What You Need to Know About Sociopaths

Short of time? Click here to read the key takeaways.

🧠 Sociopathy is closely related to psychopathy and antisocial personality disorder. The three terms are often used in slightly different ways, but they usually refer to the same collection of traits. 'Sociopath' is more of an informal term, and although 'psychopath' has been used in past research, the norm today is to talk in terms of antisocial personality disorder.

🧊 Sociopaths tend to pursue goals without emotional brakes like guilt or empathy. Their decisions are typically based on outcomes and self-interest, with little internal resistance from fear, remorse, or emotional concern for others.

🧬 No two sociopaths are alike. As with any demographic, individuals vary widely. Some sociopaths adapt their behavior to fit in socially or live stable lives, while others act in more openly harmful or exploitative ways.

🧩 Although relationships with them can elevate some kinds of risks, understanding their ways of thinking can help. Knowing more about the mental life of sociopaths (such as their reduced fear of consequences or tendency to view relationships as transactional) can make it easier to protect yourself and build more sustainable dynamics.

🎭 Many sociopaths learn to mask their traits to avoid stigma. Because sociopathy is so heavily stigmatized, high-functioning sociopaths often adopt socially acceptable behaviors as a survival strategy, which can make them especially hard to detect.

Sociopaths are easy to recognize in movies: they are the ruthless killer, the charming con artist, the mastermind pulling every string. In real life, they are often much less theatrical - and much more common than many people think. A sociopath might be your lawyer, your coworker, your roommate, or even a family member, without you realizing it.

If there's a sociopath in your life, should you be afraid? Not necessarily. Not all sociopaths are dangerous or at odds with the law. But they often share a cluster of traits that can elevate the chance that they pose a risk: a willingness to deceive, a lack of empathy, and a tendency to treat people as means to an end.

Because these patterns can be subtle, you might spend years interacting with someone like this without knowing it, or realizing that something seems "off" but not being able to pinpoint what it is. But why even care? Isn't sociopathy incredibly rare? Actually, the cluster of traits people often call sociopathy is much more common than many people think. To put numbers on that, it helps to look at Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD), a closely related diagnosis with clear clinical criteria. According to one study, 2-4% of US men and 0.5-1.0% of US women match the diagnostic criteria of ASPD. Another study found a lifetime prevalence of ASPD in the US of 3.6%.

ASPD and sociopathy are highly related, but not identical. In fact, 'sociopathy' is an informal term and inconsistently defined. 'Psychopathy' is more standardized in research, but it isn't a formal diagnostic category, which is one reason we'll lean more heavily on ASPD criteria when we want clear definitions in this article. We'll unpack these distinctions further in a moment; for now, the key point is this: throughout the article, we'll rely mainly on ASPD criteria and on studies that explicitly measure ASPD (and sometimes psychopathy), while using 'sociopathy' as a loose, reader-friendly label most of the time.

Taken together, these study results suggest that many (and probably most) adults in the US will have interacted with sociopaths before. Given such a high prevalence as well as how strongly sociopaths tend to deviate from much of the rest of society in their thinking and behavior, we decided to dig deeper and explore what sociopathy is really like - and what you should know about this type of person. As part of this research, we published a podcast episode in which Spencer Greenberg (founder of Clearer Thinking) interviewed M. E. Thomas, who identifies as a sociopath and has been formally diagnosed by a licensed psychologist as a prototypical psychopathic personality. In this article, we build on that interview and occasionally quote it, placing it in relation to the state of research and the official diagnostic criteria, while examining many different aspects of this type of mind. 

Despite movies often painting a different picture, many sociopaths are not actually violent or sadistic - but interacting with them can still pose challenges, and in some circumstances poses significant risks. Understanding how their minds work can help you navigate social situations with them in a way that is beneficial to you both, while also reducing potential risks, whether the person is a family member, work colleague, or just an acquaintance. So, let's find out:

• What are sociopaths actually like?

• How, if at all, can you tell whether someone is a sociopath?

• How, if you decide to, can you most effectively relate to and interact with sociopaths?

What is Sociopathy?

If we take a peek into the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (the latest version of which is the DSM-5-TR), we find the condition Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD), the diagnostic criteria of which we'll get into in the next section. ASPD is typically diagnosed based on a clinical interview and a person's history.

ASPD is tightly linked to the terms 'psychopathy' and 'sociopathy', both of which are ambiguous but have slightly different connotations.

