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Spanish version � � � A new study ranks each state, plus D.C., by their psychopathic tendencies. � The race for first? It isn't even close... � As Washington's shock over winning the Stanley Cup demonstrates, the nation's capital isn't used to being first in anything.
But finally, the capital has a claim to No. 1... and unfortunately, it's not just in hockey. � Ryan Murphy, an economist at Southern Methodist University, recently published a working paper (Psychopathy by U.S. state - A translation of Regional Measures of the Big Five Personality Traits to regional measures of Psychopathy) in which he ranked each of the states by the predominance of - there's no nice way to put it - psychopaths... � The winner? Washington D.C. in a walk... � In fact, the capital scored higher on Murphy's scale than the next two runners-up combined.
When Murphy matched up the "constellation of disinhibition, boldness and meanness" that marks psychopathy with a previously existing map of the states' predominant personality traits, he found that dense, coastal areas scored highest by far - with Washington dominant among them.
The runner-up, Connecticut, registered only 1.89 on Murphy's scale, compared with the overwhelming 3.48 clocked by the District. � What's going on? There's one big structural reason:
But even when you correct the rankings for density, Murphy says, Washington still ranks first. � This, Murphy hypothesizes, is because psychopaths are attracted to the kinds of jobs Washington offers - jobs that reward raw ambition, a relentless single-mindedness and, let's admit it, the willingness to step over a few bodies along the way.
The television critics who dismissed Netflix's "House of Cards" as cartoonish and unrealistic - surely nobody could be that villainous - may have a few apologies to make.
To psychologists, a "psychopath" isn't necessarily a Norman Bates or Patrick Bateman lurking with an ax in the shadows; it's a person with a particular collection of antisocial traits, including a powerful sense of spite and an inability to consider the welfare of others. � Murphy realized it might be possible to plot them on a map of America when he came across a forthcoming paper from psychologists at the University of Georgia and Purdue University that projects those antisocial traits onto the "Big Five" personality traits:
...which had already been mapped geographically. � By combining those studies, he could get a rough idea of which areas have the most psychopathic personalities. � Psychologists study psychopathy because, when it combines with other undesirable personality traits in what they call the "dark triad," it can lead to dangerous and even criminal behavior. � For Washingtonians who might now worry about walking out the front door every day, there's no more reason to fret than anywhere else in the country. � Although D.C., like most major urban centers, struggles with a high crime rate, it's nowhere near the outlier in that department that it is in psychopathy. � In their less dangerous form, the traits might combine in that person rudely elbowing past you on the Metro in the morning, or cutting the taxi line with a smirk, determined to get her way at your expense if necessary. � Not all Murphy's colleagues buy his analysis. As a working paper, it hasn't yet been through peer review. � Josh Miller, a University of Georgia psychologist whose work Murphy used to map psychopathic traits onto the already-existing map of those across the country, points out that Murphy's measurement of "psychopathic" traits includes some positive ones, like low neuroticism and high extraversion. � A city high in civic-minded Type A personalities might very well rate high on this scale without producing many harmful psychopaths. And people tend to rate as more "disagreeable" when they're younger - so highly millennial cities, like Washington, can get skewed results. � Still, Murphy notes that other work supports his broad conclusions. � Washington is awfully rich in the kinds of jobs rated "disproportionately psychopathic" by the psychologist Kevin Dutton, author of The Wisdom of Psychopaths - What Saints, Spies, and Serial Killers can Teach us About Success. � These include,
(What are the low-psychopathy jobs? Nurse, therapist, craftsperson, beautician/stylist, charity worker, teacher, artist, doctor and accountant.) � Among psychologists, it's become accepted wisdom that psychopaths can be eerily effective in their given professions. � Paul Babiak, a New York psychologist who specializes in business and management, developed, alongside the Canadian psychopathy pioneer Bob Hare, the B-Scan 360, a business tool intended to identify the psychopath in your workplace. � According to some psychologists, there's a good chance it's the person in the corner office.
The top five habitats for such people, by Murphy's measure, are,
The five least psychopathic states are,
("This is a rare ranking of states where West Virginia is rated as 'best,'" Murphy points out, "in the sense that psychopathy is generally viewed as a social bad.") � If that sounds like a pattern, it is:
A psychopath map of the U.S. would also look quite a bit like the red-blue political map, with the red areas notably lower in psychopathy. (Though not universally: Vermont, a deep-blue state, is extremely low on the list, while red Wyoming is up in the top five.) � �
� � Murphy warns against drawing any partisan conclusions, given the diversity in both the data and the country's political makeup.
Politicians as a class, however, may be another story. � In a previous paper, (What's the Best Way to Judge a Psychopath's Empathy?), impishly titled "Kissing Babies to Prove You Are Not a Psychopath" - which explored the motivations behind our collective need to witness our leaders displaying empathy - Murphy foreshadowed his findings here, writing that in a system designed to reward the power-hungry, voters are given the unenviable but important responsibility of weeding out the phonies. � Murphy's findings might ring true to anyone in D.C. who's found themselves on the wrong end of a ruthless bureaucratic knife-fighter, or just anyone who's been cut off one too many times by a BMW in downtown Bethesda. � On a national level, it raises the troubling question as to what it means to live in a country whose institutions are set up to reward some very dubious human traits. � Like it or not, we're more likely than not to wind up with "some alarming personalities in positions of power"... � �
� � That may or may not always be a bad thing, according to some psychologists.
But that doesn't relieve of us the responsibility to consider the darker side and somehow allow for it.
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