I haven't updated Examining Deception in TEN MONTHS... Well I'm updating it. I'm freshening it up and have already deleted a lot of the content. Now, it looks a lot different and is ready for some traffic.
I have been away and now I'm back ready to be in the thick of it. Right now, I'm making a facial expression app called the FETA (Facial Expression Training Application).
The FETA is targeted to be used by security, health care, and educational professionals as to teach people to recognize deceit, diagnose, verify, and moderate treatment plans for patients, and help kids build social skills when they aren't able to test them in real life.
Expect the FETA version 1.0.0 to come out this year on the Blackberry App World. If I get good reviews, expect it to appear on Android, Apple, and Windows 8! Yes, its going to happen!
Check the FETA out at examiningdeception.com!
Sunday 13 January 2013
Monday 23 April 2012
Identity in Parents and the Role of Society
In my psychology class, which I am taking online, I have had a lengthily discussion in the class Forums on parents not taking part in certain aspects of society. I have it here and I've cleaned it up for you as to minimize spelling errors. Also, note that me and the teacher love getting off-topic.
Article about parents not naming their child
Teacher: We spoke about this in the live class - the case where the parents refused to tell people the gender of their child...well there are a few cases...
Me: I already have a bit of a grasp on this. A blogger that goes by the Last Psychiatrist, makes many lengthily posts on his deductions. He's quite funny and is very good at it. He has recently done something on this. Here is the link.
In a basic sense, the mother refused to tell the world her child's gender because she wanted to confidence her own identity and sacrifice the child's. You can read as that the mother used the child as a narcissistic feed to increase her own worth rather than the child. She ignored the child's rights, enforced potential ridicule, and lowered his ability to identify his own self. In my opinion this was a terrible mother who used the child to engross their own identity. You can read more about narcissistic parents here and more from my own personal blog here.
I hope this helps you understand why parents can sometimes do this. I recently watch an episode of QI (501 Engineering) where Rob Briden states how he has sex and Stephen Fry replies "Rob, can I remind you of something? Your father is in the audience." Rob replies after saluting to his father: "He's up there going 'That's My Boy!'" (He quotes his father using a Scottish accent.) In this example, is this not the point of, forgive my vulgar pun, 'sex'? Only recently has the word sex changed from a gender term to a 'sex'ual term.
To understand why parents do this, I believe looking towards the psychopath and how they only 'empathize' for them is highly important. Of course they are not actually empathizing, but what they are doing is puting their own goals into the child's eyes. Psychopaths have right-hemisphere amygdala damage and from this, they are not able to 'receive' eye contact and also cannot recognize the disgust expression; this evidence possibly indicates that psychopaths can't feel disgust. This stops them from having any concern for others and being able to develop any self-conscious emotions. The psychopath uses self-deception as a technique to 'self'-empathize with their child.
Teacher: Thank you for the links!
In particular I was quite interested in the parent/narcissism article as that was one thing that occurred to me when reading about the parents (especially the Toronto couple) that this seemed more like a stunt than something they really believed in. This is also something that concerns me when Reality TV shows like Toddlers and Tiaras become so popular. As a society, are we rewarding parents for their selfishness?
Me: Before I begin a rant, I'm first going to define selfishness in my context. Selfishness is to build one's self values only, not to increase social, safety, or physiological needs. On the terms of selfishness, is the person focused on building self-esteem or self-identity. Self-esteem focuses on an external locus where they act for the concern of what others are thinking or feeling. Self-identity focuses on an internal locus where they act for the concern of how they feel or think of the value of their own self. Self-esteem could be a university degree, while self-identity could be a set of morals. When one feels a sense of gusto for either the self-esteem ot self-identity motive and becomes ashamed of who they are for it, then one can pin them down as having an addiction, but if one is unable to recognize they have a problem, or rather, are deviating from the norm of society and society are noticing rather than the person, then they themselves are selfish. (I think I just concluded that people cannot call themselves selfish in certain areas... this paragraph is therefore entitled to some development.)
Anyhow, I think I would say that although parents receive that instant 'high' from being "rewarded" by society, I wouldn't say it to be long term. I would feel that although the society is giving them their needed fame, the child will go on to probably degrade them. Although, simple counteractions could be taken to stop this such as instilling a religious belief into them that loving one's parents is mandatory for some afterlife reward. Many things can be counter-productive to remove the religious belief and so on.