Colloquially, people sometimes speak of psychopathy when referring to the more severe cases, or to people born with the condition, or the more "cold-blooded" types. Some researchers differentiate between subtypes, such as primary psychopathy (low in anxiety and generally less affected by emotions) and secondary psychopathy (more impulsive and aggressive). In scientific studies, tools such as the Hare Psychopathy Checklist (also known as PCL-R) are sometimes used to measure psychopathic traits - not as a formal diagnosis, but as a structured way to assess a trait profile that often overlaps with ASPD, especially in forensic contexts.

Sociopathy, on the other hand, is sometimes used to refer to less severe cases, those who developed the traits over time (rather than being born with them), or the more hot-blooded types with a tendency toward anger.

The distinctions between these three terms (ASPD, psychopathy, and sociopathy) are not always clear or consistent, but the concepts are highly related and point to similar types of people. Throughout this article, we'll mostly focus on ASPD as the most clearly defined of these terms, but primarily use the terms sociopathy and sociopaths for the sake of readability. Some of the studies and quotations use the term 'psychopathy' instead; we'll include those as well, since in practice they're largely pointing at the same underlying cluster of traits we mean when we say 'sociopathy', even if the labels and measurement tools differ.

What Are Sociopaths Actually Like?

First off: no two sociopaths will be the same. Any claims we make about them in this article will typically apply to many or most of them, but it's always hard to infer what these broad tendencies mean for any given individual.

One way to model how sociopaths interact with the world is to think of a video game like the Grand Theft Auto (GTA) series: in these games, you play a character in a somewhat realistic virtual world where you go on (often illegal) missions. Suppose you're in the game and need to get to the other end of the city quickly. A few meters down the street, you see a stranger entering their car. You know that you could just walk over and take the car by force to drive to your destination. Considering this option, what may go through your mind? If you're like most players, you'd think about practical considerations: are there any better alternatives available? What's the risk of getting caught? Could you easily get away with this crime? A calculating look focused primarily on your own goals. Empathy, guilt, and fear of consequences would likely play a minor role. That same skew toward the practical over the personal can be a useful lens for what we're about to discuss. It won't fit every detail, but it can capture something real about how some sociopaths navigate everyday life: with fewer internal brakes and a stronger focus on outcomes than on people.

So, let's have a look at what research (as well as our podcast guest, M. E. Thomas) actually says about sociopaths.

A key criterion for ASPD in the DSM-5 (the standard manual in the US for diagnosing mental health conditions) is "the presence of a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others." This can manifest in various ways, a common one being a pattern of lying, deception, and manipulation. The DSM-5 refers to the related concepts of "deceitfulness, repeated lying, use of aliases, or conning others for pleasure or personal profit." Looking at our sister project PersonalityMap (where you can explore over one million correlations relating to human psychology and personality), we find that sociopathy indeed has very large correlations with statements like "I often make up things about myself to help me get what I want" (0.70) and "I use people to get what I want" (0.69).

M. E. Thomas mentioned one example of her attitude towards lying in the interview with Spencer about how it's a tool she uses to achieve specific ends:

"If I think that my friend is dating somebody that's no good, and I'm like, this is a terrible relationship, I will lie and say things like, "Oh yeah, you know he said XYZ to me. He doesn't really see a future in this relationship," or whatever. I'll just lie and say whatever. It's not necessarily to get an advantage. [...] It's almost like a shortcut."

Most non-sociopaths are not willing to lie to try to break up a friend's relationship. But why? Well, one reason, among many, is the guilt one would expect to feel after behaving in such ways. Sociopaths typically have little or no capacity or propensity to experience guilt. As the DSM-5 puts it, sociopathy involves "Lack of remorse, [and] indifference to or rationalizing having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another person."

In a different interview, M. E. Thomas shared an anecdote about how she once tried to drown an opossum stuck in a pool with a garden hose. This seemed to her like an effective way to deal with the animal without risking being attacked or annoyed by it. Many people would feel some empathy for the struggling opossum. But, like guilt, sociopaths tend to have little or no ability or propensity to experience empathy. They may be able to figure out how you (or an opossum) feel in a given situation, but they don't feel what you're feeling as a result, and unless they see a way that your suffering is an impediment to their goals, they may well be totally indifferent toward it.

