I recently read this article, which got me wondering:
I’ve heard several figures for the alleged percentage of sociopaths in the population, the usual figure being about 1 in 200. That seems to be a high number given the nature of the condition and I was wondering why does the human race have such a high proportion of sociopaths, whats the evolutionary purpose or benefit to their existence?
I’m certain I read a thread with a similar question before but I’ve unable to find it.
Thanks
There are probably greater than 1 in 200 sociopaths in the general population … however there are varying degrees of symptom manifestation throwing those numbers into question.
I think your questions suggests a fundamental misunderstanding of natural selection. Just because something exists in a population, even at a reasonably high rate, doesn’t mean that it has a purpose, or fills some sort of gap. It just means that it isn’t selected against at a high enough rate to eliminate it. And that’s granting that it’s a genetically inherited disorder. While a tendency towards antisocial behavior may be somewhat inheritable, there’s a host of things that play into presentation of full blown antisocial personality disorder.
Keeps the rest of us on our toes?
The way I see it, it’s one step above the norm when it comes to “survival of the fittest.”
Take your average human. Now take one that can lie, cheat, steal, and manipulate with a straight face and not feel any guilt in doing so, no remorse.
These people are willing to go above and beyond what a normal person would to get what they want and/or believe they need. Not only that, but they don’t have the nagging conscience that prevents a typical person from doing so.
Perhaps it was more handy back when you needed that extra piece of food or clothing to survive. Hell, my mother is a sociopath and I’ve seen firsthand how the lack of self-governing morals helped her in life. She really has no marketable skills to speak of and sponges off of others with her sociopathy. It’s her way of surviving. But, if you were to pair that characteristic on a person who does have some other skills, that’d be a step above all other, I think.
(Not to say that I like sociopathy. I really hate that it exists and I hate how it affects everyone- not just the sociopath. I’m just looking at it from a scientific viewpoint for the moment.)
Jumping off Boozahol Squid, P.I.'s excellent answer with a few WAGs:
It seems quite possible to me that during hard times, as long as there are enough people with ordinary social empathy for society to keep functioning, sociopaths would have an excellent chance to survive and pass on their genes… these are people who are good at taking what they need and not feeling the need to give back. Obviously, the survival of the society as a whole is threatened if there are too many sociopaths.
Another possibility is that sociopathy could emerge as a spontaneous result of mutations or suboptimal combinations in any of the genes that affect how social empathy behaviour develops in the human brain, which I would figure would have to be a lot of complex and inter-relating genes.
My non-expert opinion is that “mild” sociopathy is probably associated with traits that confer certain benefits to the individual. Such as risk-taking and disregard for societal norms.
More severe sociopathy would be disadvantageous. But assuming sociopathy is an inheritable thing, as long as enough “mild” cases were out in the population, it wouldn’t be weeded out completely.
There is some speculation that mild schizophrenia is associated with high creativity, which makes one more sexually attractive. Assuming this is the case and that there is a genetic component to schizotypy (evidence seems to support this), then one could hypothesize that schizophrenia ain’t going away anytime soon simply for this reason.
If we take Dunbar’s number (150) as an accurate predictor of historical human social groups, I think it’s very interesting that a frequency of 1/200 sociopaths means that 3 out of 4 tribes would have a sociopath.
That makes sense… every tribe can’t have a sociopath, because their deeds tend to reveal them, and once revealed they’re either killed, imprisoned, or banished. If they’re banished, they can’t go to a village that has recent experience with a sociopath, because people will know to judge newcomers more harshly. Thus the rate of sociopaths should be something less than one per village, which fits nicely with Dunbar’s number.
As far as why they exist… simply, because they can. In a cooperative society, it is highly profitable to be a cheater as long as you don’t get caught, and as long as you can outrun your reputation. It is too expensive for cooperators to find and punish every single cheater all the time, so a few are tolerated. But if there are too many cheaters then society declines because cooperative societies fare better in the long run. So you’d expect humans to live in an overall cooperative society with a few cheaters, which is exactly what we have.
Tell me something: What’s the evolutionary purpose or benefit of the belief that every little nuance or our existence must have an evolutionary purpose or benefit?
That’s an explanation I’ve heard before. As long as they are a small minority they can succeed as parasites upon the larger society; there’s an environmental niche for a human predator. But only in small numbers or they will destroy the society they prey upon. So there’s a natural evolutionary equilibrium; rather like how species tend to stay around 50% each males and females because when there’s fewer of one gender, the benefits of being that gender increase. It’s just that the equilibrium point is far from 50/50.
