The Aspiring Psychologist Podcast - Why Psychopaths Are So Charming (And Why That's Dangerous)

Starting point is 00:00:00 My name is Diakalola Amujam. I am a recent psychology graduate from Ireland. I am also an aspiring clinical psychologist. Dr. Marion's book, The Clinical Psychologist Collective, has been so helpful to me on this journey to become a clinical psychologist. As I plan to continue postgraduate studies in the UK, I found it extremely useful that this book provided in-depth information on the UK. the declineside application process. I enjoyed reading about the experiences of both qualified and training clinical psychologists. The various narratives were my favorite part of the book, as everyone's story was different and it provided amazing insights into the clinical psychology

Starting point is 00:00:49 journey. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in psychology and aspires to become a clinical psychologist. If a psychopath walked into the room, you think you'd know? Most of us do, but psychology suggests something much more uncomfortable. And that's that the people we're most likely to trust sometimes might be the people we should question the most. Today I'm joined by Dr Emma Kavanaugh, psychologist and author of the psychopath effect as we explore why charm can be so persuasive, why love bombing works, and while the real psychology isn't necessarily about the psychopaths, it's about the effect they have. have on the rest of us. I'm Dr. Marianne Trent and this is Psychology Actually. Hi, welcome

Starting point is 00:01:46 along to Psychology Actually. I'm Dr. Marianne Trent, a qualified clinical psychologist and I have another doctor with me today. I'm joined by Dr. Emma Kavana. Hi Emma. Hi, thank you so much for inviting me. Thank you so much for your PR team pitching me the episode, which is all about psychopathy, which is linked to your new book, The Psychopath Effect, the mind-altering power of the psychopaths among us. So, Emma, I thought it might be a little bit of fun to start with a bit of a myth-busting, quick-fire round about psychopathy. So are you ready? I am ready, let's go. Most psychopaths are violent. Myth. Most psychopaths end up in prison. Myth. Psychopaths can be changed. Charming.

Starting point is 00:02:35 A fact. You can spot a psychopath straight away. Fact. If you know what you're looking for. If there are a lot of qualifiers that show, my brain is like, ugh. Psychopaths always know when they're manipulating people. I'm going to say. Trauma bonding is just falling in love.

Starting point is 00:03:01 A myth. Psychopaths can never change. Oh, that's a good one. I'm going to say myth, but don't try and change them. They have to qualify that one. Therapy is pointless for psychopathy. Is it pointless? Going to say myth, but I feel like that one should be heavily qualified. Thank you. That was the end of our myth versus fact round. So, tell us about what the psychopath effect is. So we talk a lot about psychopathy. It's one of those issues within psychology that everybody has an opinion on and everybody feels like they understand it. But it's like so many other things in science and in psychology specifically that we all understand it, but often we're wrong. So psychopathy as a psychological function. Rather than thinking of it as a disorder, psychologists now classify it as a collection of behaviours.

Starting point is 00:04:15 So we have meanness, boldness and disinhibition. So meanness is your archetypal psychopathy. That's the thing you think of when you think of psychopathy. So it's that antagonism, that low empathy, resource hoarding, tending to be cruel. boldness on the other hand is something that we tend to like so it's the tendency to be low fear low stress we tend people tend to be confident they tend to be charming these are the kind of people who tend to function very well in society and then disinhibition are the kind of people who tend to struggle more in society they have trouble controlling their impulses

Starting point is 00:05:06 they're more likely to have a criminal background relationship issues just because they don't have that inhibitory capacity that hopefully the rest of us do. We talk a lot about what the psychopath is, but what fascinated me more than that was what effect do they have on the rest of us? As we go through the book, so the book is organized in terms of first, glancing at a psychopath across a crowded room, getting to know them, maybe getting into a friendship with them, becoming colleagues, romantic relationships, if the psychopath is a parent. So it follows our progress through the relationship with the psychopath. And what was so interesting to me is that in each of those stages, they have different effects.

Starting point is 00:06:06 on us. So they have a pronounced capacity to affect our cognitions, our emotions, even our sense of reality, you know, what we understand the world and ourselves to be. So the psychopath effect is about psychopathy, but more than that, it's about us and it's about how we react to psychopathy. Thank you. I really enjoyed the book, and I really liked the way that it was structured with those kind of different relationships. And one of my favourite bits was that you used kind of real-life examples of people who probably would have scored quite highly,

Starting point is 00:06:46 high-profile people, for example, there was someone that had been a big player in kind of the kind of Nazi movement was in it. And I just found that really helped me to think, right, okay, oh, yeah, I can see how that plays out. But also it was really helpful to think, actually these might be people that we'd meet on our way up in a career or we might be, you know, shoulder to shoulder trying to go for the same jobs and how that's going to impact us.

