Although most people have the basic understanding of empathy, most psychopaths usually experience low empathy towards sufferings and pain. In chapter 10, Lilienfeld even mentions that they even feel pleasure when representing those negative stimuli instead of experience sympathy. This makes many psychologists question whether the lack of empathy in psychopaths is innate or nurture. Before going deep into the nature and nurture of empathy, we need to understand the concept of empathy. According to Baron-Cohen empathy research, they define empathy as "the ability to see the world through the eyes of another person or to understand how it might feel to be the other" (1).
There is a misconception that people that turn into psychopath usually experienced awful childhood; for instance, child abuse, violence, sexual assault and negligence. Yes it is somewhat true but nonetheless the only cause; psychologists have noted that there are lots of people have experience awful childhoods which haven't turned them into serial killer, sexual predators, or ethnic cleansers. Thus, there must be another factor that psychopaths have that generate what some may refer to as 'evil.' It seems that genetic factors play an important role in creating these psychopaths with no sympathy to pain and suffering. Many genetics researchers are working to identifying some of the biological groundwork that may influence this behavior. Researchers have found genetics links aggression, anxiety and fear and psychopathic behavior. Because of their impulsivity problems, psychopaths usually run into trouble with the law since they do not weigh the pros and cons before doing something. Another study shows that there also a biological difference in psychopath in comparison to the normal people. Researchers have found that the hippocampus and corpus collosum in psychopathic brain are larger than average (2). Their hippocampus is frequently disproportionate and that the right side of the hippocampus is much larger than the left. Not only that, their corpus collosum tends to be larger and longer than the average person. Also the speed that a psychopath transfer information through their corpus collosum is also much faster than the average person. Thus this demonstrate that the biological difference may play a role in influence their absence of emotions especially empathy towards others.
Although there are many genetic factors that play a role in psychopathic behaviors, we must not neglect the environmental factor that can influence their behavior as well. In a collaborative Longitudinal Personality Disorders Study, it shows that there is a strong correlation between psychopathic behaviors and childhood trauma. Psychologists' findings also suggest that parents, caregivers, teachers and peers can play a role in offset personality disorders and possibly lead to psychopathic behaviors in the future(3). These findings all show the "interactionist perspective" between nature and nurture in initiate psychopathic behaviors that it is a very controversial topic that still debate until this day even though the study of personality have been developed several decades ago.
1. http://connorkinsella.blogspot.com/2011/05/empathy-psychopaths-nature-and-nurture.html
2. http://www.angelfire.com/amiga/aut/psychopath.html
3. http://www.apa.org/monitor/mar04/awry.aspx
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