by him."

Cleckly expresses astonishment at this in view of the "psychopath's perfect orientation, his ability and willingness to reason or go through the forms of reasoning, and his perfect freedom from delusions or other signs of an ordinary psychosis." Later he notes that "[s]uch a deficiency of insight is harder to comprehend than the schizophrenic's deficiency, for it exists in the full presence of what are often assumed to be the qualities by which insight is gained. Yet the psychopath shows not only a deficiency but apparently a total absence of self-appraisal as a real and moving experience."

Instead of facing the facts that lead to insight, the psychopath "projects, blaming his troubles on others with the flimsiest of pretext but with elaborate and subtle rationalization." He may, from time to time, "perfunctorily admit himself to blame for everything and analyze his case from what seems to be almost a psychiatric viewpoint, but we can see that his conclusions have little actual significance for him.... The patient seems to have little or no ability to feel the significance of his situation, to experience the real emotions of regret or shame or determination to improve, or to realize that this is lacking. His clever statements have been hardly more than verbal reflexes; even his facial expressions are without the underlying content they imply."

I'm not saying anything about the source page it came from -- just don't want to go there! But at least it seems to give you the information you are looking for, I hope. The link is below. BTW, you might try posting this question to the psychology area if you don't like the answers you are getting here.

Answer 6

That phrasing would mean that the said person is majorly lacking in emotional reactions to incidents... They just don't have it in layman's terms... Peace!!!

Answer 7

If you look up "psychopath" in the dictionary, you would find a picture of Dick Cheney!

lol lol lol!

Answer 8

It means they don't respond emotionally -- either to positive or negative events.

Answer 9

Psychopath:

In lame-man's terms....they have no developed consience. When they do something, they do not know if it's right or wrong because they feel no guilt, remorse, or happiness.

Answer 10

He lacks emotion, and regrets nothing.