This also aligns with our video game comparison: most players would likely not empathize strongly with simulated characters. Perhaps their empathy towards them wouldn't be entirely absent, but it would certainly be thinner than what most people feel towards real humans.

While sociopaths tend to experience fewer or less intense emotions compared to other people, a notable exception is anger and aggressiveness: For instance, the DSM-5 lists "Irritability and aggressiveness, often with physical fights or assaults." In the interview with Spencer, M. E. Thomas describes a particular situation and how it caused her to experience what she calls "gray rage":

"So it was in the Washington, DC metro station. [...] I saw an escalator, and it was broken down, but I just walked down it because it's stairs. At the bottom of the escalator, a worker stopped me. [...] it became clear he was trying to tell me that I was wrong for having walked down the broken escalator, which is really just stairs. I've done that all my life [...]. I responded to what I perceived to be his aggression, trying to shame me, in a way that I call 'gray rage'. Gray rage I experience when somebody who's not in a position of authority over me seeks to assert authority over me. [...] After he left, I started kind of following him, thinking, I just have to destroy him. Those were sort of my ideas. When it's gray rage, you just are subsumed by the emotion. It's acting on pure impulse, and the impulse is just to destroy the threat, the thing that caused you to be triggered in this particular way."

It may not come as a surprise that these traits can sometimes culminate in criminal offenses. While certainly not all sociopaths are criminals (nor vice versa), some studies have found that more than a third of incarcerated offenders meet the diagnostic criteria for ASPD, meaning they are highly overrepresented among prison inmates compared to the prevalence of around 3.6% in the general population.

But a more meaningful number may be the share of sociopaths who have committed crimes. What can we say about that? Well, one frequently-cited claim is that 47% of individuals who meet ASPD criteria have "significant arrest records" - the research on which this is based, however, goes back to 1991, and it's unclear to what degree this would hold up today. Additionally, these numbers are likely inflated at least somewhat by the fact that both the DSM-5's ASPD criteria ("Failure to conform to social norms concerning lawful behaviors, such as performing acts that are grounds for arrest") and the Hare Psychopathy Checklist ("Many types of offense", "Juvenile delinquency") take past criminal conduct into account for their diagnostics. That means merely being a convicted criminal may cause you to automatically tick a box of ASPD or psychopathy. Still, based on these numbers, it seems highly plausible that even beyond the bias introduced by the diagnosis, sociopaths engage in illegal behavior at a much higher rate than others.

One surprising trait that seems to be fairly common among sociopaths is that of a reduced sense of self or personal identity. One study found that secondary psychopathy (which, as we explained earlier, refers to those with a stronger tendency to experience anxiety and being impulsive), was correlated with and the strongest predictor (among the traits they tested) of a weaker sense of self (r=-0.76, p<0.001, n=262) and lower self-concept clarity (r=-0.75, p=<0.001, n=262). Primary psychopathy showed slightly weaker, but still large, correlations (r=-0.61 and r=-0.60, respectively, with p<0.001), which, however, seemed to be mostly explained by the large correlation between primary and secondary psychopathy (r=0.80, p<0.001) in this study.

A not-yet-published study of ours is consistent with this broader finding, showing a medium-large correlation between sociopathic traits and a diminished sense of self in our data. In this study, we measured individuals' sense of self by asking how much they agreed with statements such as "Deep down, I'm unsure if there is a real 'me' beneath how I act around others."

This also aligns with our video game metaphor: most players would likely not identify strongly with the character they control, and their behavior within the virtual world would largely depend on the situations the game throws at them.

M. E. Thomas, from our podcast interview, describes her experience as follows:

"I feel like, because it's almost like a jailbroken phone that's capable of connecting to everything, it feels like I'm untethered; I don't have, kind of like normal people, who think of their sense of self as being like an anchor. [...] For me, it's more like there's no anchor. It's very flexible the way that I'm able to interact with people. I can show up pretty much any way that I want to."

How Sociopaths Navigate Social Life

We've now discussed several traits that are common among sociopaths, such as:

• Patterns of lying, deception, and manipulation

• Making decisions more in terms of their personal goals than general principles

• Reduced experience of emotions like empathy or guilt

• Propensity for anger and aggression, impulsiveness, and sometimes even lawbreaking

• Sometimes, a reduced sense of self

It's important to understand that, while many sociopaths exhibit these patterns, this does not apply to every individual, and no two sociopaths will be the same. So if all you know about a person is that they fit this label, you can reasonably expect an elevated risk of these traits - but it's far from guaranteed that they will act this way in any given situation. People vary in how strongly they show these tendencies, and some learn to adapt to their environment in ways that support a stable, law-abiding life. For instance, even with low empathy or guilt, they may learn that treating people well is often the most effective way to get what they want. Or they may adopt clear personal rules or philosophies that guide their behavior.