Sure, I’m not a scientist and thats why I come here, to learn. But I was under the impression it must confer some benefit or it would have been disappeared or been marginalised over the generations, as I said in the OP 1 in 200 people seems rather high.
Thanks for the answers everyone.
You’re being snarky why exactly?
Has it been proven for certain that it is genetic and not environmental, or a combination of both that produces a psychopath?
It must feel very empty, not to care about others, or have compassion or empathy. I can only think of a shark in the waters, with other more harmless fish around it…when I think of a psychopath.
But there are a lot of negative “conditions” (if that’s what we want to call sociopathy) that confer no benefit, and yet have always been with us. Does diabetes have a benefit? Mental retardation? Dwarfism?
Personalities are an emergent property of the interaction of multiple factors. Some features of personality are inherited, but much of it is influenced by the environment. Or just randomness.
It’s important to bear in mind that sociopath does not necessarily equate to psychopathy.
Sociopaths can just be dissociative personalities who essentially don’t care about other people. I can see where that could be good (and probably contributes to leadership, in that sending folks to war or otherwise sacrificing for the greater good means sacrificing lives) for a community.
Psychopathy tends to include a tendency to be an asshole for the fun of it. At least, that’s my recollection from psych101 (which, admittedly, was more than a decade ago).
Googling turns up too many hits to even bother citing.
Understanding the boundaries around and pressures resulting in rates for certain attributes is a completely valid question.
Both: lack empathy, possess superficial charm, are neurologically incapable of being taught empathy.
IIRC sociopaths can develop that way due to the environment, psychopaths are due purely to biology.
A sociopath is disorganized, not as good at hiding it, someone who lives on the fringes of society. They tend to have poor impulse control and the spontaneity can be part of their allure. In serial killers, think Jeffrey Dahmer.
A psychopath is more organized, may potentially be good enough at hiding it to fool everyone they know (even a spouse and kids) into thinking they’re completely normal, and is better at delaying gratification- that’s what makes it easier for them to hide it. In serial killers, think Ted Bundy.
Being an asshole for the fun of it is its own issue, which tends to afflict psycho/sociopaths- pathological sadism.
The question originally asked is unfortunately looking at the problem backwards. A trait will not tend to disappear unless it intereferes with our ability to find sexual partners and make live babies. Diabetes for example does not tend to manifest until after primary childbearing years. If diabetes killed us by age 12 you would eventually see less and less tendency towards it as people with a less functional pancreas would be dead before they could pass on their genes.
It’s lower than infertility rates, which would seem to present a bigger problem in the evolutionary landscape.
You might as well ask what purpose does homosexuality serve, sexual reproduction is messy and creates variation, some bad, some good, and it just gambles that way. As long as the total is mostly not psychopaths and assuming that is the best reproductive strategy, thats what you will get, evolution generally settles for good enough solutions, as perfect tends to cost too much energy.
Sociopathy does not in any way prevent procreation. It’s interesting to note the imbalance of male/female (much higher rates in males) and a circumstantial corellation could easily be drawn to infant survival if the female parent is sociopathic. Of course, in our society, the infant would usually be removed and reared by someone else, so there’s no total wipeout of the genes.
Sociopaths in the past were made into soldiers, sailors, or forced to do manual labor through the penal system. There were plenty of niches into which they could fit easily.
I recall as a kid a group of men referred to as “The Committee” who would come through my GrandMother’s farming community every Autumn. Their arrival announced the beginning of “Hog-killin’ time.” These guys were a loose bunch of migrant workers who went from town to town killing and butchering animals. They were dirty, homeless, and vulgar men, and all the children were carefully watched while they were in town. But they served a needed function, and were welcomed, paid, and then “given a ride” (escorted) to the next town.
Alcoholism? Other addictions? Sociopathy? All of the above? Certainly a niche that would work for a sociopath. And if they then cleaned up and went to a small country bar on Saturday night, I see no reason to believe they wouldn’t eventually have left a baby forming in some small town along the way.
In short, think of the jobs that are repugnant to people of conscience; that’s where the sociopaths fit. And many of them, of course, just live off the charity of others, moving on whenever their current enabler catches on to the hopelessness of the situation.
ETA: WoodenSpoon: Psychopaths tend to be charming and quite successful at finding willing reproductive partners.