This was needed elsewhere, so a quick important distinction:
From Greek:
• psychosis: mind-condition
• in psychosis: temporarily disconnected from reality
• psychopathy: mind-suffering or - disease
• a psychopath: a person with a persistent antisocial personality disorder
they’re unrelated
In terms of technical usage, whatever your discipline says it means is correct.
In terms of common usage, I'm afraid that ship has sailed, and 'psychopathy' means "the state of being a psychopath" as often as it has the technical meaning. 1/2
#EtymologicalFallacy
This is the (good IMO) reason they keep changing the names of things in the DSM. Words get into the common vernacular, become subject to natural linguistic change, and confusing everyone.
It helps if you explicitly clarify whether you're using technical jargon or vernacular. 2/2
Oh sure there’s a lot more to be said there even beyond your point
My only purpose in posting this is to make a distinction, for the vast majority of people who confuse them, that what people experience in bipolar is not equivalent to a persistent social disorder
Hallucinations and delusions are an easy mental illness to mark the barrier on. When you no longer treat them as your imagination running away, and treat them as real it is psychosis.
Notably a lot of people only get them when they hit psychosis.
One of the patterns of psychosis is additional symptoms appearing that were not part of the psychiatric issues before.
Schizo-effective disorder is among the most common to appear under psychosis.
Also, psychopath / sociopath are both effectively the same thing, antisocial personality disorder, right?
Or was that a misconception that I was told and wound up parroting?
It seems psychopaths are born and sociopaths are made. A sociopath has traits of impulsivity, risk-taking, and violence. A psychopath shows a lack of regard for the rights and feelings of others, controlled and manipulative behavior, absence of shame, and inability to form emotional relationships.
I've never heard of a sociopath being "made"...
Though it is also important to keep in mind that personality disorders do not always translate into bad people. There are perfectly nice, nonviolent people out there who would be diagnosed as psychopaths.
oh absolutely, in some disciplines and in some environments these personality disorders can in fact be very useful - and also appear in various degrees, they are not absolutes