Anyhow, these parents have raised a transsexual cultural child, and on a personal note, I'm not very accepting of transsexuals who wear another sexes clothes because they were raised to or because they like it. I'm accepting of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, asexuals and so on, but when someone wears another persons clothes, that's like a guest at your wedding wearing a wedding dress (if I were female, I wouldn't find it very 'attractive'). Or, how about an atheist wearing a priests uniform, or maybe an anti-nationalist wearing that nations military outfit; is this not displeasing? Society has set rules and people who break them obviously get attention, but is this selfish? Above, I believe I accidentally defined selfish as being societies word for another, not a word one can use onto themselves. If they are using it on themselves, they have what I believe an addiction and the only reason it is an addiction, is because they are feeling shame, not guilt; where guilt is an emotion that focuses on evaluating events and often leads to repairative actions. since they aren't feeling guilt, they conduct a societal disgrace, enjoy it, and then feel bad because they did something that went against society's rules. This is constantly recurring and they feel evermore ashamed the more they do it. The more they do it, the less enjoyment they receive and therefore after a series, they can't stop an action that will give them no happiness, but a deep sense of shame.
These parents have degraded the child's values towards society and the parent will soon identify the shame they have placed. Perhaps they may receive their 'high', but as time goes by, they will have paid a dear price: the world's evaluation of their family and it's lineage, the deep and intrinsic addiction that will no doubt lead to chronic suicidal thoughts, and the failure to create the fully functioning self that they paradoxically went about to actually mature.
Although, maybe they felt this was society's norm?
Or, what if the parents themselves deeply believe to be split from society?
Or, what if the parents feel that their shame increases the hubristic value of themselves?
Or, what if the parents are doing it to not just to receive attention for themselves, but to prove to society that they are split from society?
There is of course many questions one can ask to explain why some people do certain things, but in the above paragraphs, I think you yourself are equipped with the needed information to answer all four questions and any others you can think of.
Teacher: "Although, maybe they felt this was society's norm?"
Ah, yes see, this is what is both curious and alarming - has this become a norm? Has this level of selfishness and narcissism become a norm in our society? Have we, in the past decade in particular, rewarded people for their narcissism? I doubt you waste you time watching TV, but I also teach the Media courses, and in the past decade I have seen the rise of Reality TV along with a marked rise in narcissism. As we reward people with money and increasing fame (attention); when we reward the participants in these "games" (which we confuse people by calling them "reality"), do we condone anti-social behaviors as being the characteristics of "winners"?
And it is interesting that in the past three years we are now seeing former contestants or people who tried to get onto these shows who failed - are committing suicide. (Paula Goodspeed being the most notable in the media, but in your personal studies I think you would find the case of Ryan Alexander Jenkins to be more interesting as he committed suicide after brutally murdering his girlfriend). Is this because failure on TV has no privacy and the participant can not live with their public shame? Is it because once the media attention is no longer feeding their narcissism do they lose their "reason" for living?
This is just something I've noticed and been curious about...
Me:I wouldn't say that this has become the norm, I would rather say that this has become the norm. Has the media caused this epidemic or has media alerted us of thisepidemic; it can't be an epidemic if it has been the norm, can it?
I actually waste a lot of my time watching TV. That being QI, Criminal Minds, Mental, the once powerful and all great: Rubicon, and my new addiction, In Treatment. If you've figured out my genre, then I should continue to say my favorite movies are Dark Knight, Inception, Memento, and Following; all done by the omnipotent screen writer: Christopher Nolan.
The real definition of narcissism is simply to lie about ones capabilities and say that they are greater than they really are. Here, the definition of lie is quite ambiguous as many identify deception as cooperative. It is not. You do not have to believe the lie to be lied to, you just need the lie teller to believe their own lie for them to tell it as if its the truth. I remember a study where professors took hundreds of people and asked what the worst lie had ever been told to them. For their conclusions, only lies of betrayal rather than lies of harm were spoken. It is interesting though that if I were asked this, I would say whenever I think of something that I have an emotional connection to and have found out that it is false, I blow it away. The fear of it not being true is very painful, so I have to say that I am the betraying rather than those around me. It seems that this is much confirmed externally, so when ones supposed life is flipped into a completely different one when someone finds out a lot of what binds their life together. The binding of their life is like an emotional thread, which has now been broken with a quick snap. Please read this carefully: a participant in their study told the experimenters that the worst lie she was ever told was when she was looking for laundry to clean in her husband's briefcase, but instead found ladies underwear that weren't her own. Why was she searching for dirty laundry in her husband's briefcase anyway?
