Open AccessIs there a link between psychopathy and self-harm?
Author(s) -
Lisa C. Campbell,
Anthony R. Beech
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
international journal of risk and recovery
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2561-5645
DOI - 10.15173/ijrr.v1i2.3475
Subject(s) - psychopathy , psychology , harm , psychopathy checklist , checklist , association (psychology) , clinical psychology , meta analysis , poison control , injury prevention , social psychology , medicine , antisocial personality disorder , personality , environmental health , cognitive psychology , psychotherapist
The aim of this review was to examine whether there is a link between psychopathy and self-harm. A systematic search identified 14 papers which examine this link. A quality appraisal checklist was used to evaluate the quality of each study. The application of the quality appraisal checklist showed that the majority of the studies had good internal validity; however, there were some biases that affected the external validity of some studies. The results indicated that there may be a positive association between total psychopathy score and self-harm; however some studies with smaller sample sizes and low rates of self-harm failed to show this association. The results of most of the studies showed a positive association between Factor 2 of the Psychopathy Checklist (PCL-R; Hare, 2003) and self-harm. No link was found between Factor 1 and self-harm. The results did not show consistent evidence for a link between any of the four facets and self-harm. Although this review indicates a link between Factor 2 and self-harm, and a possible link between total psychopathy score and self-harm, the small number of studies in this area means that the research is not robust enough to provide strong evidence for these associations.