Sociopath vs Psychopath Test - The Differences

in this video you're going to learn about a subject that fascinates scares and intrigues many psychopaths and i'm also going to talk to you about a subject that equally fascinates scares and intrigues many sociopaths but before we start do you know the difference between the two these two terms psychopath and sociopath are often used interchangeably they're used to describe a person who is for a lack of a better word crazy it's not exactly nice to call someone a psychopath or a sociopath even if they did something that hurt your feelings or someone else's feelings and it might also not be accurate either i've actually just created a sociopath versus psychopath quiz that you can take to determine if one of your friends or your parents or someone that you know displays sociopathic traits psychopathic traits or doesn't present any of these if you're curious there's a link below you can take that quiz for free now while psychopaths and sociopaths have a lot of common traits there are subtle differences between these two terms let's explore how the american psychiatric association defines both of these terms and what separates a psychopath or sociopath from the rest of the normal population so where can you find information about psychopaths sociopaths and alike in the apas diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders this is also known as the dsm now the manual is in its fifth edition and has been used by professionals to diagnose patients since 2003 but the dsm-5 the current edition doesn't have a specific diagnosis for psychopathy or sociopathy instead both of these terms fall under a disorder called anti-social personality disorder or aspd before we look at the subtle differences between psychopathy and sociopathy let's look at what it means to have anti-social personality disorder and the overall official name for a psychopath or sociopath so number one they usually have an inaccurate sense of self by the age of three a child develops their sense of self they see themselves as separate from other people and as a child grows they learn more about the world they also learn more about themselves and the personality traits that make them unique that make them who they are as this learning takes place their sense of self grows and it may change their sense of self influences the way a person may interact with others and who we choose to let into our circle of friends now this sense of self may influence the career person chooses or how they decide to spend their free time and having a strong sense of self puts achievements failures and other events into the correct perspective now people with antisocial personality disorder do not have a strong developed sense of self or rather their sense of self is over inflated something's lacking they might not recognize their personality traits or how they fit into a larger society this distorted sense of self plays into their usual lack of empathy and their ambitions some people with aspd may seek wealth or fortune to feel satisfied others have a hard time being consistent with their friends family or colleagues now of course this isn't the only sign of a sociopath or a psychopath number two is lack of empathy now most people recognize sociopaths or psychopaths as just lacking empathy they don't care for others they're not able to tap into the feelings of other people now does this mean they're incapable of caring or feeling love not always but does that mean they're more likely to display hurtful behaviors yes without empathy it's hard to step back and say this isn't right or maybe i should get permission before doing something i mean if you knew that nothing you could do would harm someone else you might behave differently too next up is number three which is pathological personality traits so other personality traits that might point to a psychopath or a sociopath include having no moral compass being very attention sinking antagonism negative effectivity and unusual behavior you might be thinking to yourself already hmm maybe i know a sociopath it's not uncommon to have a distorted sense of self lack empathy or display attention seeking behaviors children often have these traits because they're still developing but once a child reaches adulthood they should be able to have a healthy sense of self and understand empathy they should also know how to behave in a way that doesn't hurt themselves or the people around them if a person can go around in their business without harming anyone they're not likely to be a psychopath or sociopath but if the behavior is unusual alarming or harmful then it might be time to go see a professional so now i want to get into the specific differences between psychopaths and sociopaths again both of these terms fall under the larger umbrella of antisocial personality disorder now whether someone is a psychopath or a sociopath they are both likely to exhibit unusual behavior and a lack of empathy but there are some minor minor differences between a psychopath and a sociopath that are important to note the first is that psychopaths have a much harder time forming bonds with people a sociopath usually isn't a loner they're sometimes even very good with people sociopaths can form emotional connections with friends and family even if they're not entirely empathetic a psychopath on the other hand does not have the same capabilities to form those close bonds even if they're able to charm and manipulate the people that they do meet they're just not able to form those bonds another difference between psychopaths and sociopaths is that psychopaths tend to display much more aggressive behavior serial killers are generally regarded as psychopaths not sociopaths while sociopaths may emotionally hurt people through manipulation or not caring about their feelings it's unlikely that they'll actually get physically violent a sociopath may be impulsive but again not as likely to become a serial killer the impulsive actions are likely because they still feel some emotions my personal theory is that psychopaths don't feel as much emotions and so the aggressive behavior doesn't seem as crazy to them it seems more like they're just manipulating a tool just like manipulating a person people to them are just an ends to a means to get what they want and when a sociopath displays impulsive or harmful behavior they usually recognize it they can just explain their behavior away however a psychopath is usually unlikely to recognize that they're doing anything remotely wrong they will think out their manipulative and hurtful behavior and at no point do they think they're in the wrong or that they could cause harm it's unlikely that a psychopath will go to a mental health professional for help because they simply do not think that they need it now of course if they went to a mental health professional they wouldn't be told that they were a psychopath the therapist would likely diagnose them and they would diagnose a sociopath with antisocial personality disorder now as i'm ending this video you should know there's only a few subtle differences between psychopaths and sociopaths but knowing some of these differences may help you identify who's better to keep your distance from and maybe someone that could hurt you in the future in other terms you may not know if you're friends with a sociopath but you'll probably know it with a psychopath last thing i actually just developed a psychopath versus sociopath quiz so if you have a friend you may have thought about throughout this video feel free to check that link in the description and answer some questions based on them you'll get one of three results psychopathic tendencies sociopathic tendencies or neither i think it's a really interesting test i don't think anything like this has been done before and i hope that you've learned something and enjoyed this video thank you so much for watching

Channel: Practical Psychology

Views: 122,683

Rating: 4.7428899 out of 5

Keywords: sociopath vs psychopath, psychopath vs sociopath, what is a psychopath, what is a sociopath, practical psychology

Id: iLXDPW9t-Cw

Length: 7min 6sec (426 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 22 2020