Before I even get into this, I think we should probably make it clear we're not talking about the kind of psychopaths you see in movies, tv and books. We're talking about real psychopaths, not necessarily murderous psychopaths.  Not that there aren't murderous psychopaths, but you get where I'm going with this.

There was a study done by Ryan Murphy, who is a professor at Southern Methodist University.  They looked at traits in people to see their level of agreeableness, extraversion, openness, conscientiousness and neuroticism in each state. Those are called the "Top Five" things that make up our basic personalities.

So what is a psychopath? Eh, it's not that precise.  Basically they tend to have brains that are a little different from the normal person.  Basically it's kind of put in together with antisocial personality disorder.  It's someone who doesn't really have much remorse or empathy for other people, and they tend to be more impulsive.  But that doesn't mean they're all Hannibal Lecter.

Having said that, they ranked all the states and the District of Columbia,  and I bet you can guess what's at number one.  Yep, DC.  They say that's not surprising though, because psychopathic personalities tend to enjoy politics.  Explains a lot about the folks in government, huh.

Anyway, the top five are DC, Connecticut, California, New Jersey and New York. You might be a little relieved that we here in Missouri are at number 34.  But then, I think I would be a little MORE relieved if we were in the bottom three. Those states are Tennessee, Vermont, and West Virginia. I guess we're about in the middle when it comes to psychopaths.

What do you think? Have you ever met someone you thought might be a psychopath? Do you think it's helpful to continue these studies and get more information out there? Let me know in the comments!

Psychoingly yours,
Behka

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