Being realistic, if you know a sociopath, until proven otherwise, it's safest to assume they will act in a transactional and empathy-less manner. In other words, they are likely to be indifferent towards harm befalling you, they are likely to help you if they see an advantage to themselves in doing so, and, unless they have strong principles that they have learned to live by that preclude it, are likely to harm you if they see a large enough advantage to themselves in doing so.

There is another key aspect that's important to be aware of when understanding their behavior: sociopaths tend to respond differently to fear and are often unbothered by stressful situations. For instance, one study concludes that "there is evidence that psychopathic individuals have deficits in threat detection and responsivity" (while also mentioning that "the evidence for reduced subjective experience of fear in psychopathy is far less compelling"). Another study observed that the sociopathic study participants were much less startled by shocking imagery than others. Other research even suggests that sociopaths may enjoy the experience of fear. To make things somewhat more complicated, Newman et al. found an important nuance: the reduced fear response to expected shocks appeared only under "alternative-focus conditions." When attention was directed directly to the threat, fear responses appeared normal, suggesting that the difference may be partly due to attention and processing, not just fear itself.

While the evidence is somewhat mixed, a reasonable takeaway is that fear is far less of a limiting factor for the behavior of some people high in these traits than for much of the rest of society. This also fits the fact that "reckless disregard for the safety of self or others" is part of the DSM-5 criteria for ASPD. Being less constrained by fear can cause many problems, but there are certainly activities, careers, and situations where boldness, risk-taking, and staying calm under pressure are highly beneficial qualities. The flip side is that if a sociopath believes they can get an advantage by harming you, fear is less likely to be a limiting factor to doing so than it would be for most people.

Another DSM-5 criterion for ASPD is "Impulsivity or failure to plan," and they may be more likely to exhibit this trait, at least in part, due to their different relationship to fear. If consequences don't feel threatening, there's less pressure to slow down, think ahead, or hold back. Low fear can function like a missing stop sign: you move first, and only later deal with what happens.

Finally, the last criterion in the DSM-5 we have not yet mentioned is "Consistent irresponsibility, failure to sustain consistent work behavior, or honor monetary obligations." In everyday life, this can manifest as repeatedly making commitments and failing to follow through, leaving practical burdens to others, or treating deadlines, jobs, and debts as negotiable when they no longer feel immediately useful.

Putting all these traits together, we start to see the full picture of why sociopaths aren't all harmful, but do present elevated risk to people in their lives: they tend to focus on what advantage they can get from a situation and lack (or have reduced levels of) many important guardrails that prevent harmful behavior, including empathy, guilt, and fear of consequences. This doesn't preclude them from having other guardrails, perhaps even ones that most others don't have, but it does leave them lacking some very significant guardrails that shape the behavior of most people.

Are Sociopaths Dangerous to Be Around?

On the one hand, common traits among sociopaths certainly elevate the risk of having them in your life. On the other hand, every person is different; nobody deserves to be judged only based on the group they are a part of (without ever having chosen to be part of that group), and many sociopaths have adapted to their environment, sometimes living stable lives and contributing positively to the world. While caution is absolutely warranted when getting to know a sociopath, it's also important to recognize that this set of traits doesn't automatically make them harmful or dangerous.

One can rightly argue that every person has the potential to be harmful or dangerous to others. As soon as another person becomes a part of your life, there is always some risk of conflict or getting hurt, emotionally or physically. With that in mind, a more helpful question than  "Are sociopaths dangerous?" is "What are the specific risks one should be aware of when interacting or forming relationships with sociopaths?"

While there are good reasons not to jump to conclusions about any individual sociopath, one risk we established earlier is that of being manipulated and lied to. If another person views their relationship to you as fundamentally transactional while you don't see it that way (and you're not aware that they see the relationship that way), that's a natural setup for being taken advantage of. It helps to be clear-eyed about the actual nature of the relationship you have. What's more, some sociopaths can be vindictive and pursue an active interest in harming people who crossed them, as Spencer mentioned in the interview with M. E. Thomas:

"[One sociopath] told me that they keep a list of everyone who's wronged them, and every month they check it to see if they can hurt those people in any way without putting much effort into it, sort of low-effort ways of harming the people that wronged them."

