There is now substantial evidence that psychopaths can in fact experience emotions – but only under the right circumstances. And they can display normal emotional responses – when the emotion is part of their goal, or when they are invited to respond to perceptually simple basic shapes or single objects.

If someone is psychotic (or has what doctors call psychosis), their mind is losing its grip on reality. A psychopath is someone who isn’t able to feel for others and may act in reckless and antisocial ways. Psychosis is often a symptom of another condition, while psychopathy is a personality trait.

Their health deteriorates as the effects of their recklessness accumulate. Social isolation, loneliness, and associated emotional pain in psychopaths may precede violent criminal acts.

The majority of the identified psychopathic alcoholics in this sample were likely to be secondary psychopaths, characterized by features of psychopathy (e.g., callousness, manipulativeness) and emotional dysregulation and/or thought disturbance.

Conclusion. As summarized in Table 1, narcissism and psychopathy are associated with substance-related and non-substance-related addictive behavior across nonclinical and clinical populations, whereas Machiavellianism is not.

Relative to non-psychopathic offenders, research has shown that psychopaths are more likely to have a diagnosis of drug abuse or dependence and are more likely to have a polysubstance diagnosis (Smith and Newman, 1990). An interesting paradox may exist, however.

Moreover, the use of alcohol and drugs greatly increases the likelihood of psychopathic individuals engaging in serious and/or violent criminal activity.

Carbamazepine and lithium may help control symptoms such as aggression and impulsive behaviour, and a class of antidepressant called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) may improve anger and general personality disorder symptoms.

Drugs like heroine-to which psychopaths are also more susceptible—can push circuits in this system into overdrive, leaving addicts compulsively seeking another hit. The researchers hypothesized that psychopaths might also overreact to other rewards.

Models of drug use

• Moral model. During the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries addiction was viewed as a sin.
• Disease model. The disease model assumes that the origins of addiction lie within the individual him/herself.
• Psycho-dynamic model.
• Social learning model.
• Socio-cultural model.
• Public health model.

“Consistent with what we thought, we found people with high levels of psychopathic traits had almost four times the amount of dopamine released in response to amphetamine.”

Addiction is defined as a chronic, relapsing disorder characterized by compulsive drug seeking, continued use despite harmful consequences, and long-lasting changes in the brain. It is considered both a complex brain disorder and a mental illness.