Starting point is 00:07:16 So I really liked that kind of real world kind of how to spot a psychopath aspect as well. I think that's part of how our understanding of psychopathy has changed because we've traditionally, because psychopathy was treated as a disorder, these weren't the kind of people that we'd were shoulders with. You know, in the book, I talk about the extremes. So like Ted Bundy, you know, the kind of people who you read about in the news. But odds are you're not going to bump into those. You know, statistically, you'd be quite unlucky to meet a Ted Bundy. But as our understanding of psychopathy has evolved, we've realized that the lower levels of psychopathic traits tend to affect all of us, you know, what we can call it a dimensional personality trait. So meanness, boldness,

Starting point is 00:08:08 and disinhibition, we all have those traits. You know, we all have a certain level of meanness within us. We all have a certain level of boldness and of disinhibition. The difference is when we're talking about somebody who would score as a psychopath is that they're looking at higher levels of those behavioural traits. But it is very much a societal issue. You know, and as we're, as you saw in the book, I interviewed people who's, who had real life experiences with people high and psychopathic traits. And there was no shortage. And the fun thing is you say, I'm writing a book about psychopaths and everybody, everybody will say, well, there was this guy. You know, everybody, has a story. It's so interesting what happens when you remove the disorder element. You know,

Starting point is 00:09:06 when you start looking at the subclinical, just below that threshold, how much it kind of proliferates out and how pronounced of an issue it becomes. Yeah, I think your book has changed the way I think about people for sure. Is that a good thing? Or have I ruined people for you? Well, a little bit of both. A little bit from column A, little bit from column B. Even the conversations I was having in the hairdressers on Friday, you know, about antagonism. Like, I think the word antagonism is ruined for me now. It's never going to make me not, right, okay, let's have a little look at that. But it's, it's, because I do a lot of work with people who've experienced complex trauma, so we've often met people that are really not good people. It's really helped me think about formulating with them

Starting point is 00:09:59 in a different way. Like it was never your fault and maybe, you know, there was never and maybe anything you could have done that was any different once you'd kind of been locked in their sights. And I think that that can be very dis-shaming in itself

Starting point is 00:10:14 and kind of putting that responsibility firmly outside of your control and back into the court of the person with the high psychopathy score. And what's so interesting. So when I started research, in the book. The one thing I knew I wanted to talk about was what happens if you have somebody with high psychopathic traits who is a parent. And my comfort blanket for anything is the research.

Starting point is 00:10:42 So when I wanted to understand what that looked like, I went straight into the psychological research. And there was nothing. There were a handful of studies. I spoke to one brilliant researcher Adele Forth, who was in Carlton University in Canada. And she was incredibly helpful and has done the study on parental psychopathy. But it was stunning that it was a case of the study. You know, there was so little research done. And for those people, I started doing a series of interviews because I had to find out myself because there just wasn't anything there. And what was so fascinating with these individuals who had been raised by somebody who they can now identify as having psychopathic traits is they had gone through life, never knowing what was wrong, but always feeling that there was something wrong with them. And what you would see is they had gone to, they would have histories of anxiety, depression, PTSD, chronic ill health.

Starting point is 00:11:53 and they would go for psychological support, always saying there's something wrong with me. And what happened when they were unable, when they were able to correctly locate the problem, when they were able to say, actually, perhaps the problem wasn't me. Perhaps the problem was that my parent had psychopathic traits, which massively influenced the way in which they parented me. And what happened then was really quite fascinating. In terms of mental health, they were able to function in a far more healthy way. They were able to, there's something really powerful about that saying it wasn't about me. You know, it was about them. And what the research suggests is that even if they didn't remove themselves from their parent, you know, we're talking about adults. now, but most of them maintain relationships with the psychopathic parent. A lot of them, the majority of them, looked after them in their old age. But even doing that, even still being in that environment, the difference in mental health when you can locate the problem, as opposed to

Starting point is 00:13:15 when you think it's you, is staggering. There's something really powerful about being able to say, this didn't start with me. Yeah. And also, almost that you can choose to not be riled or choose not to be affected or choose to mildly dissociate in order to get through to just be able to do the physical care jobs associated with looking after your parents. But know that actually this isn't about me. You know, any other child that had been born or in their power would have likely had the same experience. And it wasn't my fault and I deserve something different. Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, in terms of, it's so difficult. I think for those were that,

Starting point is 00:13:53 was the group that affected me more than any other because their entire their identity, their worldview, everything had been built by a psychopath. That's a really dangerous place to be. And, you know, we think of psychopaths as being bad guys because that's what society has kind of taught us. But all of these people, all of the psychopathic parents showed evidence of loving behaviours, generosity, kindness. So it wasn't a dichotomy. There was this real contradiction in terms going on. And it was really confusing then for the children going, well, they can't be a psychopath because they gave me, you know, money to, they supported me through university or they gave me money to buy a car. but the problem I think we always have in those situations is that when we find our