This is an extreme self-report, and it shouldn't be taken as typical. But some research suggests it may indeed be a broader tendency, as it found psychopathy to be associated with greater vengefulness, revenge-focused rumination, and lower forgiveness. Additionally, on our platform, PersonalityMap, we find quite a strong correlation (r=0.56) between anti-social personality disorder traits and agreeing with the statement "I am often out for revenge."

What about physical violence? Given that the DSM-5 criteria, as we mentioned, include both impulsivity and "irritability and aggressiveness, often with physical fights or assaults," it's not surprising that the relative risk of physical violence is increased among people diagnosed with this condition when compared to the general population (but that's essentially true, by definition). That said, one systematic review found that a big part of the difference disappears when controlling for substance abuse (studies adjusting for substance use disorders found average odds ratios for violence of about 3.9, compared to 10.8 in studies without such adjustments). On PersonalityMap, we find a fairly strong correlation between anti-social personality disorder traits and agreeing that "I like to start fights" (r=0.57), though it doesn't specify that those are physical fights in particular, as well as agreeing that "I have a violent temper" (r=0.50). 

Overall, while the risk of physical aggression from sociopaths is increased statistically, there will be many cases where the situational context plays a bigger role than an individual's propensities. When a person you don't trust is clearly influenced by substances like alcohol, or they seem very angry, or they have a substantial incentive to harm you, it's wise to avoid any provocations and to protect yourself, whether or not the person has sociopathic traits. Sociopathy, however, acts as a risk factor, magnifying these risks. 

Of course, there is no single right answer to the question of whether sociopaths are dangerous that will always apply (much as there is no single universal right answer as to whether any other demographic is dangerous). Sociopaths are statistically more likely to be dangerous in some ways than non-sociopaths, but in any specific case, the answer strongly depends on the individual, your relationship to them, and the context (such as whether it benefits them to harm you or to help you, and to what extent they have pro-social life principles that they truly adhere to with their behavior). 

As a final note before we move on to understanding how sociopathy is similar to and different from other conditions, it's worth noting that sociopaths are themselves often negatively affected, both by their own traits and by how society relates to them. Sociopathy is highly stigmatized and can itself be very challenging for affected individuals, who can easily end up in unstable relationships, have a hard time relating to others, and may also face disadvantages in many career tracks.

How Sociopathy Compares to Other Conditions

As we mentioned before, sociopathy and psychopathy are two highly related terms. In some contexts, researchers instead refer to ‘psychopathic traits,’ measuring psychopathy dimensionally (as a trait score) rather than treating it as a yes-or-no category. Psychopathic traits are also part of the Dark Tetrad, a research framework for four interrelated, socially harmful traits, with the three others being (sub-clinical) narcissism, Machiavellianism, and sadism. Various studies suggest that these personality traits tend to correlate rather than fall neatly into distinct categories. For example, studies commonly find a moderate correlation between narcissism and psychopathic traits (one report found r = 0.35).

Why the overlap? One explanation is simply that the traits share a common core. Vize et al., for instance, argue that this common core may be antagonism (low agreeableness), which shows up both in narcissism and psychopathy measures, and that it may account for some of the overlap in outcomes such as aggression. Measurement overlap likely plays a role too: some narcissism and psychopathy scales include similarly worded items (for example, about manipulating or exploiting others), which contributes to the correlations.

Whatever the reasons for these correlations, their presence illustrates the complexity and nuance involved in making these distinctions in the first place: personality traits are often not cleanly separable from one another, making generalizations about them difficult. Still, some common patterns emerge, and we can learn from them.

Besides correlations that are often found between sociopathy and narcissism, there is another complication: the two can be surprisingly hard for outside observers to tell apart. Even when an individual only matches one of them, some overlapping behavior patterns can make them look similar.

Some of the behaviors and attributes that narcissists - by which we mean here people with narcissistic personality disorder, about which we've written before - tend to share with sociopaths include acting in self-centered, manipulative ways, warping the truth for personal gain, reacting with anger in situations that can seem surprising or out of proportion to others, and having unstable relationships.

