Citation

Sellbom M, Drislane LE. Aggress. Violent Behav. 2021; 59: e101473.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2021, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.avb.2020.101473

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The current article reviews the literature regarding several issues that are relevant to the classification of psychopathy. We make the argument based on the available literature that psychopathy cannot be easily categorized in a qualitative manner but rather is a dimensional construct. We also make the claim that psychopathy is not unitary. Indeed, virtually all available research points to psychopathy being multidimensional and therefore gives rise to the potential of multiple constellations of traits (i.e., subtypes or variants) that fall under the broader umbrella term of psychopathy. We review the literature on subtypes of psychopathy, which is in our opinion the best perspective from which to consider psychopathy classification, with the caveat that such constellations or 'psychopathy variants' are also dimensional in nature and would vary in severity. We also added an empirical contribution in which we replicate and expand upon the existing psychopathy subtype literature in a novel way. We end our article with general implications and discussion of future directions in this area.

Language: en

Keywords

Classification; Psychopathy; Subtypes; Taxometrics; Triarchic psychopathy model