California is among the two U.S. states with the highest concentration of psychopaths, according to a working study from Southern Methodist University released on the Social Science Research network this week. The study looks at trends in personality traits across areas (the study hasn't yet gone through the full peer review process, so take the findings with a grain of salt).
The only places with more psychopaths? Connecticut (thanks, hedge funds!) and, shocker, the District of Columbia. Other highly psychopathic states include New Jersey, New York and Wyoming, while West Virginia, Vermont and Tennessee are among the least psychopathic states.
'The presence of psychopaths in District of Columbia is consistent with the conjecture found in Murphy (2016) that psychopaths are likely to be effective in the political sphere' the author writes.
The author, Ryan Murphy, combined the findings of two past papers, one that mapped distribution of the "big five" personality traits (neuroticism, conscientiousness, agreeableness, extraversion and openness to experience) across states and one that tracked which of those five personality traits most closely corresponded with psychopathy, to get the results.
The former paper found that there are three distinct clusters of personality traits in the United States - people are "friendly and conventional" in the Midwest and the South, "temperamental and uninhibited" in the Northeast and Texas, and "relaxed and creative" in the Southwest and Pacific Northwest.
Murphy's paper operates with the assumption that psychopathy exists on a spectrum - not as a binary category - and that it correlates with a combination of low neuroticism, high extraversion, low agreeableness and low conscientiousness.
Murphy found that the greater the share of a state's population that lives in dense urban areas, the higher the rate of psychopathy.
Other findings were more intuitive. Two things that correlate with a state with lots of psychopaths? High concentrations of journalists and lawyers.
Reader Comments
But the burning question is, so what! What can be done about it?
That is in the hands of the people.
that is why I make mine obvious.
it is sorta like the moniker or screen name one chooses. it says a lot about you.
at this point in time. I do not know what you do or where you live. but I do not like you. and I know your type very well.
@Good Optics:
Journalists are copycats.
Copycats do not catch rats, they are fed by them.
ned,
out
Here is a picture of a bald, fat grey cat 'journalist' being fed by a haired rat of the also greying variety.
[Link]
There are thousands and thousands of these pictures.
And the words the copycats recite faithfully never end.
And the rats?
They multiply and rejoice and reign over the earth.
ned,
OUT
[Link]
Cool, I guess, but remember being messy, happy and contrarian don't make you a predator.