4 ms·
The article is kind of all over the place. It's a bit grating to me, because it's a long form piece attempting to grapple with a complex subject, but it's overl
by dsacco 9y ago
The article is kind of all over the place. It's a bit grating to me, because it's a long form piece attempting to grapple with a complex subject, but it's overly sensationalized and doesn't meaningfully differentiate itself from the media representation. Consider that the article insists on using the colloquial, imprecise and emotionally charged term "psychopath" - the clinical diagnosis, antisocial personality disorder, is not mentioned once in the entire article, despite the fact that the author acknowledges the stigma inherent in the disorder. The title itself is clearly sensationalized. Furthermore, it has passages like this one:
Like the guy standing 20 feet away from me in the North Hall of Mendota Juvenile Treatment Center, in Madison, Wisconsin. The tall, lanky teenager has just emerged from his cell. Two staff members cuff his wrists, shackle his feet, and begin to lead him away. Suddenly he swivels to face me and laughs—a menacing laugh that gives me chills. As young men yell expletives, banging on the metal doors of their cells, and others stare silently through their narrow plexiglass windows, I think, This is as close as I get to Lord of the Flies.
That's a laughably sensationalized and stereotypical depiction of someone with antisocial personality disorder, even one given to criminal behavior. On the one hand it's trying to evoke images of children who are wildly remorseless, on the other hand it talks about the "chills" you get from interacting with these people.
It feels like the article decided to play up the angle of, "What if your child was a psychopath?" instead of realistically tackling the subject in a new way. It's just perpetuating the stigma that already exists - "psychopaths" are either remorseless killers with an insatiable thirst for violence, or they're hyper-efficient captains of their fields. I honestly expect much more nuance and integrity in a long form piece approaching this subject.
- scott_s 9y agoThe article does mention the clinical diagnosis, but the one for children: "Samantha was diagnosed with conduct disorder with callous and unemotional traits. She had all the characteristics of a budding psychopath." Antisocial personality disorder is, as far as I know, used for adults.
- UnpossibleJim 9y agoI think the youngest diagnoses was 12 (I need to double check) but it, generally, begins to manifest at puberty to mid-twenties, barring some jarring event. Even then, that is usually diagnosed as PTSD with Atypical symptoms, displaying in antisocial behavior. It's been a while since I was in school, so categorization may have (and has, since a new DSM has been published) changed, but they rarely make huge changes. It's, generally, language to accord to the societal language.
- scott_s 9y agoThe point of this article, and one I mention in another comment (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14359033 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14359033), is that some of the behavior associated with antisocial personality disorder appear to manifest much earlier than puberty. In that case, they use the diagnoses of callous and unemotional traits.
- mtdewcmu 9y agoThe really broad, overarching point of the article is that a treatment facility was getting good results in children previously considered hopeless. The novel technique is using positive, rather than negative, reinforcement. It seems kind of ironic that the one technique nobody thought to try was being positive.
- pmiller2 9y agoFunny you should mention PTSD. The treatment they describe in the article is reminiscent of exposure therapy for PTSD, except it seems to have a different theoretical basis. Rather than calming fear by repeated exposure in a safe environment, it looks like they're trying to blunt a reward response from hurting people by not giving them the reaction they're after.
- mzs 9y agoYes DSM-5 allowed adolescents to be diagnosed with a number of personality disorders previously reserved for adults, but antisocial personality disorder remains adult only.
- eric_h 9y agoI agree that this article was too long and overly sensationalized, but I think at the very least I learned a little bit regarding the progress in the field of treating these behaviors. The concept of coopting the reward system rather than using punishment is a somewhat novel concept to me (with the exception of dog training)
- phren0logy 9y agoI'm a child and adolescent forensic psychiatrist. The omission of psychopathy from the DSM was a considered decision, but not everyone agreed with it. People with psychopathy often exhibit antisocial / criminal behavior, but not everyone who exhibits criminal behavior has the deficit of empathy that characterizes psychopathy. I work in juvenile prisons, and most of the kids have had a very difficult life and have never been able to trust or rely on the adults in their lives who were supposed to take care of them. Almost all of these, with patience and kindness, can learn what it means to trust someone. Others struggle with it, and don't grasp the value of other people beyond what that person can do for them. What I do think is much sensationalized is the idea that psychopaths enjoy violence. This can be true, but is hardly a hallmark. Most of them are best described as callous, and are not deterred by the effect of their actions on others, but aren't violent for the sake of being violent.
- jorvi 9y agoI always make this mental distinction: to psychopaths, emotions are alien, including fear. That's why they _can_ be such remorseless killers, almost not caring about self-preservation. They'd look at a distressed human like we'd look at a twittering bird. Next to this are sociopaths, who actually have emotions, understand them in others, but only care for themselves and thus game the entire system of human interaction. A psychopath would be able to stab a bystander `because he looked at me funny-like` whereas a sociopath would abhor this violence, but _would_ be okay with gaming his parents out of €50,000, use this to set up a fake investment company, con 20,000 people out of their retirement savings and then just disappear. Is there any grounds to this distinction?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- woodandsteel 9y agoYou present yourself as having some knowledge in this area. That being the case, what do you think of the treatments presented in the article?
- qb45 9y ago> On the one hand it's trying to evoke images of children who are wildly remorseless, on the other hand it talks about the "chills" you get from interacting with these people. You reminded me of one guy who said he lived 20 years believing that knees shaking out of fear is some cheesy bullshit made up by Looney Tunes until he actually experienced it. Is that what your problem is? Because otherwise I fail to see the WTF here.