Psychopaths experience pain differently, even when their bodies say otherwise

Psychopathy has long been associated with murderers, notorious criminals, and the griping true crime stories that dominate Netflix documentaries. But our recent research is showing they have a complex relationship with pain which may in part be responsible for their lack of empathy. Psychopathic traits are on a spectrum. We all have levels somewhere on this scale. To be deemed a “psychopath” by some medical professionals, though, you would need to sit on the higher end of the spectrum. Typically, people who are higher on the psychopathic traits spectrum show greater pain tolerance. And this is usually reflected in their physiology. For instance, in a 2022 study people higher in psychopathic traits showed lower brain activity with pressure pain. When we conducted our recent research on pain and people with different levels of psychopathy, our results surprised us. Participants with high levels of psychopathy seemed to process pain differently to people low in psychopathy. We applied pre...