Articles about badly behaved people and how to spot them are common. You don’t have to Google or scroll too much to find headlines such as 7 signs your boss is a psychopath or How to avoid the sociopath next door . You’ll often see the terms psychopath and sociopath used somewhat interchangeably.
That applies to perhaps the most famous badly behaved fictional character of all – Hannibal Lecter, the cannibal serial killer from The Silence of the Lambs . In the book on which the movie is based, Lecter is described as a “pure sociopath”. But in the movie, he’s described as a “pure psychopath”.
Psychiatrists have diagnosed him with something else entirely. So what’s the difference between a psychopath and a sociopath? As we’ll see, these terms have been used at different times in history, and relate to some overlapping concepts. What’s a psychopath? Psychopathy has been mentioned in the psychiatric literature since the 1800s .
But the latest edition of the Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (known colloquially as the DSM) doesn’t list it as a recognised clinical disorder. Since the 1950s , labels have changed and terms such as “sociopathic personality disturbance” have been replaced with antisocial personality disorder , which is what we have today. Someone with antisocial personality disorder has a persistent disregard for the rights of others.
This includes breaking the law, repeated lying, impulsive behaviour, getting into fights, dis.