Being a psychopath can have advantages, study finds

The tendency to lie, manipulate and not empathize can have positive effects for oneself.

When talking about people with a high degree of psychopathy, we often think of individuals with a penchant for crime and destroying everything they touch. However, it is possible that traits linked to a preference for manipulating others may have been an evolutionary advantage.

In fact, recent research has found indications that, in certain environments, psychopathy is a reproductive positive.. In the end, what serves the perpetuation of genes does not necessarily mean that society improves.

Psychopathy as an advantage

Psychopaths are usually seen as people with a mental disorder, individuals in whom there is something "wrong". However, as a behavioral pattern, whether or not something works depends on whether it fits the context, as a behavioral pattern, whether something works or doesn't work depends on whether it fits the context. and, although we can decide whether something is appropriate or not depending on its morality, there is another possible criterion: does it help to survive and reproduce?

Psychopathy may express itself through undesirable actions, such as lying, emotional manipulation or even abuse, but the hard truth is that, in theory, this need not mean that one will live less, as would be expected of someone who has a serious illness or, as it is commonly understood, a serious illness, as it is commonly understood, a personality disorder..

Greater chance of having offspring?

If psychopathy is an evolutionarily adaptive trait, this means that the gene variants that cause it to appear (the psychopathy alleles) are treated favorably by natural selection, at least in some contexts.

For this research, a sample of 181 inmates from prisons in Serbia were sampled, and psychological tests measuring psychopathic traits were administered to them. (among the prison population, these traits tend to be more present than among the rest of humanity).

The results obtained showed a curious trend: prisoners with higher psychopathy scores were more likely to have more sons or daughters. Specifically, the psychological characteristics that seemed to be most advantageous in transmitting the genes were the tendency to manipulation and inflated self-image, while insensitivity and coldness were only found in men who had lived in harsh and competitive contexts.

Why might it be advantageous?

This result does not indicate that being a psychopath is a good thing or that it helps to find a partner and have more offspring, just like that. From an evolutionary point of view the value of a personal characteristic always depends on where one lives and the type of relationships one has with others. and the type of relationships with other individuals.

In the same way that in a place with little food strong and big animals do not survive, in some places psychopaths will have more problems to adapt. The question is to know whether, in practice, the contexts that give privileged treatment to psychopathy are more or less frequent.

It should be borne in mind that, in today's contexts, most people in Western countries live in places where cooperation and non-aggression pacts prevail.

Thus, there is reason to believe that in general terms, people with high psychopathy would not necessarily have an easier time spreading their genes (and, in particular, those linked to the propensity to develop such behavioral patterns).

Creating more collaborative societies

This study serves to draw attention to an important fact: that which we find morally undesirable need not be "punished" by nature."by nature.

If we do not create societies in which cooperation or good behavior is rewarded, manipulation, deceit and individualism can be another option through which to live, something as valid as altruism. That is why we must do our part to make, among all of us, being collaborative worthwhile.

There is no automatic mechanism to punish bad behavior, but there are ways to create contexts in which we all take care of each other. If human beings are famous for modifying the environment to suit their needs, they should also be famous for changing the context in which they live to modify the very society in which they live.