 For Authors: October 12, 2016 Issue [#7905] |
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This week: Psychopath or Sociopath Edited by: Vivian  
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As a writer of mystery/suspense/thrillers, I research to find what traits I can give my antagonists to make them more believable, more real, more motivated.
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Making an antagonist evil and believable: Psychopath or Sociopath – how to make your antagonist real
A good writer does his/her best to make characters believable. Antagonists need to be round characters, too, not stereotypes or flat. One way to put depth into a villain is to decide whether or not the person has a “problem,” perhaps one that’s pathological or traumatic, that motivates behavior.
I’ve researched psychopath and sociopath. Most information stated that they are one and the same, and the terms have been considered interchangeable for at least twenty years. However, some of the newer decisions by the psychiatric community has been to show a slight difference between the two conditions.
Let’s look at the traits found in a psychopath and then look at the slight difference between psychopath and a sociopath. The first eight are absolutely associated with a psychopath. Nine through fifteen aren’t always noticeable, but are found to some extent. The final four are not as common as the first fifteen, but many psychopaths have the traits or history of such traits.
1. Glibness/superficial charm
2. Grandiose sense of self-worth
3. Pathological lying
4. Cunning/manipulative
5. Lack of remorse or guilt
6. Emotionally shallow
7. Callous/lack of empathy
8. Failure to accept responsibility for own actions
9. Need for stimulation/proneness to boredom
10. Parasitic lifestyle
11. Poor behavioral control
12. Promiscuous sexual behavior
13. Lack of realistic, long-term goals
14. Impulsivity
15. Irresponsibility
1. Juvenile delinquency
2. Early behavior problems
3. Revocation of conditional release
4. Many short-term marital relationships
5. Criminal versatility
The one difference between a psychopath and a sociopath is a sociopath can, and sometimes does, feel guilt or remorse. A psychopath never does, and if he "shows" such emotion, he is acting.
Does that mean that every psychopath and sociopath is a criminal? No, because the same traits can be found in politicians, CEOs, and other people in positions of power. However, those people don’t believe that anything they do is wrong, that if others are hurt, it doesn’t matter.
So using the traits to make the antagonist more believable makes our writing better, gives motivation for our villain.
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Words from Our Readers
Sand Castles Shopgirl 739 
Thanks for the information! Every little bit of insight to the publishing world is helpful.
I'm glad my articles are helpful.
chord0
hello
I found this newsletter very informative and also the one before this one. So far I have published 2 ebooks in Bookrix.com, after a number of wonderful helpful reviews and receiving lots of MBs and also awardicons in this website for which I thank all the wonderful writers here.
But there were 2 items here that I have questions: first, on number 16 here it says that dialogue should not be speeches, this was most surprising to me, because Shakespeare wrote like that many times and not just in his play about Pericles, who was a Greek lawyer and statesman, and therefore probably wrote many speeches. I am a big fan of Shakespeare, and like his flowery language, great poetry and historical plays.
Second, I have another question on the last paragraph, where it says something like shifting into sliding point of view, not sure what that means. There are several points of view, one of them is I omniscient, I limited and third person limited, maybe third person omniscient. But, again I don't understand 'sliding point of view', sliding to what?
Thank you for your highly informative newsletter
gchord0
First, what was written ages ago is not what readers want to read now. Also, speeches are not what I'm discussing at all. I mainly deal with what makes fiction or narrative nonfiction interesting and better-written. Therefore, if you are writing for yourself, you may write whatever you want, however you want. However, if you are writing for readers, you want to write what they will read.
Joy 
Hi, Viv  ,
Thank you for such an enlightening NL. Not knowing what the editors focus on and insisting on their easy ways out seems to be the newbie writers' way of doing things. I hope everyone who wants to be published will read what you so generously tell us.
Thank you for the encouragement.
Thank you for joining me again this issue. If you have a topic you would like for me to cover, please let me know.
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