The Psychopathy Checklist or Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised, now the Psychopathy Checklist—revised (PCL-R), is a
psychological assessment
Psychological evaluation is a method to assess an individual's behavior, personality, cognitive abilities, and several other domains. A common reason for a psychological evaluation is to identify psychological factors that may be inhibiting a pers ...
tool that is commonly used to assess the presence and extent of the personality trait
psychopathy
Psychopathy, sometimes considered synonymous with sociopathy, is characterized by persistent Anti-social behaviour, antisocial behavior, impaired empathy and remorse, and Boldness, bold, Disinhibition, disinhibited, and Egotism, egotistical B ...
in individuals—most often those institutionalized in the criminal justice system—and to differentiate those high in this trait from those with
antisocial personality disorder
Antisocial personality disorder (ASPD or infrequently APD) is a personality disorder characterized by a long-term pattern of disregard of, or violation of, the rights of others as well as a difficulty sustaining long-term relationships. Lack ...
, a related diagnosable disorder.
It is a 20-item inventory of perceived
personality traits
In psychology, trait theory (also called dispositional theory) is an approach to the study of human personality. Trait theorists are primarily interested in the measurement of ''traits'', which can be defined as habitual patterns of behaviour, tho ...
and recorded behaviors, intended to be completed on the basis of a
semi-structured interview
A semi-structured interview is a method of research used most often in the social sciences. While a structured interview has a rigorous set of questions which does not allow one to divert, a semi-structured interview is open, allowing new ideas to ...
along with a review of "collateral information" such as official records.
The PCL was originally developed in the 1970s by Canadian psychologist
Robert D. Hare for use in
psychology experiments
Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries between ...
, based partly on Hare's work with male offenders and forensic inmates in Vancouver, and partly on an influential clinical profile by American psychiatrist
Hervey M. Cleckley first published in 1941.
An individual's score may have important consequences for their future, and because the potential for harm if the test is used or administered incorrectly is considerable, Hare argues that the test should be considered valid only if administered by a suitably qualified and experienced clinician under scientifically controlled and licensed, standardized conditions.
Hare receives
royalties
A royalty payment is a payment made by one party to another that owns a particular asset, for the right to ongoing use of that asset. Royalties are typically agreed upon as a percentage of gross or net revenues derived from the use of an asset o ...
on licensed use of the test.
In
psychometric
Psychometrics is a field of study within psychology concerned with the theory and technique of measurement. Psychometrics generally refers to specialized fields within psychology and education devoted to testing, measurement, assessment, and ...
terms, the current version of the checklist has two factors (sets of related scores) that correlate about 0.5 with each other, with Factor One closer to Cleckley's original personality concept than Factor Two. Hare's checklist does not incorporate the "positive adjustment features" that Cleckley did.
PCL-R model of psychopathy
The PCL-R is used for indicating a dimensional score, or a categorical diagnosis, of psychopathy for clinical, legal, or research purposes.
It is rated by a
mental health professional
A mental health professional is a health care practitioner or social and human services provider who offers services for the purpose of improving an individual's mental health or to treat mental disorders. This broad category was developed as a ...
(such as a psychologist or other professional trained in the field of mental health, psychology, or psychiatry), using 20 items. Each of the items in the PCL-R is scored on a three-point scale according to specific criteria through file information and a
semi-structured interview
A semi-structured interview is a method of research used most often in the social sciences. While a structured interview has a rigorous set of questions which does not allow one to divert, a semi-structured interview is open, allowing new ideas to ...
.
The scores are used to predict risk for criminal re-offense and probability of rehabilitation.
The current edition of the PCL-R officially lists three factors (1.a, 1.b, and 2.a), which summarize the 20 assessed areas via
factor analysis
Factor analysis is a statistical method used to describe variability among observed, correlated variables in terms of a potentially lower number of unobserved variables called factors. For example, it is possible that variations in six observed ...