Starting point is 00:14:53 ourselves presented as an adult with a psychopathic parent we're often not approaching them as an adult we're approaching them as a child again because they bring up every I mean you know and obviously this is your area you know they bring up all of these child like heartbreaks. And so when they trigger us, I love the fact you use the word mild dissociation because I think it very much is that. There is a part of us choosing to go, okay, think about sheep. Or, you know, I'm Welsh, we think about sheep. You know, anything just to kind of to remove yourself from that bombardment of pain, to remove yourself from being a small child again in that environment and unable to escape.

Starting point is 00:15:41 You know, there's a lot. It's a very powerful message to be able to say, I'm having a boundary. I'm setting a boundary because it gives you that sense of control that you didn't have as that small child. Yeah, I think speaking as a parent myself, like I would consider my job, you know, well done or done enough if my children ultimately choose to have me in their lives,

Starting point is 00:16:08 they're grown but that they don't need to have me in their lives because they're not dependent and that we're not emmished. You know, I want them to, you know, choose to come out and have coffee or go to the cinema with me or come around for dinner or my youngest always says, don't you worry, I'm going to cook for you. I'm like, lovely, that would be nice. But we need to, in order to have that happen, we have to give our kids permission to individuate from us and to not still be under our constant control. And even, the idea of, you know, once we go into our parental homes, I think sometimes as soon as I put my keys in the dish where we keep our keys, it's that like ching that suddenly gets you back into being

Starting point is 00:16:48 a child. And you need to grow up as a parent in order to let your children develop into young adults and beyond. And you can't still expect to control all of their behaviours. It's like, I can allow you to make an unwise decision that I don't agree with. I can't necessarily allow you to make an unsafe decision as a child. But even those small amounts of autonomy are so important, aren't they? And the thing is, I mean, nothing is more threatening to somebody who is high in psychopathic traits than individuation. Having as having not just a child, you know, a child is kind of the purest example of this. But, you know, for anybody who finds themselves within the orbit of a psychopath. Any sense of individuation, any sense of not entirely agreeing, not entirely buying into

Starting point is 00:17:39 their worldview is immensely threatening. And so, you know, you see the wealth of research and psychopathy has been done in organizational psychology. So, you know, within workplace environments. And, you know, you see it there that anybody who finds themselves, with a psychopathic boss. That's a classic example. The level of control exerted will be staggering. I gave an example in the book of staff being unable to decide what color to paint a toilet in case they got into trouble. And it's that level of control. And I think we see that throughout the psychopath's behavioral repertoire. it is very much about I will enter a social situation and I will take charge of it and I will control not just how that social situation goes but how you think about it which is what is

Starting point is 00:18:45 so damaging to everybody around them. So interesting, so interesting. So you kind of teased us at the beginning that you can tell a psychopath straight away. So I'm going to keep my hands out of the way. when I ask you, when I ask you that question, Emma. Tell us about some of the things that people might be able to look out for. So what's really interesting in terms of psychopathy is you can, evidence suggests, research for shown, that we can detect psychopathy from what's called thin-slice behavioural examples.

Starting point is 00:19:24 So if you see somebody from across a room, we do have the capacity to pick up psychopathic traits. However, the problem comes when we start to communicate with that person. What we know is that when that thin slice becomes a bit thicker, critically, once they start talking to us, we lose the capacity to assess psychopathy. And I think one of the reasons that that happens is the killer blow of psychopathic charm. Nothing fascinates me quite as much as psychopathic charm. Because in terms of, you know, we talked about their need to control an environment and this is how we do it. Because they are, they have the ability to lock you in, to talk to you in, to talk to you. in a way that you stop questioning. There's some fantastic research in the book. Not my research.

Starting point is 00:20:33 That's not me blowing my own trumpet. There is just some really interesting research about what happens when we find ourselves face to face with somebody who's very high in charisma. And research has shown that if we are in communication with somebody who is very charismatic, we see a reduced blood flow in the prefrontal cortex. The prefrontal cortex is critical for all our smart stuff, you know, all our logical thinking, rational thinking, our ability to tell if somebody is lying to us. They termed it the guru effect. This is so cool. This is why I love psychology. Because they called it the guru effect. Because when you're are face to face with somebody like a guru who is highly charismatic, you actually become a bit

Starting point is 00:21:25 stupider. And there is an evolutionary logic to it. In evolutionary terms, we read charisma or charm as being a social signal. This tells us somebody knows what they're doing. This person is capable. you know, if this person is capable, high in social status, I don't need to reinvent the wheel. I can just assume they know what they're doing. Ergo, I can stop thinking so hard and let them take control. As a psychopath, you don't want anything more than that. You know, that is a phenomenal tool to have in your arsenal. But the problem comes, of course, when you walk away and you go, wait, what did I just?

