Psychopathy: Newman Talk

Psychopaths are known for the "Mask of Sanity". This means that while they may look, act, talk, and walk just as every other human being, they are hard to discipline and fail at many of their life goals. The fact that they are hard to identify and pick out of a crowd, makes them all the more deadly.
Professor Joseph Newman from UW Madison began his talk by telling the story of Karla Homolka, a young woman considered completely normal until meeting a man named Paul. She quickly fell for Paul and accepted his habit of raping young girls. She began to help fuel this horrible passion and assisted in the rape and murder of three girls, one of which was her own sister. Even more disturbing, Karla seemed to feel no remorse for the unspeakable actions she helped to commit.
How is it possible for someone to go from "normal" to a heartless killer? Professor Newman attempts to answer this question by first addressing the "Low Fear Hypothesis". This states that psychopaths feel little to no fear and therefore are able to commit much more horrible acts than one who feels more fear. This is linked to what is called an amygdala-mediated deficit. When an individual has this deficit, he/she is often has poor passive avoidance and is more likely to inhibit punished responses. Once this person focuses on a goal, the rest of the world becomes a blur. The individual becomes completely oblivious to threats of punishment or consequences around them because he/she is so fixated on the final goal.
This can be illustrated through hundreds of murders and rapists around the world, such as Karla Homolka. However, psychopathy can also be seen in emotionally abusive relationships. As a psychopath needs complete control of every situation. They lie and cheat in an attempt to come out on top. They also enjoy the suffering of their partners, knowing that their suffering will only help to make themselves feel important. They try to isolate their partner from the rest of the world, forcing them to think that the abuser him/herself is the only person the victim can turn to. This is often the definition of an emotionally abusive relationship and explains why it is so difficult for the victim to simply leave.
There have been many different experiments conducted all over the world trying to explain the mind of a psychopath. One of which that helps to explain an amygdala-mediated deficit is the simple Stroop Test. This is when a word such as "red" is written in a different color, like blue. The average person will struggle to name the color because the mind automatically reads the word "red". However, the task is much easier for psychopaths. Because they have such keen focus, they are able to simply name the color blue while ignoring the word "red" altogether. They are oblivious to the conflict of word and color.
All in all, psychopathy is extremely hard to diagnose before the individual begins to perform dramatic acts, such as rape and murder in Karla's case. Your neighbor, best friend, roommate, or even the boy sitting next to you in class could simply be hiding behind the "Mask of Sanity" and you may never know.