Psychopathy, from psych (soul or mind) and pathy (suffering or disease), was coined by German psychiatrists in the 19th century and originally just meant what would today be called mental disorder, the study of which is still known as psychopathology.
Through the early 20th century this and other terms such as 'constitutional (inborn) psychopaths' or 'psychopathic personalities', were used very broadly to cover anyone who violated legal or moral expectations or was considered inherently socially undesirable in some way.
The psychiatric anthropologist Jane M. Murphy writes that, in northwest Alaska, the term Kunlangeta might be applied to "a man who… repeatedly lies and cheats and steals things and does not go hunting and, when the other men are out of the village, raping many women—someone who does not pay attention to reprimands and who is always brought to the elders for punishment.
"[3] Historical descriptions of people or characters are sometimes noted in discussions of psychopathy, with claims of superficial resemblance or retrospective diagnosis — for example, a vignette by Theophrastus in Ancient Greece concerning The Unscrupulous Man.
[5] Figures of insanity (e.g. vagabonds, libertines, the "mad") have, at least since the 18th century, often represented an image of darkness and threat to society, as later would "the psychopath" – a mixture of concepts of dangerousness, evil and illness.
[7] In 1835 English psychiatrist James Cowles Prichard, based partly on Pinel's publications, developed a broad category of mental disorder he called moral insanity - a "madness" of emotional or social dispositions without significant delusions or hallucinations.
German psychiatrist von Feuchtersleben's (1845) The Principles of Medical Psychology, which was translated into English, used it in this sense, as well as the roughly equivalent new term psychosis, now traced back to Karl Friedrich Canstatt's Handbuch der Medicinischen Klinik (1841).
The use of the term in a criminological context was popularised by a high-profile legal case in Russia between 1883 and 1885, concerning the murder of a girl who had previously lived in Britain for some time, Sarah Becker (Sarra Bekker).
Habitual criminality was only a small part of his concept but the German public soon used the shortened version "inferiors" to refer to anyone supposedly suffering from an inherent ('constitutional') disposition toward crime.
This covered abnormalities in the emotional and volitional spheres associated with episodic disturbances which did not fit into the established categories of psychosis: "The type of behavior disorder, the social reactions, the trends of interests, etc., which the psychopathic inferior may show give special features to many cases, e. g., criminal traits, moral deficiency, tramp life, sexual perversions and various temperamental peculiarities."
[25] Meanwhile, the American Prison Association had its own definition, in which psychopathic personalities were considered non-psychotic and characterized by failure to adjust to environment, lacking purpose, ambition and proper feelings, while often showing tendencies towards delinquency, lying and various eccentricities, perversions or manias (including dromomania (compulsion to travel or experience new lifestyles), kleptomania (stealing), pyromania (fire-setting) etc.).
[26] In 1933, American Psychiatrist Harry Stack Sullivan first coined the term "Psychopathic child," which is now thought to be the first formulation of autism spectrum disorder, to describe interpersonal deficiency which starts from childhood.
[34] The Mask of Sanity by American psychiatrist Hervey M. Cleckley, first published in 1941 and with revised editions for several decades, is considered a seminal work which provided a vivid series of case studies of individuals described as psychopaths.
[38] At the same time, however, in America and other countries the concept became increasingly prominent, used to categorise allied soldiers as fit or unfit for duty or on return to society, or, conversely, in the more specific sinister sense of the term, as a way to explain the actions of Nazis.
The first version of the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 1952 did not use the term psychopathy as a diagnosis, but "sociopathic personality disturbance".
The antisocial reaction was said to include "individuals who are chronically in trouble and do not seem to change as a result of experience or punishment, with no loyalties to anyone", as well as being frequently callous and lacking responsibility, with an ability to 'rationalize' their behaviour.
It later fell out of favor for some time, however, such that when he died in 1984 he was better remembered for a vivid case study of a female patient published in 1956, turned into a movie The Three Faces of Eve in 1957, which had (re)popularized in America another controversial diagnosis, multiple personality disorder.
"[43] Nevertheless, criminologist sociologists William and Joan McCord[44] were influential in narrowing the definition of psychopathy in some quarters to mean an antisocial lack of guilt accompanied by reactive aggression.
This was a legal subcategory in addition to 'mental illness' which did not equate to any one psychiatric diagnosis but covered anyone with "a persistent disorder or disability of mind which results in abnormally aggressive or seriously irresponsible conduct.
"[48] On the other hand, various analysts began to identify "successful" psychopaths in society, some even suggesting it was but an adaption to the social or economic mores of the age, others noting they could be hard to spot either because they were so good at hiding their lack of conscience, or because many people showed the traits to some degree.
This was still described in similar terms as the DSM-I's category, for individuals who are "basically unsocialized", in repeated conflicts with society, incapable of significant loyalty, selfish, irresponsible, unable to feel guilt or learn from prior experiences, and tend to blame others and rationalise.
It warned that a history of legal or social offenses was not by itself enough to justify the diagnosis and that a 'group delinquent reaction' of childhood or adolescence or 'social maladjustment without manifest psychiatric disorder' should be ruled out first.
[64] The Federal Bureau of Investigation's monthly outreach and communication bulletin focused on psychopathy in June 2012, featuring articles introduced and co-authored by the main contemporary proponent of the construct, Robert D.
Overall this was found to have suffered from 'a number of serious logical confusions and deliberate mischaracterizations of its scientific merits' - including its early basis in degeneration theory, tautological definitions and associated neuroscience findings, routinely unclarified assumptions and shifting levels of explanation about the core concept, and exaggerated statistical claims such as based on Hare's use of factor analysis.
[67] Swedish sociologist Roland Paulsen has further placed the more recent resurgence in popular coverage of psychopathy in the context of "the Enlightenment project" to use rationality and technology to deal with problems in human life and society.
[68] A Scottish sociologist of biomedical ethics has suggested that the DSM's attempt to develop different standards for Antisocial Personality Disorder have been limited and modified by path dependence on the concept of psychopathy/sociopathy, due to the latter being embedded in diverse sociotechnological networks and thereby demanded by various users.