Dutton argues that there are indeed “functional psychopaths” among us—different from their murderous counterparts—who use their detached, unflinching, and charismatic personalities to succeed in mainstream society, and that shockingly, in some fields, the more “psychopathic” people are, the more likely they are to succeed. Dutton deconstructs this often misunderstood diagnosis through bold on-the-ground reporting and original scientific research as he mingles with the criminally insane in a high-security ward, shares a drink with one of the world’s most successful con artists, and undergoes transcranial magnetic stimulation to discover first-hand exactly how it feels to see through the eyes of a psychopath."
In sum, this book is about how some psychopathic qualities are actually really helpful and positive and incorporating them into your life can make you succeed. They can reduce anxiety and depression, make you more productive, and even make your more empathetic (although if you're a true psychopath with sadistic tendencies, the empathy pay-out is getting to enjoy the suffering of your victims more … so, this isn't a heart-warming "hope for psychopaths" book).
Look, I'll be honest. I was kind of jealous of psychopaths after reading this book. I mean, I'd love to react to all situations in a cold and calculating manner, with a accompanying drop in blood pressure and heartrate. I'd love to be able to never take things personally, see projects through doggedly to the end, and keep myself from fearing by staying strictly in the "now." However something that would ha ben and improvement to the book, was that while Dr Dutton kept calling successful career psychopaths "functional" he didn't at all go into how functional a psychopaths family is. Did they not have families to interview or...? As someone with a psychopath in the family I can say that their influence in life never lead to a functional family environment.
What annoyed me is after all the promising studies, Dutton doesn't really tell us HOW to make the more positive traits of the psychopath into our own. While I understand part of the premise is that they're just "wired that way" (the author himself has part of his brain treated to feel like a psychopath for an afternoon). What I would've liked is something in the cognitive behavioural realm to get there. Instead, he wasted pages boy crushing on Special Forces agents, cops, and his childhood psychopathic friend who I'm unclear why he kept. Nope, he punted that to TIBETAN MONKS MEDITATING. Look, Tibetan monks have been doing that for a while. How about something more approachable?
At the very least, it would've been considerate of him to include the questionnaire used to measure the index of one's own psychopathic tendencies, even if I was just a little morbidly curious after discovering I have not issues whatsoever shoving fat guys in front of streetcars to save other people. Since most of the studies use this as a basis to pick their subjects and control group, it would've been helpful.
The lack of female psychopaths in this book was also a real problem, even though he did point out they are the minority a contrast would've been nice since I think dealing with psychopathic females always has its own issues. In fact, given that he was targeting the "most successful psychopaths" and singing their praises to high heaven, some rep of the fairer sex would've been much appreciated. I mean, we're allowed to be lawyers now - even CEOs, the number ONE profession where you have a tendency to be a psychopath.
That said, I still learned enough from this book not to make it a tossup and I really enjoyed reading about the cognitive differences between psychopaths and non-psychopaths that were backed up with some extremely interesting studies that made me look at psychopaths in a new light. The book was well written and flowed easily.
Age Rating 14+. Discusses some of the more famous serial killing psychopaths crimes and uses some high grade technical language.
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