January 17, 2005
Successful psychopaths at work:
If you suspect your boss is a psychopath, you may be onto something.
Belinda Board and Katarina Fritzon of the University of Surrey compared personality traits of successful business managers and patients at Broadmoor Hospital, one of Britain's highest security psychiatric hospitals.
The researchers found that the business managers scored, on average, more highly on measures of histrionic, narcissistic and compulsive personality than samples of former and current patients. These personality traits are thought to reflect characteristics such as superficial charm, lack of empathy and perfectionism. All of which could be potentially useful in the cut-throat business world.
However, unlike the Broadmoor patients, the business managers scored lower on antisocial, borderline and paranoid personality traits, reflecting lower levels of aggression, impulsivity and mistrust. Exactly the sort of personality traits that are likely to cause problems with senior managers and the law.
The authors of the study suggest that the business managers may be examples of 'successful psychopaths' - "people with personality disorder patterns, but without the characteristic history of arrest and incarceration".
Link to study summary (via BPS research digest).
