psychopathy
Americannoun
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a mental disorder in which an individual manifests amoral and antisocial behavior, lack of ability to love or establish meaningful personal relationships, extreme egocentricity, failure to learn from experience, etc.
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any mental disease.
noun
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another name for psychopathic personality
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any mental disorder or disease
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of psychopathy
Explanation
Someone who suffers from a mental illness that makes them violent without any sense of remorse or empathy has psychopathy. Although it's a common term in criminal justice, psychopathy isn't an official psychiatric diagnosis. If someone has psychopathy, they're referred to as a psychopath. As common as these terms are, a psychiatrist or psychologist won't diagnose someone with psychopathy — a patient with these symptoms will likely get a diagnosis of "antisocial personality disorder." A common test measuring psychopathy is used to study prison populations and for sentencing violent criminals. Psychopathy comes from the Greek roots psykhe, "mind," and pathos, "suffering."
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The study was published in the Journal of Psychiatric Research under the title "Larger striatal volume is associated with increased adult psychopathy."
From Science Daily • May 10, 2026
By comparing MRI scans with psychopathy assessment results, the researchers found that a larger striatum was linked to a stronger need for stimulation, including thrill-seeking, excitement, and impulsive behavior.
From Science Daily • May 10, 2026
“You get people who are verging on psychopathy and you get people who are just troubled.”
From Slate • Jul. 23, 2025
"As a clinician I have to spend a good chunk of time with a person to be able to adequately discern between narcissism, sociopathy and psychopathy," Durvasula said.
From Salon • May 9, 2024
Whether he saw anything or not belongs among the obscurer questions of psychopathy.
From Where the Pavement Ends by Russell, John
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