. The previous edition of the PCL-R listed two factors. Factor 1 is labelled "selfish, callous and remorseless use of others". Factor 2 is labelled as "chronically unstable, antisocial and socially deviant lifestyle". There is a high risk of recidivism and mostly small likelihood of rehabilitation for those who are labelled as having "psychopathy" on the basis of the PCL-R ratings in the manual for the test, although treatment research is ongoing.
PCL-R Factors 1a and 1b are correlated with
narcissistic personality disorder
Narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) is a personality disorder characterized by a life-long pattern of exaggerated feelings of self-importance, an excessive need for admiration, a diminished ability or unwillingness to empathize with other ...
.
They are associated with extraversion and
positive affect
Positive affectivity (PA) is a human characteristic that describes how much people experience positive affects (sensations, emotions, sentiments); and as a consequence how they interact with others and with their surroundings.
People with high po ...
. Factor 1, the so-called core personality traits of psychopathy, may even be beneficial for the psychopath (in terms of nondeviant social functioning).
PCL-R Factors 2a and 2b are particularly strongly correlated to
antisocial personality disorder
Antisocial personality disorder (ASPD or infrequently APD) is a personality disorder characterized by a long-term pattern of disregard of, or violation of, the rights of others as well as a difficulty sustaining long-term relationships. Lack ...
and
borderline personality disorder
Borderline personality disorder (BPD), also known as emotionally unstable personality disorder (EUPD), is a personality disorder characterized by a long-term pattern of unstable interpersonal relationships, distorted sense of self, and strong ...
and are associated with reactive anger, criminality, and impulsive violence. The target group for the PCL-R in prisons in some countries is criminals convicted of
delict
Delict (from Latin ''dēlictum'', past participle of ''dēlinquere'' ‘to be at fault, offend’) is a term in civil and mixed law jurisdictions whose exact meaning varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction but is always centered on the notion of ...
and/or
felony
A felony is traditionally considered a crime of high seriousness, whereas a misdemeanor is regarded as less serious. The term "felony" originated from English common law (from the French medieval word "félonie") to describe an offense that resu ...
. The quality of ratings may depend on how much background information is available and whether the person rated is honest and forthright.
[
]
Items
* Item 1: Glibness/superficial charm
* Item 2: Grandiose sense of self-worth
* Item 3: Need for stimulation/proneness to boredom
* Item 4: Pathological lying
* Item 5: Conning/manipulative
* Item 6: Lack of remorse or guilt
* Item 7: Shallow affect
* Item 8: Callous/lack of empathy
* Item 9: Parasitic lifestyle
* Item 10: Poor behavioral controls
* Item 11: Promiscuous sexual behavior
* Item 12: Early behavior problems
* Item 13: Lack of realistic long-term goals
* Item 14: Impulsivity
* Item 15: Irresponsibility
* Item 16: Failure to accept responsibility for own actions
* Item 17: Many short-term marital relationships
* Item 18: Juvenile delinquency
* Item 19: Revocation of conditional release
* Item 20: Criminal versatility
Each of the 20 items in the PCL-R is scored on a three-point scale, with a rating of 0 if it does not apply at all, 1 if there is a partial match or mixed information, and 2 if there is a reasonably good match to the offender. This is to be done through a face-to-face interview together with supporting information on lifetime behavior (e.g., from case files). It can take up to three hours to collect and review the information.
Out of a maximum score of 40, the cut-off for the label of psychopathy is 30 in the United States and 25 in the United Kingdom. A cut-off score of 25 is also sometimes used for research purposes.
High PCL-R scores are positively associated with measures of impulsivity
In psychology, impulsivity (or impulsiveness) is a tendency to act on a whim, displaying behavior characterized by little or no forethought, reflection, or consideration of the consequences. Impulsive actions are typically "poorly conceived, prema ...
and aggression
Aggression is overt or covert, often harmful, social interaction with the intention of inflicting damage or other harm upon another individual; although it can be channeled into creative and practical outlets for some. It may occur either reacti ...