Starting point is 00:22:15 agree to. Yeah, that is so funny. And there's something around the smile and the hand gestures and the fact that if you don't let the psychopath get to you, you can observe their psychopathy in 33 milliseconds, I think. Yeah. Once you get them a chance to start working on you, they get your defences down a little bit. Absolutely. You know, and this is exactly what's happening. So, you know, as humans, part of what we do is read the environment. You know, we, we badmouth hypervigilance, but it's very useful in terms of keeping us alive. And one of the threats in the environment is potentially other people. So psychopathy does come with signals. You know, so one of the classic ones that always gets my spidey senses tingling is somebody who stands that a little bit too close to me.

Starting point is 00:23:14 you know, somebody who doesn't respect interpersonal space. There are standards for interpersonal space, who we will allow into what radius. You know, the closer we are to somebody, the closer we'll allow them to stand. But psychopaths just go, yeah, I'm just going to stand where I want to stand. And that is a really powerful evolutionary signal because that tells us this person isn't playing by our social rules. And what that should do is signal a threat. But of course, once they start talking, the bit of the brain that's like, hi, hi, this isn't okay, tends to clock off. So it becomes a lot harder. So it's all about people say, how do you detect psychopathy? I'm like, it's a really, really intensely difficult thing to pick up. Your ability to see it will depend on who you are. If you are somebody, who is, A, engaged in a conversation with them, but B, somebody who has value to them, your odds of seeing it are very, very low indeed, because you will then become the target.

Starting point is 00:24:30 One thing we know about psychopathic behaviour, the constant, the myth of psychopathy is that they can't empathise. Well, we know that that's not true, that they can empathise. They can show equal, if not superior, empathic ability to the rest of us. But the difference is it's motivated. So for somebody who has a high value to them, they will seem immensely empathic. They will be very good at looking for what you need. I talk to people who were early in romantic relationships with somebody who then transpired to have psychopathic traits. They would be so interested. They would be so interested in who you were, what you wanted in a relationship, what you needed out of life, which is great. However, there are a couple of different reasons why you do that. One of them is because you're nice. The other one is because you are gaining information that you will then use. And that's what happens. If you are somebody who is high in value to a psychopath, that's what you're up against. I maintain the people who see psychopaths for who they truly are are those who have nothing to offer them whatsoever.

Starting point is 00:25:54 In organizational psychology, you will see a pronounced difference between how somebody would describe a person with psychopathic traits, depending on where they sit in the organization. The people below them will call them Satan. They will be like, this is the worst person I've ever met. He is evil. The person above them will say, oh, he's great. He's great. He's so obliging, so interested, you know, always willing to go out of his way. They termed it upward licking, downward kicking. And it's a really good example of what psychopaths do. So for my money, the people who can detect psychopaths, are the people who have nothing whatsoever to offer them. You know, if you want to see who you're with, watch how they treat the waiter. Watch how they treat somebody who's checking them out in Tesco. Somebody who they'll never see again,

Starting point is 00:26:59 who isn't immediately offering them anything. Because that's where you see the core of a person's personality. So interesting. It's so interesting. And it definitely made me think that when I'm working in the media, they love it when I use my hands. And I don't know, is that because I'm then likely to be, because apparently psychopaths are more likely to speak with their hands,

Starting point is 00:27:26 I think I saw in your book. So are we trying to persuade our audience to believe what we're saying more, I'm using my hands as I speak, to kind of get people on board with what we're saying? Is that why the media want me to do that? We don't actually know. So there's a lot of mixed evidence in terms of why we use our hands. So there's a couple of theories. What we do know is that when somebody uses their hands and I could land planes when I talk, you know, I'm very gesture heavy. But I was also a teacher for a very long. I used to teach non-students about psychology. So one of the advantages is. of somebody using their hands is it helps with the flow of information.

