What is the latest news on the neurological basis of a sociopath's condition?

Answer 1

If you are a sociopath, you probably are resistant to the idea of change.

But you will miss the chance to get much further in your life than you ever could on your own if you reject all help.

Robert Hare, PhD., says that the personality of a sociopath(psychopath) is essentially set in stone, so to speak, by adulthood,and incredibly hard to change.

Hard to change, not impossible.

Recent research on the disparities of brain function in psychopaths/sociopaths yielded some startling results:

Structural and functional hippocampal abnormalitieshavebeen previously reported in institutionalized psychopathic andaggressive populations. This study assessed whether prior findings of aright greater than left (R > L) functional asymmetry in caughtviolent offenders generalize to the structural domain in unsuccessful,caught psychopaths.

Methods:

Left and right hippocampal volumes were assessed using structuralmagnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in 23 control subjects, 16unsuccessful psychopaths, and 12 successful (uncaught) communitypsychopaths and transformed into standardized space.

Results:

Unsuccessful psychopaths showed an exaggerated structuralhippocampal asymmetry (R > L) relative both to successfulpsychopaths and control subjects (p < .007) that was localized tothe anterior region. This effect could not be explained byenvironmental and diagnostic confounds and constitutes the first brainimaging analysis of successful and unsuccessful psychopaths.

Conclusions:

Atypical anterior hippocampal asymmetries in unsuccessfulpsychopaths may reflect an underlying neurodevelopmental abnormalitythat disrupts hippocampal-prefrontal circuitry, resulting in affect dysregulation, poor contextual fear conditioning, and insensitivity to cues predicting capture.

Keywords: Hippocampus, psychopathy, MRI, trauma, neurodevelopment, asymmetry.

So it is understandable why many people don't think anything at all canbe done to change the sociopath, but in fact, that isn't true. Somekeep trying to help them; giving up is not an option. Sociopaths cause too much trouble. And experience as much.

A good therapist can prevent you from victimizing him/her withoutvictimizing you in the process. And, as mentioned above, recent studies made byneurosurgeons and other medical experts have finally begun to pinpointthe things that go awry in the brain that are part of what causessociopathy.

In some cases, such medications as Depakote, Topamax, Risperdal, Dilantin, Pentobarbitol, andeven Lithium are being prescribed, and although some individualtherapists prescribe Ativan and the like, much more research needs Tobe done there on ultimate benefit of drug treatment. It is alreadyknown that drug treatment must be augmented by a very structured andpositive-oriented talk therapy.

Sociopaths can get somewhere in a specialized form of talk therapy if the clinician isself-confident and relaxed, firm but never authoritarian orself-important. It must not ever become an ego-contest.

Once theprocess gets far enough along so that the sociopath is actually able tofeel even a tiny flicker of genuine happiness, that is an impetus thatwill grow stronger if the process continues to move forward.