, Machiavellianism
Machiavellianism or Machiavellian may refer to:
Politics
*Machiavellianism (politics), the supposed political philosophy of Niccolò Machiavelli
*Political realism
Psychology
*Machiavellianism (psychology), a personality trait centered on cold an ...
, persistent criminal behavior, and negatively associated with measures of empathy
Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another's position. Definitions of empathy encompass a broad range of social, co ...
and affiliation
Affiliation or affiliate may refer to:
* Affiliate (commerce), a legal form of entity relationship used in Business Law
* Affiliation (family law), a legal form of family relationship
* Affiliate marketing
* Affiliate network or affiliation platfo ...
.
Early factor analysis
Factor analysis is a statistical method used to describe variability among observed, correlated variables in terms of a potentially lower number of unobserved variables called factors. For example, it is possible that variations in six observed ...
of the ''PCL-R'' indicated it consisted of two factors. Factor 1 captures traits dealing with the interpersonal and affective deficits of psychopathy (e.g., shallow affect, superficial charm, manipulativeness, lack of empathy) whereas factor 2 deals with symptoms relating to antisocial behavior (e.g., criminal versatility, impulsiveness, irresponsibility, poor behavior controls, juvenile delinquency
Juvenile delinquency, also known as juvenile offending, is the act of participating in unlawful behavior as a minor or individual younger than the statutory age of majority. In the United States of America, a juvenile delinquent is a person ...
).
The two factors have been found by those following this theory to display different correlates. Factor 1 has been correlated with narcissistic personality disorder
Narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) is a personality disorder characterized by a life-long pattern of exaggerated feelings of self-importance, an excessive need for admiration, a diminished ability or unwillingness to empathize with other ...
, low anxiety,[ low empathy,] low stress reaction and low suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Mental disorders (including depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, anxiety disorders), physical disorders (such as chronic fatigue syndrome), and s ...
risk[ but high scores on scales of achievement and social potency.][ In addition, the use of ]item response theory
In psychometrics, item response theory (IRT) (also known as latent trait theory, strong true score theory, or modern mental test theory) is a paradigm for the design, analysis, and scoring of tests, questionnaires, and similar instruments measuring ...
analysis of female offender PCL-R scores indicates factor 1 items are more important in measuring and generalizing the construct
Construct, Constructs or constructs may refer to:
* Construct (information technology), a collection of logic components forming an interactive agent or environment
** Language construct
* ''Construct'' (album), a 2013 album by Dark Tranquillity ...
of psychopathy in women than factor 2 items.
In contrast, Factor 2 was found to be related to antisocial personality disorder, social deviance, sensation seeking, low socioeconomic status[ and high risk of ]suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Mental disorders (including depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, anxiety disorders), physical disorders (such as chronic fatigue syndrome), and s ...
.[ The two factors are nonetheless highly correlated][ and there are strong indications they do result from a single underlying disorder.] Research, however, has failed to replicate the two-factor model in female samples.
In 2001 researchers Cooke and Michie at Glasgow Caledonian University
Glasgow Caledonian University ( gd, Oilthigh Chailleannach Ghlaschu, ), informally GCU, Caledonian or Caley, is a public university in Glasgow, Scotland. It was formed in 1993 by the merger of The Queen's College, Glasgow (founded in 1875) and G ...
suggested, using statistical analysis involving confirmatory factor analysis
In statistics, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) is a special form of factor analysis, most commonly used in social science research.Kline, R. B. (2010). ''Principles and practice of structural equation modeling (3rd ed.).'' New York, New York: Gu ...
, that a three-factor structure may provide a better model, with those items from factor 2 strictly relating to antisocial behavior (criminal versatility, juvenile delinquency, revocation of conditional release, early behavioral problems and poor behavioral controls) removed. The remaining items would be divided into three factors: arrogant and deceitful interpersonal style, deficient affective experience, and impulsive and irresponsible behavioral style.[ Hare and colleagues have criticized the Cooke and Michie three-factor model for statistical and conceptual problems, for example, for resulting in impossible parameter combinations (negative variances).]