Starting point is 00:28:16 It helps us process the information they're delivering. We don't really know why. But we do know that when somebody has their hands in use, that it helps the flow of communication. But it also serves a different purpose, and that's acting as a distractor. So if you are a... tempting to distract somebody from the content of your information. Using your hands quite a lot is quite a

Starting point is 00:28:48 good way of doing it. Now, I understand that when I said that, it sounded like I'm saying, if somebody gestures a lot, they're lying. That's not what I'm saying at all. But it is one of those things that works towards cognitive load. A lot of gestures can add to the sense of cognitive load. So how hard the brain is having to work to process the information you're giving. And another one of the psychopath's power moves is cognitive load. So what we know in conversational styles is they'll often talk a lot. You know, if you put somebody high in boldness specifically will talk an awful lot. When you're talking a lot, you're generating quite a lot of cognitive load. And that's a lot. And that's the higher the sense of cognitive load we experience, the harder our brain is working. So the more

Starting point is 00:29:45 difficult it becomes to pick out things that are a wrong or B flat lies. So I think the gesture thing is a part of that. It's a part of turbo charge in this conversation. The other thing it does is it signals social status. You know, if you gesture a lot, you're you're signaling that I'm in charge of this conversation. I'm running the room and I'm really hyper aware of my hands as I'm saying this but I'm going to go sit on them now. Yeah it's hard isn't it's hard to not think about these things once you know them and I think I probably use my hands more when I'm podcasting and then the media than I do in day-to-day conversations at the school gates for example and I hope that would mean that I'm less in charge in social situations. I don't think it means your site my friend texted me the other

Starting point is 00:30:37 night. She's reading the book and she texts me. She went, I gesture it all the time. Does that make me a psychopath? I'm like, no, I tested you. You're fine. But it is, it is a way of easing the flow of communication. And I think we especially use it when we are in the teacher role, because we are illustrating our words via hand signals. So let's, let's go with that rather than being psychopathic. Thank you. I think what you're saying is like, I'm not, I'm not ringing your psychopath bell, which I hope that's what you're saying. Okay, so are there any non-verbals we should be looking out for? Sure. So what we know is that when we display something called a Duchenne smile, it's the kind of smile that you display when you're nice. That's how we read it. So somebody goes, hi. And it's the kind of smile that triggers the muscles in your eyes. And it is perceived by everyone around us as a very warm welcoming. You know that saying, well, they smile, but they didn't smile with their eyes?

Starting point is 00:31:48 That is amateur hour. Because the Duchenne smile is what is perceived as more authentic. It's perceived as warmer. And we are more likely to trust somebody who delivers a Duchessne smile. However, what we also know is it's really not difficult to fake a Duchessne smile. Actors have been doing it for years. And psychopaths are very good at delivering what we want to see. They're very good at easing that flow of communication, of warmth, creating that image.

Starting point is 00:32:24 You know, remember what we said. When you first meet a psychopath, they will seem like the warmest, kindest, most interested individual. We like people who are interested in us. And the Duchesne smile is a really powerful part of that delivery system. It's a way of signaling to our evolutionary brain. Don't worry about me. I'm fine. Nothing to see here. You know, and what's really interesting is if we were paying attention, the early part of our threat detection system should have been going, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa,

Starting point is 00:32:59 something's going on here. that that early bit that can detect psychopathy from thin-slice behaviour should have been signalling us the Duchampil is a really good way of disarming that follow that up then with psychopathic charm we're defenceless

Starting point is 00:33:20 wow indeed we are it's definitely making me think about when I used to work in forensic units for impatient settings And people with high psychopathy scores were really good at splitting teams and kind of telling people what they wanted to hear on one side, not on another, causing friction, causing chaos. But it also made me think about people I've worked with in kind of adult mental health teams who have borderline personality disorders diagnoses. And that was something you mentioned in your book as being kind of around quite a lot for people with high psychics. psychopathy scores, I also know just how upset so many of my clients with kind of complex trauma and borderline personality would be for other people to be holding them in mind as being

Starting point is 00:34:11 potentially psychopaths. But one that you didn't mention in the book was with antisocial personality disorder and people talk a lot about narcissism, don't they, in the public sphere currently. So could you talk to us a little bit around psychopathy and diagnoses? I think we, psychopathy as a diagnosis is a immensely difficult because of its propensity to come along with all of these behavioral, the means of throwing us off. You know, inherent in psychopathy is a powerful tendency to emotionally manipulate. But not only a tendency, a skill, you know, emotional manipulation runs at the heart of psychopathy. You know, we describe antagonism and meanness as the centre pole of psychopathy. And one of the most effective ways of doing that is this emotional manipulation, you know, cutting people down, manipulating them so that they feel lesser.