But it's important to understand that these shared behaviors originate from very different underlying causes: where sociopaths tend to experience a relative lack of emotions and empathy, narcissists tend to suffer from self-absorption that masks deep-rooted insecurity and a need for admiration. They try to build up their egos by seeking attention and getting others to think they are impressive. The Venn diagram below maps out what traits are commonly different between narcissists (shown on the left) and sociopaths (shown on the right), as well as traits that are commonly shared between them (shown in the middle). If you are convinced someone in your life is a narcissist or sociopath, you may find this chart helpful in clarifying which of the two conditions is a cleaner match to their behavior and motivations.

Another neuroatypicality that is sometimes confused with sociopathy is autism. One thing that autistic people can have in common with sociopaths is being perceived as difficult to read and appearing to lack empathy. In the case of autistic people, however, they generally are able to (and do) experience empathy, but may miss typical social or body language cues when others express their suffering in subtle ways, or may not express their empathy in the same ways as allistic (non-autistic) people, even when they do experience it (for a discussion of empathy and autism, see here).

As deviations from social expectations can cause friction or social punishment, both autistic people and sociopaths often engage in "masking," learning over time to behave in more socially acceptable ways. For instance, they may memorize in which situations others tend to expect certain types of expressions of empathy. One sociopath told Spencer, for instance, that she loved watching movies because even though she was incapable of empathizing with the protagonist, she would learn the proper ways to behave in order to blend in (e.g., by saying you feel so sorry for them and making a sad facial expression when your friend tells you that their father died).

Can You Identify a Sociopath?

As with most personality disorders, sociopathy is hard to judge with confidence from the outside, particularly given overlaps in some behaviors with other conditions. At the same time, high-functioning sociopaths typically have learned to blend in very well, which makes it even harder to spot.

Anecdotally, when Spencer meets people whom he becomes confident are sociopaths at events, he'll eventually take them aside and broach the subject with them directly, asking, "I know this is an odd question, but have you ever wondered whether you might be a sociopath or have antisocial personality disorder?" So far, at least, they've always given him an emotionally neutral response along the lines of "Yes, I have considered that," or "Yes, I've thought about that, but I'm not certain. Do you think that I am?" He'll then generally explore the topic in more depth with them, for instance, discussing how they see the world, which they have been amenable to.

If you need to figure out whether a particular person is a sociopath, it's advisable to look beneath their words, at their actions, and the beliefs and ways of seeing the world implied by their behavior: 

• Are they manipulating people a lot? 

• Do they casually lie about things most people wouldn't lie about? 

• Do they routinely violate people's boundaries? 

• Do they appear transactional in their relationships, doing what is advantageous to themselves (even if they can provide excuses or justifications for their behavior)? 

• Do they show an unusual lack of fear of consequences, guilt, or remorse? 

• Do they show little or no genuine empathy, and when they do show it, does it come across as performative?

• In the event that you ask them directly, do they consider themselves to be sociopathic?

None of these traits is proof in isolation, but observing many of them is evidence for sociopathic tendencies. That being said, sociopaths who spend a lot of time around people have likely figured out how not to stand out socially and may have learned how to behave in socially expected ways, even when it doesn't match their inner experience.

Ultimately, it is going to be difficult to identify sociopaths reliably - the ones you are most likely to encounter at work or at social gatherings are likely going to blend in. For casual social interactions, it's unlikely to matter anyway whether someone is a sociopath. But regarding a longer-term relationship, whether a coworker, a spouse, or a family member, whether someone is a sociopath can influence how best to engage with them.

How Can You Maintain a Relationship with a Sociopath?

When you know that someone is a sociopath and they exhibit some of the more problematic patterns of behavior, it is, as for any other person, a reasonable question to ask whether you want them in your life to begin with. If you do want to maintain such a relationship, it's important to understand how best to relate to them sustainably.

First, it is important to understand how they think. The more you understand how their minds and decision-making differ from others, the lower the risk of conflict and disappointment. One key difference is that they're much less, if at all, motivated by compassion, empathy, or guilt than others, so appealing to such emotions is unlikely to be met with understanding. Keep in mind that they will typically act in whatever way they perceive as in their best interest and may be less constrained than others by fear of negative consequences.