In the 2003 edition of the ''PCL-R'', Hare added a fourth antisocial behavior factor, consisting of those factor 2 items excluded in the previous model. Again, these models are presumed to be hierarchical with a single, unified psychopathy disorder underlying the distinct but correlated factors. In the four-factor model of psychopathy, supported by a range of samples, the factors represent the interpersonal, affective, lifestyle, and overt antisocial features of the personality disorder.
Use
The PCL-R is widely used to assess individuals in high-security psychiatric units, prisons and other settings. This may be of help in deciding who should be detained or released, or who should undergo what kind of treatment. It is also used in academic psychology for its original purpose as an assistive tool in studies on the pathology of psychopathy.
The PCL-R is also used as a risk assessment
Broadly speaking, a risk assessment is the combined effort of:
# identifying and analyzing potential (future) events that may negatively impact individuals, assets, and/or the environment (i.e. hazard analysis); and
# making judgments "on the to ...
tool that attempts to predict who will offend or reoffend (recidivism). It is effective in assessing risk of sexual re-offending, which is especially helpful, as clinical judgement of recidivism is a poor predictor. The PCL-R seems to be more useful for violent sexual offenders who are not pedophiles.
In controlled research environments the inter-rater reliability
In statistics, inter-rater reliability (also called by various similar names, such as inter-rater agreement, inter-rater concordance, inter-observer reliability, inter-coder reliability, and so on) is the degree of agreement among independent obse ...
of the PCL-R may be satisfactory, but in real-world settings it has been found to have rather poor agreement between different raters, especially on the personality trait scores.
Screening and Youth Versions
There are additional inventories directly from the PCL-R, including the Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version (PCL:SV) and Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version ( PCL:YV). The PCL:SV was developed as a labor-saving assessment for the same forensic settings as the PCL-R and to meet the needs of settings where clients do not necessarily have criminal records (e.g. civil psychiatric patients). It includes 12 items and takes 90 minutes. According to the MacArthur violence risk assessment study in 2014, there is a stronger correlation between the PCL:SV results and later violence than any other of the 134 variables evaluated in that study. The PCL:YV assesses early signs of juvenile psychopathy in children and adolescents.
Comparison with psychiatric diagnoses
Among laypersons and professionals, there is confusion about the meanings and differences between psychopathy, sociopathy, antisocial personality disorder
Antisocial personality disorder (ASPD or infrequently APD) is a personality disorder characterized by a long-term pattern of disregard of, or violation of, the rights of others as well as a difficulty sustaining long-term relationships. Lack ...
(ASPD), and the ICD-10
ICD-10 is the 10th revision of the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD), a medical classification list by the World Health Organization (WHO). It contains codes for diseases, signs and symptoms, ...
diagnosis, dissocial personality disorder.
Hare takes the stance that psychopathy as a syndrome should be considered distinct from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders
The ''Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders'' (DSM; latest edition: DSM-5-TR, published in March 2022) is a publication by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) for the classification of mental disorders using a common langua ...
-IV's antisocial personality disorder construct, although the DSM states ASPD has been referred to as or includes the disorder of psychopathy. Although the diagnosis of ASPD covers two to three times as many prisoners than the diagnosis of psychopathy, Hare believes the PCL-R is better able to predict future criminality, violence, and recidivism than a diagnosis of ASPD. He suggests there are differences between PCL-R-diagnosed psychopaths and non-psychopaths on "processing and use of linguistic and emotional information", while such differences are potentially smaller between those diagnosed with ASPD and without.
Although Hare wanted the DSM-IV-TR
The ''Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders'' (DSM; latest edition: DSM-5-TR, published in March 2022) is a publication by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) for the classification of mental disorders using a common langua ...
to list psychopathy as a unique disorder, the DSM editors were unconvinced and felt that there was too much room for subjectivity
Subjectivity in a philosophical context has to do with a lack of objective reality. Subjectivity has been given various and ambiguous definitions by differing sources as it is not often the focal point of philosophical discourse.Bykova, Marina F ...
on the part of clinicians
A clinician is a health care professional typically employed at a skilled nursing facility or clinic. Clinicians work directly with patients rather than in a laboratory or as a researcher. A clinician may diagnose, treat, and otherwise care for pat ...
when identifying things like remorse and guilt; therefore, the DSM-IV panel decided to stick to observable behavior, namely socially deviant behaviors.
