‘Psychopaths’ at Work? Implications of Lay Persons’ Use of Labels and Behavioural Criteria for Psychopathy

Abstract

In attempting to explain or deal with negative workplace behaviours such as workplace bullying, the notion of 'workplace psychopaths' has recently received much attention. Focusing on individual aspects of negative workplace behaviour is at odds with more systemic approaches that recognise the contribution of individual, organisational and societal influences, without seeking to blame a person(s) for their behaviour or personality disorder. Regarding a coworker as a psychopath is highly stigmatising, and given the relatively low prevalence of psychopathy in the community, is likely to be incorrect. Sources promoting the notion of workplace psychopathy provide lists of diagnostic criteria and appear to encourage the perception that it is common. This research examines how lay persons use behavioural criteria consistent with psychopathy and the label 'psychopath' in relation to a coworker. 307 Australian workers completed an online survey concerning their experience of workplace bullying, which also asked them to rate a coworker's behaviour on a range of scales to assess perceptions of psychopathy. Rates of psychopathy, when using labels and behavioural criteria, were found to be much higher than scientific estimates of prevalence, for both participants who had been bullied and those who had not. A higher proportion of non-bullied participants classified a coworker as a psychopath when using the label 'psychopath', compared to when using behavioural criteria. The notion that there are psychopaths in every workplace should be treated with caution to ensure that the potential for 'misdiagnosis' and stigmatisation do not cause further harm in situations of unacceptable workplace behaviours.

Manipulative Businesses: Secular Business Cults

“…For example, one relevant field of study is the presence and influence of psychopaths in business (Boddy 2011a(Boddy , 2006, possibly because the psychopath's traits of manipulation and antisocial behavior acutely describe a common "darkside" among modern businesses, and because of the purported usefulness of the psychoanalytic view (Brown 1997;Stein 2011). Most authors have focused on the direct and destructive influence of actual and borderline psychopaths on working organizations (Babiak 1995;Babiak et al 2010;Babiak and Hare 2006;Boddy 2011aBoddy , 2011bClarke 2005;Deutshcman 2005;Hare 1999;Mathieu et al 2013), although not without warnings of overuse of the term "psychopath" (Caponecchia et al 2012), while a few others have attributed psychopath-like traits to corporations and corporate behavior (Bakan 2004;Lee 2005). Even a low population of psychopaths in an organization may strongly and negatively affect the business environment through incidences of psychopath bullying (Babiak and Hare 2006;Boddy 2011b), and in executing nonproductive workplace schemes that emotionally harm others (Babiak 1995;Deutschman 2005), resulting in higher employee turnover (Boddy 2011b), and the promotion of the psychopath (Babiak 1995) accompanied by less competent leadership: "Employees working under Corporate Psychopaths experience less instruction, less training, and less help from others than they would experience otherwise" (Boddy 2010, p. 304).…”

Successful Psychopaths: A Contemporary Phenomenon

“…Finally we can say that corporate psychopaths are thought to gravitate toward organizations where they can gain money, power, and prestige rather than to the less well-remunerated caring professions [10,26]: they have been found to be more common in some work categories rather than others, including CEOs and lawyers [10,[38][39][40]. This level of incidence results in between 5.75 and 13.5% of employees working with a corporate psychopath, as shown in Figure 2 [10,41,42].…”

Échelle auto-rapportée de psychopathie de Levenson : adaptation française et validation

“…Leur apparition peut survenir dès l'enfance ou l'adolescence et ils demeureraient stables jusqu'à l'âge adulte (Lynam et al, 2005 ;Salekin, Rosenbaum & Lee, 2012), entraînant de nombreuses conséquences. Dans des contextes occupationnels, ces traits de personnalité sont associés à des vols, de la supervision abusive, un leadership malsain, une prise de décision non éthique et à de l'intimidation en milieu de travail (Babiak & Hare, 2007 ;Buss, 1993 ;Caponecchia, Sun & Wyatt, 2012 ;Hall & Benning, 2006 ;O'Boyle, Forsyth, Banks & McDaniel, 2012 ;Poon, 2003 ;Stevens, Deuling & Armenakis, 2012 ;Tepper, 2007). En ce qui a trait aux relations conjugales, quelques données documentent des degrés importants d'insatisfaction conjugale et sexuelle (Jonason & Buss, 2012 ;Kastner & Sellbom, 2012 ;Savard et al, 2006Savard et al, , 2011, la présence d'infidélité (Egan & Angus, 2004) ainsi que de la violence conjugale et sexuelle (Holtzworth-Munroe, Meehan, Herron, Rehaman & Stuart, 2003) au sein des couples où l'un des conjoints présente ces traits de personnalité.…”