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Sociopathy: Adaptation, abnormality, or both?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 September 1997

Don Joseph Stein
Don Joseph Stein
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, University of Stellenbosch, Tygerberg 7505, South Africadjs2@maties.sun.ac.za
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Abstract

Mealey's article on the sociobiology of sociopathy raises questions about the relationship between adaptiveness and abnormality. Although sociopathy may be adaptive, simply defining medical and psychiatric disorders in terms of evolutionary function is problematic. Rather, sociopathy may be characterized as a relatively atypical disorder, an entity to which it may be useful to extend the metaphors of the medical model.

Type
Continuing Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 20 , Issue 3 , September 1997 , pp. 527
Copyright
© 1997 Cambridge University Press

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