Other PCL-R findings and Controversy
Findings
According to Hare, one FBI
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...
study produced in 1992 found that 44 percent of offenders who killed a police officer were psychopaths. The study was 'Killed in the Line of Duty: A Study of Selected Felonious Killings of Law Enforcement Officers.'
Hare has described psychopaths as 'social predators', 'remorseless predators', or in some cases 'lethal predators', and has stated that 'Psychopathic depredations
Raiding, also known as depredation, is a military tactic or operational warfare mission which has a specific purpose. Raiders do not capture and hold a location, but quickly retreat to a previous defended position before enemy forces can respond i ...
affect people in all races, cultures, and ethnic groups, and at all levels of income and social status'.
A study using the PCL-R to examine the relationship between antisocial behavior and suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Mental disorders (including depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, anxiety disorders), physical disorders (such as chronic fatigue syndrome), and s ...
found that suicide history was strongly correlated to PCL-R factor 2 (reflecting antisocial deviance) and was not correlated to PCL-R factor 1 (reflecting affective functioning). Given that ASPD relates to factor 2, whereas psychopathy relates to both factors, this would confirm Hervey M. Cleckley
Hervey Milton Cleckley (September 7, 1903 – January 28, 1984) was an American psychiatrist and pioneer in the field of psychopathy. His book, ''The Mask of Sanity,'' originally published in 1941 and revised in new editions until the 1980s, ...
's assertion that psychopaths are relatively immune to suicide. People with ASPD, on the other hand, have a relatively high suicide rate.[
]
Controversy
Because an individual's scores may have important consequences for his or her future, the potential for harm if the test is used or administered incorrectly is considerable. The test can only be considered valid if administered by a suitably qualified and experienced clinician under controlled conditions.
There has been controversy over the use of the PCL-R by UK prison and secure psychiatric services, including its role in the government's administrative category of 'Dangerous and Severe Personality Disorder' (a separate older administrative category of 'psychopathic disorder' in the Mental Health Act was abolished in 2007). One leading forensic psychologist, while Deputy Chief at the Ministry of Justice A Ministry of Justice is a common type of government department that serves as a justice ministry.
Lists of current ministries of justice
Named "Ministry"
* Ministry of Justice (Abkhazia)
* Ministry of Justice (Afghanistan)
* Ministry of Just ...
, has argued that it has not lived up to claims that it could identify those who would not benefit from current treatments or those most likely to violently reoffend.
Several recent studies and very large-scale meta-analysis
A meta-analysis is a statistical analysis that combines the results of multiple scientific studies. Meta-analyses can be performed when there are multiple scientific studies addressing the same question, with each individual study reporting me ...
have cast serious doubt on whether the PCL-R performs as well as other instruments, or better than chance. To the extent that it does perform better, it is unclear whether it is due the PCL-R's inclusion of past offending history, rather than the personality trait scores that make it unique.
Criticism
In addition to the aforementioned report by Cooke and Michie that a three-factor structure may provide a better model than the two-factor structure, Hare's concept and checklist have faced other criticisms.
In 2010, there was controversy after it emerged that Hare had threatened legal action that stopped publication of a peer-reviewed article on the PCL-R. Hare alleged the article quoted or paraphrased him incorrectly. The article eventually appeared, three years later. It alleged that the checklist is wrongly viewed by many as the basic definition of psychopathy, yet it leaves out key factors, while also making criminality too central to the concept. The authors claimed this leads to problems in over-diagnosis and in the use of the checklist to secure convictions. Hare has since stated that he receives less than $35,000 a year from royalties
A royalty payment is a payment made by one party to another that owns a particular asset, for the right to ongoing use of that asset. Royalties are typically agreed upon as a percentage of gross or net revenues derived from the use of an asset o ...
associated with the checklist and its derivatives.
