These giveaway signs could show that you are a psychopath, according to science
Be honest now - do you love swilling down gin, going to bed late, and taking risks?
Those are all distinctive signs of being a psychopath, according to PsyBlog - although we should point out that being fond of gin doesn’t actually mean you’re likely to snap and kill someone.
Psychopaths - according to the standard Hare Psychopathy Checklist - are charming, impulsive, and fail to take responsibility for their behaviour.
But psychopathic traits are surprisingly common - here are some subtle signs to look out for.
Psychopaths lack empathy with other people - and one of the ways this manifests itself is that they never ‘catch’ yawns from other people.
Researchers from Baylor University in Texas found that people who have psychopathic traits are less likely to yawn after seeing somebody near them yawn.
While we’re on the subject of yawns, people who stay up late exhibit more antisocial personality traits - such as narcissism and psychopathy.
Psychology researchers at Innsbruck University in Austria found that people who expressed a preference for bitter tastes (like coffee) were more likely to be have psychopathic traits - such as manipulating and hurting others.
The researchers interviewed 1,000 people, both students and prison inmates, correlating the results of psychological tests with a chart of taste preferences.
The experiment offers the ‘first empirical evidence that bitter taste preferences are linked to malevolent personality traits,’ the researchers say.
Some professions have more psychopaths than others - and, surprisingly, the worst one isn’t being a clown.
CEOs, lawyers and people in the media are the most likely to be psychopaths.
There’s two types of psychopaths - primary and secondary - and the ‘primary’ type is the one you’re most likely to encounter (‘secondary’ psychos tend to be destructive, unhelpful and bad at work.)
Researcher Nora Schütte says a trait to look for is ‘fearless dominance’:
“People with this character trait want to get their way, have no fear of the consequences of their actions, and can withstand stress very well.