Starting point is 00:35:29 Of course, the problem with emotional manipulation is if you can see it coming, it's not as powerful. So for psychopathy to work as a behavioural tendency, it has to operate under the radar. In terms of diagnosis, I'm not a diagnostician. And the DSM has looked to antisocial personality disorder as, would I? say alternative to psychopathy. You can't diagnose psychopathy in the DSM. You can diagnose antisocial personality disorder. Now, antisocial personality disorder has some of the tenets of psychopathy. They're very closely related. But what it does is it relies, it leans far more heavily on the disinhibition side. It's far more representative of those who show criminal

Starting point is 00:36:25 behavior, who struggle within society. Now, what interests me, you know, we talk about diagnosis and we talk about disorders. Often disorders represent somebody who's struggling, somebody who is struggling, somebody who is struggling to function within our society, within the way that we have deemed our society should work. Yeah, in truth, that's not a psychopath. Psychopaths are often immensely capable. You know, we've looked at the social positioning of psychopathy, especially within organizations. In organizations, psychopaths rise to the top. The people who are struggling within society don't tend to do that. So I have a bit of a problem, almost using the word. diagnosis because it feels like we are medicalizing it in terms of saying this is a problem that needs

Starting point is 00:37:36 to be fixed. For the psychopath, it's not a problem. For the psychopath, it's a behavioral response often to a tough environment. In the book, I talk about, you know, how one goes on to develop psychopathy, what has to happen for psychopathy to evolve? And in terms of surviving a tough environment, psychopath is a really good way of doing it. It's not great for everybody else, but for you as the psychopath, it's immensely effective. So I, as I said, I'm not a diagnostician, but even the concept of diagnosis when it comes to psychopathy, I struggle with a little bit because I think that it, for me, it is represented far better as a pattern of behaviours that an individual has developed to allow them to survive and to thrive in a harsh environment. Thank you. So that's kind of more in line with the power threat meaning framework and kind of more thinking about formulation rather than diagnosis. That's really helpful.

Starting point is 00:38:44 All right. Can we think about the psychopath in love and why love bombing is such a, potentially disarming an important part of what people with high scores might do. Whenever I said, I was writing a book about psychopathy, everybody had a story. Everybody had, there was this guy. And all of those guys, and it wasn't just guys, it was also girls. But all of those stories began with love bombing. So love bombing is an intense bombardment. bombing is such a good word for it because that's what it feels like. It's an intense process by which

Starting point is 00:39:25 the psychopath convinces you, they are everything you have ever wanted in a partner. It is overwhelming, immensely seductive. And I think it really helps if we think, if we hang on to what we said earlier about psychopathic charm. And now we're more. it into a different kind of relationship. So love bombing is psychopathic charm turned up to a thousand. And what's happening here is it's a way of a couple of things happening. It's a way of convincing you that this person is everything you've ever wanted. You know, we talked earlier about how they are very good listeners in the beginning. They are very interested because what they're doing is gathering information. They're finding out what do you need? What do you want? What are you looking for?

Starting point is 00:40:22 And then I'm going to give it to you. It's very fast. One of the best signals of love bombing happening is that the experience of the relationship is disproportionate to the amount of time you've been in it. If they ask you to marry them on day 10, you're being love bombed, which is highly cynical. I'm sure there will be people who will argue with that. However, you know what I'm saying. It is disproportionate to the stage of the relationship. It's also really overwhelming. And that's not an accident. Part of the psychopathic tendency is the creation of cognitive load. Love bombing is a really, really intense way of creating not just cognitive load, but emotional load. You have all of this attention and all of this communication and the gifts and the sense of Prince Charming has finally arrived.

Starting point is 00:41:26 But it also serves a different purpose. And we see this in cults. It's an incredibly common process in the early progress of an individual into a cult. You're really busy now because this person or this group of people, have invited you in, and they're now going to fill up all of your time. They're going to fill up all of your time, your attention. They're going to take all of your emotional energy. Because what that means is there's nothing left for anybody else.

Starting point is 00:42:00 So your support system, the people you had before, get pushed to one side. Now, what I am going to say is it is normal when a new romantic relationships begins to have a period of intensity. It is also normal that your social circle will change when you enter into a romantic relationship. Because in terms of social function, there's only so much that we can do. Our social brain has a capacity. So it's really normal to see those kind of changes happen. But again, in psychopathy and love bombing, it's that dialed up to a thousand.

Starting point is 00:42:44 And it's a process of isolation. because what will happen is you'll have this period of love bombing, but it cannot last forever. In order to love bomb, the psychopath is having to maintain an intense degree of control over who they are. They're having to control the one thing that defines them, which is their antagonism. That won't last forever. And so once they feel safe, the love bombing, will end and then the real psychopath will come out and that's when you really see who you're dealing with yeah and having having read this book um i wasn't very well over the weekend and i spend a lot of

Starting point is 00:43:30 time in front of a fan and uh watching netflix and it was really interesting because i found myself down a bit of a true crime wormhole and there's a Netflix documentary called worst ex-boyfriend ever and then one called maternal instinct and one called worst neighbor ever. And it was so interesting watching that unfold when I sort of had in my mind freshly all of these kind of ways of spotting the psychopath early on. So I think it's changed true crime for me forever. So sorry. Yeah, do you find yourself kind of a plan?