Hare's concept has also been criticised as being only weakly applicable to real-world settings and tending towards tautology. It is also said to be vulnerable to "labeling effects", to be over-simplistic, reductionist, to embody fundamental attribution error
In social psychology, fundamental attribution error (FAE), also known as correspondence bias or attribution effect, is the tendency for people to under-emphasize situational and environmental explanations for an individual's observed behavior whil ...
, and not pay enough attention to context and the dynamic nature of human behavior. It has been pointed out that half the criteria can also be signs of mania
Mania, also known as manic syndrome, is a mental and behavioral disorder defined as a state of abnormally elevated arousal, affect, and energy level, or "a state of heightened overall activation with enhanced affective expression together wit ...
, hypomania
Hypomania (literally "under mania" or "less than mania") is a mental and behavioural disorder, characterised essentially by an apparently non-contextual elevation of mood (euphoria) that contributes to persistently disinhibited behaviour.
The ...
, or frontal lobe
The frontal lobe is the largest of the four major lobes of the brain in mammals, and is located at the front of each cerebral hemisphere (in front of the parietal lobe and the temporal lobe). It is parted from the parietal lobe by a groove betwe ...
dysfunction (e.g., glibness/superficial charm
Superficial charm (or insincere charm) refers to the social act of saying or doing things because they are well received by others, rather than what one actually believes or wants to do. It is sometimes referred to as "telling people what they w ...
, grandiosity, poor behavioral controls, promiscuous sexual behavior, and irresponsibility).
Some research suggests that ratings made using the PCL system depend on the personality of the person doing the rating, including how empathic they themselves are. One forensic researcher has suggested that future studies need to examine the class background, race and philosophical beliefs of raters because they may not be aware of enacting biased judgments of people whose section of society or individual lives for whom they have no understanding of or empathy. Further, a review which pooled various risk assessment instruments including the PCL, found that peer-reviewed studies for which the developer or translator of the instrument was an author (which in no case was disclosed in the journal article) were twice as likely to report positive predictive findings.
Notable evaluations
*Lawrence Bittaker
Lawrence may refer to:
Education Colleges and universities
* Lawrence Technological University, a university in Southfield, Michigan, United States
* Lawrence University, a liberal arts university in Appleton, Wisconsin, United States
Preparator ...
was evaluated as 39/40.
*Canadian
Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...
serial killer
A serial killer is typically a person who murders three or more persons,A
*
*
*
* with the murders taking place over more than a month and including a significant period of time between them. While most authorities set a threshold of three ...
duo Paul Bernardo
Paul Kenneth Bernardo (born August 27, 1964), also known as The Scarborough Rapist and The Schoolgirl Killer, is a Canadian serial killer and serial rapist. He is known for initially committing a series of rapes in Scarborough, Ontario, a subu ...
and Karla Homolka
Karla Leanne Homolka (born May 4, 1970), also known as Karla Leanne Teale, Leanne Teale, and Leanne Bordelais, is a Canadian serial killer who acted as an accomplice to her husband, Paul Bernardo, taking active part in the actual rapes and murde ...
were assessed using the checklist. Bernardo was evaluated as 35/40, and Homolka 5/40 (a malignant narcissist
Malignant narcissism is a psychological syndrome comprising an extreme mix of narcissism, antisocial behavior, aggression, and sadism. Grandiose, and always ready to raise hostility levels, the malignant narcissist undermines families and organiz ...
).
*Ted Bundy
Theodore Robert Bundy ( born Cowell; November 24, 1946 – January 24, 1989) was an American serial killer who kidnapped, raped and murdered numerous young women and girls during the 1970s and possibly earlier. After more than a decade ...
was evaluated as 39/40.
