Being A Psychopath May Have Advantages, Study Finds
When we talk about people with a high degree of psychopathy, we often think of individuals with a tendency to crime and destroy everything they touch. However, traits linked to a preference for manipulating others may have been evolutionary advantageous.
In fact, recent research has found indications that, In certain environments, psychopathy is a reproductively positive thing In the end, what serves to perpetuate genes does not have to mean that society improves.
Psychopaths are usually seen as people with a mental disorder, individuals in whom there is something “wrong.” However, 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 us survive and reproduce?
Psychopathy may be expressed through undesirable actions, such as lying, emotional manipulation, or even abuse, but the hard truth is that, in theory, this does not have to mean that you will live less, as would be expected from someone who has a serious illness or, as it is usually understood, a personality disorder
Greater chance of having offspring?
If psychopathy is an evolutionary adaptive trait, that means that the gene variants that cause it (the alleles for psychopathy) are treated favorably by natural selection, at least in some cases. contexts.
For this research, a sample of 181 prisoners from Serbian prisons was used, and psychological tests were administered to measure psychopathic traits (among the prison population, these characteristics tend to be more present than among the rest of humanity).
The results obtained showed a curious trend: prisoners with higher scores in psychopathy were more likely to have more sons or daughters. Specifically, the psychological characteristics that seemed most advantageous when transmitting genes were the tendency to manipulate and inflated self-image, while insensitivity and coldness were only in men who had lived in harsh contexts and with a lot of competition..
Why can it be advantageous?
This result does not indicate that being a psychopath is a good thing or that it helps you find a partner and have more offspring, just like that. From the point of view of evolution, The value of a personal characteristic always depends on where you live and the type of relationships that exist with the rest of the individuals.
In the same way that strong, large animals do not survive in a place with little food, in some places psychopaths will have more problems adapting. The question is whether, in practice, contexts that give privileged treatment to psychopathy are more or less frequent.
It must be taken into account that, in current contexts, the majority of 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 should not have an easier time spreading their genes (and, specifically, those linked to the propensity to develop these behavioral patterns).
Create more collaborative societies
This study serves to draw attention to an important fact: What seems morally undesirable to us does not have to be “punished.” ” by nature.
If we do not create societies in which cooperation or good behavior is rewarded, manipulation, deception 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, together, being collaborative worthwhile.
There is no automatic mechanism that leads to punishing 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 adapt it to their needs, they should also be famous for changing the context in which they live to modify the very society in which they live.