Starting point is 00:44:14 this to people that you meet along the way? I do. I do. And in terms of true crime, you know, we have a, it'll, the documentary will start, because I watch a lot of true crime because I'm mildly obsessed. Not my, I'm fully obsessed with that. And it'll start, my husband will look at me and you'll be like, I'm like, yeah. You know, I think often what we see is these individuals, Because they present so well when you first meet them, it comes across as a real shock when they then display who they truly are.

Starting point is 00:44:56 You know, like when the emotional manipulation comes out, the gaslighting comes out, the cruelty, the antagonism. All of that was there right from the beginning, you know, that you mentioned the documentary maternal instinct. Fascinating, fascinating one. And you could see it coming. You could see the steps, exactly. And not simply with the partner, but with the women that she was interacting with, you could see the love bombing. And it's a really interesting indication of how we end up in these positions.

Starting point is 00:45:32 Because the one constant of everybody I've ever spoken to who have been in romantic relationships with somebody with psychopathic traits is how did I not see? how did I let this happen to myself? And the answer is you couldn't see. We can only assess the behavior that is presented to us. And as their target, that would not have been presented to you. You know, I will add a proviso to that. Our capacity to inhibit our worst selves will always fall down when we are sick, when we are stressed,

Starting point is 00:46:12 and in a heat wave. So we're all grumpy in a heat wave. Hands up full disclosure. However, when somebody is under an immense amount of pressure, often what you will see behavioral leaks in terms of psychopathy, it's worth paying attention to those. If you find yourself in a position where somebody seems like a very different person in those environments, it's worth noting that, you know,

Starting point is 00:46:42 you know, there may be a bit more going on to it. I have to say, I've been foul. We were recording during some of the hottest weather in the UK on record. And I keep having to apologise to my kids. Like, I'm just awful in the heat. And, yeah, like, I'm kind of bored myself of saying, it's so hot. It's so hot.

Starting point is 00:47:05 Like, it's a revelation. It's like, did you not notice? What did you raise? Oh, I have loved chatting with you. There's so much you haven't had a chance to cover. But I thought, can we do a very quick fire round to finish, Emma? Of course. Yes, of course we can. Okay.

Starting point is 00:47:20 What do most people get wrong about psychopathy? The thing most people get wrong is that it is all about cruelty and callousness and low empathy. They forget that there will also be moments of kindness and empathy, and that is what throws everybody off. So interesting. When it comes to dating people or having dated people, the question is, well, why didn't they leave? Why is it not that simple? When you have been in a relationship with somebody high in psychopathic traits, one of the killer moves is destabilizing your sense of self. After the love bombing comes the gaslighting, the pathological lying, and the emotional manipulation. one of its core objectives is making you less than, you know, making you feel less powerful,

Starting point is 00:48:21 less capable, less independent. All of that makes it almost impossible to leave. Thank you. And is it when the trauma bonds are coming in? And it's almost that stunt cost fallacy as well. You know, we've been together this long or we've got these many children or, you know, what will people say? Talk to us briefly about trauma bonding, Emma? trauma bonding is critical when you're looking at psychopathy and long-term relationships, not just romantic, but parental, any long-lasting relationship with a psychopath will have an element of trauma bonding. Remember, this person has told you you're useless. This person has not only told you, they've convinced you that you are incapable, that you are worthless,

Starting point is 00:49:05 that nobody else will want you. And so the logical thing to do is, is to cling on to whoever is willing to have you because you have lost any confidence that you can start again and let alone start again alone. So trauma bond, that creation of a trauma bond, I would say, is almost the end goal. After the love bombing comes the gaslighting, the emotional manipulation, the lies, and that destruction of your sense of self. Once that has happened, you are locked in because you no longer feel capable of escaping. Gosh, if someone is watching or listening to this as a single person,

Starting point is 00:49:52 this kind of... They're not all like that. Okay, good to know. If they can be loving at the beginning of a relationship, why can't they sustain that all the time? That's a very good question. So I think what we have to recognize in psychopathy is that just like empathy, lovingness, kindness, generosity are all motivated behaviors.

