Psychopaths: Shrugging Off Trauma

All individuals possess some degree of psychopathic characteristics, however, the degree or level of those characteristics vary depending on a multitude of factors. Psychopathy is a continuous personality characteristic that includes high impulsivity and thrillseeking, while typically maintaining low empathy and anxiety (Paulhus & Williams, 2002). Exposure to traumatic events can lead to the development of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), however, symptom severity can differ depending on characteristics of risk resilience (Moeller & Hell, 2003; Connor & Davidson, 2003). Previous research shows that women are at higher risk for PTSD than men; possibly due to gender specific risk factors and the higher prevalence of interpersonal traumas (Christiansen & Hansen, 2015). College students from a western university completed a demographic questionnaire, the Life Events Checklist, the PTSD Checklist 5, the Self-Report Psychopathy Scale: Version III, and the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (Blake et al., 1995; Weathers, 2013; Paulhus & Williams, 2002; Connor & Davidson, 2003) online. Our hypotheses were as follows: Psychopathy will be negatively associated with PTSD symptoms (H1); Characteristics of resilience will be negatively associated with PTSD symptom severity (H2); Psychopathy will be positively associated resilience (H3); Males will score higher on the subscale of callous affect compared to females (H4); Males will score higher on the subscale of erratic lifestyle compared to females (H5); Males will score higher on the subscale of antisocial behavior compared to females (H6); and females will score higher on the subscale of Interpersonal manipulation compared to males (H7)