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Psychopathy – A psychoanalytic investigation
Abstract
ABSTRACT
Psychopathy - A Psychoanalytic Investigation
Emmet Mallon
This study on the psychoanalytic conceptualisation of psychopathy reviews psychoanalytic considerations of anti-social/psychopathic disorders. The researcher questions whether psychopathy is particular to one psychoanalytic structure (neurosis, psychosis, and perversion), an undiscovered separate structure with an internal logic of its own or a universal symptom that crosses all three possible structures. The aim of the study is to gain a theoretical understanding of psychopathy so that psychoanalysts who direct treatments with psychopathic subjects may be better informed.
The researcher screened a population of ex-offenders using the Self-Report Psychopathy Questionnaire - SRP-III (Paulhus, Hemphill & Hare, 2009). High-scoring participants were invited to participate in a psychoanalytically informed interview. Participants were encouraged to speak freely while the researcher listened with a free-floating attention. An adapted thematic analysis was employed for the organisation and management of data which was then subject to a psychoanalytic discourse analysis allowing for the broader assumptions and meanings of Lacanian structural theory to be considered.
The study found that the participants who scored greater or equal to 3.375 on the SRP-III scale had psychotic structures evidenced by their discourse and the positions they assume in relation to others. The researcher considers the cases of psychopathy detailed in this study as non-delusional, un-triggered psychoses: ‘ordinary’ (Miller, 1998) psychoses in which subversive and violent acts serve to stabilise a psychotic structure.
The findings indicate that psychoanalytic work with psychopaths is viable based on a sinthomatic solution.
... Por su parte, Garrido (2009) sugiere para quien sea diagnosticado con psicopatía, un internamiento en un centro de terapia social que lo mantenga aislado mientras constituya un peligro para la sociedad y le permita posteriormente la neutralización del peligro. En estas propuestas del diagnóstico temprano de la psicopatía puede verse lo que denuncia Mallon (2016) sobre el control que se busca ejercer hacia aquellos que se desvían de lo socialmente establecido, puesto que conservar la figura del psicópata permite sostener la idea de un ellos, los psicópatas, los "anormales", y un nosotros. Esto devuelve una pregunta ética a los profesionales frente a la finalidad de la intervención en el campo de la psicopatía. ...
El presente texto
propone una aproximación al fenómeno de la salud mental desde la
perspectiva de la psicología en general, y desde sus ámbitos aplicados
en particular, sin olvidar que ella ha sido objeto de análisis y reflexiones
de disciplinas como la sociología, la antropología, la filosofía, la
salud pública, el trabajo social, la psiquiatría, entre otras.
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