Starting point is 00:50:16 Now, I mean, that's true for all of us. In a heat way, few of us are loving, generous and nice. So we all have that element of motivation when we behave well towards others. However, when we are talking about our closest social service, that for most of us, that tends to be removed. You know, we are, we treat them well because we treat them well, because, you know, there are children. You know, of course we do. For a psychopath, that is different. One of the fascinating things I came across when writing the book is inverted social reward. Most of us get a dopamine rush from interacting well with others, from having a nice

Starting point is 00:51:02 conversation, you know, from getting on well and having a good laugh, most of us get a sense of reward from that, a dopamine rush. Psychopaths do not. What has been, what research has shown is that they instead experience an inverted sense of social reward. So they will get their dopamine rush from creating carnage. They will get a sense of reward from causing. trouble, starting arguments, if you ever heard that person's always spoiling for a fight. That's why, because they genuinely will feel a rush of reward from that negative social interaction. The other thing that's related to psychopathy is negative social potency. You know, that having the power to cause trouble in a relationship is really appealing to

Starting point is 00:51:59 psychopaths. So you will never get them maintaining the niceness because it's just not rewarding. Gosh, wow, that really is food for thought, isn't it? Like, watch out. Okay, final one. Is it possible to read your book, The Psychopath Effect, and not think that either you are psychopathic, the reader, not you, or someone you know or have dated in the past. Is it physically possible? Is it physically possible? I don't know. I get off. ask this a lot, and I have heard a lot of people message me going, just reassure me, I'm not actually psychopathic. What I will say is we all have the traits that are displayed within psychopathy, but what makes you psychopathic is the extent to which you have them. And one

Starting point is 00:52:47 should not be judged on how one behaves during a heat wave. Absolutely. Absolutely. Could not agree more. Otherwise, you'd be locking me up, I think, because I am foul in a heat wave. Could you tell us a little bit more about you and where our audience can connect with you, Emma? So I am the author of, I think we decided nine, possibly, fiction books. I have written crime for a very long time, psychological crime. I have written The Psychopath Effects and an e-book, How to be Broken, which was about COVID and trauma and, you know, all that kind of stuff. I am available periodically on social media. But generally speaking, I'm writing constantly,

Starting point is 00:53:39 so I keep floating across people's awareness. Great. If people wanted to follow you on social media, where would be the best place to do that? I am on multiple social media platforms, so blue sky and threads at MLK. I will be posting updates about books on those platforms. For dog-related content, I'm also on Instagram under Dr. Emma Kavana. Amazing. Thank you so much.

Starting point is 00:54:11 And yeah, thank you for writing this book, because like I said, I did really enjoy it, and it's really made me think differently about my clinical work. So thank you. I definitely do recommend it. Thanks for your time, Emma. Thank you so much. What an absolute treat to speak with Dr. Emma. I hope that you've really enjoyed this episode. If you have, I think you'll also really, really love her book.

Starting point is 00:54:34 It's honestly blown my mind. So do check out the reviews or grab your own copy of the Psychopath Effect by clicking the link in the description or in the show notes. And if you're all this talk of psychology and kind of formulation and, you know, making sense of people has wet your appetite because you want to be a qualified psychologist one day. Why not check out the aspiring psychologist membership, which you can join from just £30 a month with no minimum term. And if you'd like to grab your free psychology success guide, you can get that from my website, www.spiring hyphen psychologist.com.uk.

Starting point is 00:55:17 Scroll right down at the bottom of that page, you can grab your free guide there. enjoy learning a little bit about psychology and real crime and forensic psychology. I think you'll really enjoy the episode I did with the wonderful Dr. Dana Anderson, which is all about the killer psychologist, which is her own experiences of growing up in America, in a complex trauma environment, the sense she made of that and how she ultimately went on to become a forensic psychologist. It was a real treat to speak with her. and her words have really stayed with me. So if you haven't yet watched that one, check that out.

Starting point is 00:55:58 And I'd love to know what you think to this episode and that one by dropping me a comment which you can do on Spotify, which is episode specific now, or always you can drop me comments on YouTube, which I always respond to. You'll actually get responses from me. So what's not to like? And yesterday I learned that 91% of you regularly

Starting point is 00:56:22 watching content on YouTube, don't currently subscribe. Let's click the subscribe button, maybe even consider clicking the alarm button so that you get alerted when I drop new content. Hello, my name is Veronica Kassova. I live in Edinburgh and I just graduated with a master's in psychology of mental health. Marion recommended me the clinical psychologist collective when I was networking on LinkedIn and I must say I love it. It is one of a kind. It's like a window into the lives of people on the path of becoming a psychologist. The stories are unique, honest and filled with a kind of intangible wisdom only personal storytelling can uncover. A common thread in the stories I valued most was to be compassionate not only with others but with myself too.

Starting point is 00:57:18 Also not fixating on becoming a psychic. but enjoying life, grow, and the final results will come as a buy-products. Marianne, thank you for taking the time to collate all the stories. The book is a true gem, and I think every aspiring psychologist should have a copy on their shelf. Thank you.

The Aspiring Psychologist Podcast - Why Psychopaths Are So Charming (And Why That's Dangerous)

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