*Jeffrey Dahmer
Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer (; May 21, 1960 – November 28, 1994), also known as the Milwaukee Cannibal or the Milwaukee Monster, was an American serial killer and sex offender who killed and dismemberment, dismembered seventeen men and boys ...
was evaluated as 23/40.
*Brian Dugan
Brian James Dugan (born September 23, 1956) is a convicted rapist and serial killer active between 1983 and 1985 in Chicago's western suburbs. He was known for having informally confessed in 1985 to the 1983 abduction, rape and murder of 10-year-o ...
was evaluated as 38/40.
*John Wayne Gacy
John Wayne Gacy (March 17, 1942 – May 10, 1994) was an American serial killer and sex offender who raped, tortured, and murdered at least 33 young men and boys. Gacy regularly performed at children's hospitals and charitable events as " ...
was evaluated as 27/40.
*Charles Guiteau
Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English and French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''*karilaz'' (in Latin alphabet), whose meaning was " ...
was evaluated as 37.5/40.
*Peter Lundin
Peter Kenneth Bostrøm Lundin (born February 15, 1972), who later renamed himself to Bjarne Skounborg and most recently Thomas Kristian Olesen, is a Danish serial killer who, on March 15, 2001, was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Østre Lan ...
was evaluated as 39/40.
*Brian David Mitchell
Elizabeth Ann Smart was kidnapped at age fourteen on June 5, 2002, by Brian David Mitchell from her home in the Federal Heights neighborhood of Salt Lake City, Utah. She was held captive by Mitchell and his wife, Wanda Barzee, on the outskirts ...
was evaluated as 34/40.
*Clifford Olson
Clifford Robert Olson Jr. (January 1, 1940 – September 30, 2011) was a convicted Canadian serial killer who confessed to murdering 11 children and teenagers between the ages of 9 and 18 in the early 1980s.
Murders
Christine Weller, 12, from ...
was evaluated as 38/40.
*Gary Ridgway
Gary Leon Ridgway (born February 18, 1949), also known as the Green River Killer, is an American serial killer and sex offender. He was initially convicted of 48 separate murders. As part of his plea bargain, another conviction was added, brin ...
, known as the Green River Killer, was evaluated at 19/40.
*Aileen Wuornos
Aileen Carol Wuornos (; born Pittman; February 29, 1956 – October 9, 2002) was an American serial killer. In 1989–1990, while engaging in street prostitution along highways in Florida, she shot dead and robbed seven of her male clients. Wuo ...
was evaluated as 32/40.
*Dwight York
Dwight D. York (born June 26, 1945),Philips, Abu Ameenah Bilal. ''The Ansar Cult in America,'' Tawheed Publications 1988, p. 1. Philips claims that in 1975 York's publications changed his declared birth year from 1935 to 1945, to coincide with ...
was evaluated as 39/40.
See also
* Actuarial tools in criminology
* Levenson Self-Report Psychopathy Scale The Levenson Self-Report Psychopathy scale (LSRP) is a 26-item, 4-point Likert scale, self-report inventory to measure primary and secondary psychopathy in non-institutionalised populations. It was developed in 1995 by Michael R. Levenson, Kent A. ...
*
* Narcissism
Narcissism is a self-centered personality style characterized as having an excessive interest in one's physical appearance or image and an excessive preoccupation with one's own needs, often at the expense of others.
Narcissism exists on a co ...
* Psychopathic Personality Inventory
The Psychopathic Personality Inventory (PPI-Revised) is a personality test for traits associated with psychopathy in adults. The PPI was developed by Scott Lilienfeld and Brian Andrews to assess these traits in non-criminal (e.g. university studen ...
* Psychopathy
Psychopathy, sometimes considered synonymous with sociopathy, is characterized by persistent Anti-social behaviour, antisocial behavior, impaired empathy and remorse, and Boldness, bold, Disinhibition, disinhibited, and Egotism, egotistical B ...
References
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
This American Life radio documentary on the PCL-R and its use
Online version of original Psychopathy Checklist (PCL-22)
{{Psychopathy
Checklists
Psychopathy scales