Psychoopaths

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In my previous paper, I talked about the problem of child psychopaths. I discussed how they turn into adult psychopaths that commit crimes with little to no remorse. In this paper, I will discuss the theories behind child psychopaths and their links with crime. The two main theories that I will be discussing are biological positivism and general strain theory. These two theories seem to best explain the two different types of psychopaths. I will also discuss a third theory which combines biological positivism and general strain theory to create the interdisciplinary theory of biosocial criminology.
Psychopaths are believed to be divided into two types (Skeem, et al, 2011). The first is primary psychopaths. Primary psychopaths are thought to exhibit psychopathic traits that are caused by biological factors. Secondary psychopaths, the second type of psychopath, are thought to exhibit psychopathic traits that are caused by adverse environmental factors.
Biological positivism is the theory that there is something biologically inferior about criminals that makes them predisposed to criminality (Vold, et all, 2010). Throughout its history, biological positivism has focused on different aspects of a human’s biology. Its creator, Cesare Lombroso, described criminals as “throwbacks” to primitive peoples in terms of human evolution. He theorized that criminals were physically different than non-criminals. While he described these differences as differences in facial structure, Lombroso’s idea later developed into modern biological positivism that focused on genetics, brain functions, and brain development. This modern view of biological positivism is one of the theories that best describe a primary child psychopath’s development into an adu...

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... variant of MAOA that exhibit deficiencies is the MAOA-L. MAOA-L predisposes a person to psychopathic traits. However, there has to be something that triggers that gene. Moreover, males are more likely to have it than females, which would explain why psychopaths are mostly male.
In conclusion, there are two theories that explain the two types of psychopaths. Biological positivism, which means that psychopaths have a biological deficiency, explains why primary psychopaths commit crimes. The second theory, General Strain Theory, which brings for the idea that negative stimuli caused strain of psychopaths is used to explain secondary psychopaths. There is also a third theory, that combines the two theories previously mentioned, that leads some researchers to believe that biological positivism and the general strain theory combined explain the origins of psychopathy.

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