When you have a long-term social relationship with a sociopath, it's best to work in a cause-and-effect framework. As mentioned, it's risky to threaten, shame, or exert power or control over them (or anyone, really), as this will likely backfire. Instead, work together to create situations that are mutually beneficial - where they are obviously better off relating positively to you than causing any harm to you. You may also need to assert boundaries to protect yourself - but ideally, doing so in a way that doesn't come across as coercive or controlling, but as an authentic expression of your real boundaries and the cause and effect consequences of those boundaries being violated - e.g., "when you lie to me, this erodes trust, and I may distance myself as a result", but such statements warrant caution, as they can easily appear like an ultimatum (which, in themselves, can be a form of manipulation).

As M. E. Thomas explained in the interview, sociopaths can have a hard time navigating the world (note: M.E. uses the terms 'sociopath' and 'psychopath' interchangeably in this conversation):

"There are so many half-truths or non-truths out there about psychopaths that you're just not used to dealing with them, mostly because they know that if they don't put on a mask, they will be prejudiced against. You will fire them or whatever. I've been fired several times for being a psychopath, and I get that there are costs to just being honest and not lying, pretending at funerals, etc. I think that freaks people out to understand that psychopaths are often pretending to not be psychopaths. That sounds really devious. Why are they pretending? Are they trying to trick me? Yes, they are trying to trick you, but it's mostly to stay off your radar. They just don't want to experience your prejudice. I think that as psychopaths become more open and as people start to understand who psychopaths are and learn to adjust their expectations, things are going to be okay."

So they may see value in having someone in their life who isn't prejudiced against them and who is interested in seeing the person behind the mask and in understanding their experience. M. E. Thomas further pointed out:

"I'm not saying that sociopaths aren't responsible for their actions, but they're certainly not responsible for being sociopaths. [...] Psychopaths haven't chosen to be without empathy; they've made no such choice. And it's kind of ableist to expect people who have no capacity for empathy to have empathy."

She also explained:

"Just think of [sociopaths] as an eight-year-old child who's basically acting in their own self-interest. You can ask them, "Hey, it's really important to me to do X, Y, Z," and if you're important to them, then they're probably going to make your priorities their priorities too, because that helps them in the relationship."

And:

"I use examples of how people treat children differently. No one feels it's a terrible imposition to treat children differently. They treat people on the autism spectrum differently. We treat older people differently. I hope that psychopathy will be one of these categories where we all just kind of know, like, "Don't go to [her] for emotional support..."

The key, if you choose to or must have a social relationship with a sociopath, is to understand how their minds work and take that into account in your expectations, behaviors, and choices related to them.

To summarize, when maintaining a relationship with a sociopath, it's advisable to:

• Try to understand how their mind works

• Establish clear boundaries, while being careful to avoid triggering anger by trying to coerce or control them

• Don't expect them to act out of empathy or guilt - expect transactional behavior that they carry out because they believe it's in their best interest

• Avoid engaging with them in contexts where they can get what they want by causing you harm

• Don't expect fear of consequences to act as a strong limit on their behavior 

• Remember that they likely have spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to blend in, and their words and behaviors may reflect masking as a learned strategy to avoid being stigmatized

• Separate who they are from what they do: hold them accountable for harmful actions, while remembering they didn’t choose their traits

Are There Treatments That Can Help Sociopaths?

It is often claimed that the harmful aspects of sociopathy are not treatable. It does seem plausible that the core of someone's personality can't be changed - for example, by making sociopaths capable of experiencing empathy. However, there are some interventions that show promise for reducing some harmful behaviors associated with sociopathy. Research by Jennifer Skeem et al. suggests that treatment may well be effective in reducing antisocial behavior and recidivism of previously violent individuals with sociopathic traits. The evidence on this topic is preliminary, though, and further research is needed to draw firm conclusions.

One aspect that complicates treatment is that sociopathy is usually egosyntonic, which means that many people with these traits don't see them as a problem to get rid of, and may even view them as a superior way in which to engage with the world. Still, some eventually seek treatment as a way to mitigate issues with perpetually unstable relationships or careers, or because they are required to by a court.

The most practical intervention is often to show sociopaths that their way of acting isn't working for them and leads to undesired consequences, at which point they may be willing to adopt other frameworks that are better for them and the people around them.

Whether or not it's ultimately possible (or desirable) for Sociopaths to fully 'overcome' their condition, evidence suggests that many could, if sufficiently motivated, learn to adjust their behavior in ways that minimize harm to others and improve long-term outcomes for themselves.

If you're interested to learn more about the inner life of sociopaths, we recommend M. E. Thomas' book Confessions of a Sociopath.