Passive Parasitic Psychopathy: Toward The Personality Structure and Psychogenesis of Idiopathic Psychopathy. (Anethopathy)

In a previous communication on the subject1 I have attempted to show that the large clinical group known as psychopathy, may properly be divided into two distinct groups: the secondary or symptomatic psychopathy, and the primary, idiopathic or essential psychopathy (anethopathy). In the former are included all those cases which, in terms of superficial behavior, seem to be typically, even classically, psychopathic. Psychogenic factors, however, are quite easily elicited and then their psychopathic behavior that impresses the clinician as so remarkably constitutional, reveals itself as but a specific conditioned reaction. It might well be designated as false positive psychopathy. In other words, while in terms of descriptive behavior, the individuals belonging to this group appear psychopathic, in terms of more basic underlying motivations they may belong to any of the other numerous nosological groups, such as schizoid, epileptoids, paranoid, neuroses of all sorts, etc., and they are no more constitutional than are the particular cardinal groups to which they belong. In the instance of primary psychopathy, however, a most determined search usually fails to reveal anything like deep seated psychic motivations, a reaction that truly appears to be more closely constitutional, though the possibility of psychogenesis is thus but not entirely eliminated since so little is as yet known of the reaction. They are the ‘psychopath fast’ psychopaths, meaning that regardless of what is done for them, their psychopathic pattern appears to remain unchanged. Within this group, it was indicated, it is possible to delimit two fairly distinct clinical types, namely (a) the aggressive predatory type, (b) the passive parasitic type.

Because of the extreme paucity of material available on the subject, it seemed desirable to present an analytically carefully studied case of primary psychopathy, of the passive parasitic type above