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A Five Year Follow-up of Untreated Psychopaths

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

P. D. Maddocks*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychological Medicine, St. Thomas' Hospital, London, S.E.1

Extract

It is often said that psychopaths mature and settle down later in life. Authorities differ as to when this occurs; some say between 25 and the early thirties (Curran and Partridge, 1963); Henderson and Batchelor (1962) say that improvement may occur up to the age of 36; others say about the mid-forties (Davis, 1967); Cleckley (1952) held that the prognosis is almost hopeless. Most of their descriptions are of young adults, and one wonders what happens to them thereafter; do the majority settle down? and if they do not what happens to them?

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1970 

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