What I'm trying to get at here is how emotionally connected people will become to deny even reality itself. When it comes to games, we have the losers and the winners. Is the winner a narcissist? No, because if they were, they would not have won, they would have been a loser and complained about how there was mistake as to avoid their own shame. A narcissist rarely feels guilt, so repairative actions such as practicing to have a better chance at winning is actually quite rare. Although many say hubris is bad, it is quite prosperous for an individual. Take in this example: a confident and successful looking businessman walks in asking to make a deal, you take his positive voice head on and give him the deal; later on you find out that he actually has barely any background, but his expensive suit and loud voice got him the deal. This is hubris for an individual, but hubris is toxic for society. Imagine fifty million people screaming a lie... is that pleasant? No. The lie encompasses the group and no production is made. There are no deals to made because the group has isolated itself to its own esteem. In a sense, it can't find anyone to make a deal with.
Pride for an individual is bad. It makes one look snotty and although they have had success, other people looking at them see their own despair and don't prefer to bear the mortification, but prefer to attack him with anger. Pride in a society just increases the societies prosperity. People willingly out of free choice and no peer-pressure will join a society if it is prosperous. If you are a researcher at a university and are interested in a subject the university isn't putting a lot of money into, would you go to another university that is putting a lot of money into the subject you are interested in? Absolutely, there must be a reason why this other university is gambling their money away to these other professors; perhaps they are better and have had greater success.
Public shame is embarrassment and this is a degrading in ones ethical abilities. Humiliation is the public degrading of ones reputation. This is why people feel humiliation is worse than embarrassment, because humiliation hurts ones value to society, rather than embarrassment hurting ones value to one self. One can continue life when one believes everyone loves them except themselves, but can one continue life if everyone around them put them low on the grape vine? Obviously not. It is much harder to heal from humiliation than from shame, much harder. For embarrassment to heal, you need to change your perspective of yourself, but for humiliation to heal, you must change everything: you, the environment, and anything that may remind you of it (even the memories may have to go in extreme cases).
If one is trying to receive media attention, what is one trying to accomplish? Fame obviously. What else than strutting your name and to be high on the grape vine? It is what we all work towards. In deception, a lie can be discovered simply by examining the evidence, but the lie teller may not clean up the evidence because they are cognitively exhausted. Here, I believe this path to humiliation may be caused due to exhaustion, possibly from constant self-deception and planning to achieve the "crown". Now they are out in the world as the failures everyone believes them to be and what happens when the humiliation is greater than one can bear? They attack those who constantly remind them of they are either not capable of or what they are unwilling to demonstrate out of shame. In the last sentence, the scene is set for that brutal murder and from there, the deconstruction of reality. RAJ can keep lying to himself, but he knows reality has finally come and he can no longer betray himself, hence is suicide. No more humiliation. No more.
Just to add, in groups embarrassment and pride are good. In individuals, humiliation and hubris are good. Humiliation usually leads to repairative actions and in RAJ's case: murder as the action and suicide as the reaction. Unfortunately, when successful suicide is a reaction, you don't get the chance to learn from the mistake.
Article about parents not naming their child
Teacher: We spoke about this in the live class - the case where the parents refused to tell people the gender of their child...well there are a few cases...
Me: I already have a bit of a grasp on this. A blogger that goes by the Last Psychiatrist, makes many lengthily posts on his deductions. He's quite funny and is very good at it. He has recently done something on this. Here is the link.
In a basic sense, the mother refused to tell the world her child's gender because she wanted to confidence her own identity and sacrifice the child's. You can read as that the mother used the child as a narcissistic feed to increase her own worth rather than the child. She ignored the child's rights, enforced potential ridicule, and lowered his ability to identify his own self. In my opinion this was a terrible mother who used the child to engross their own identity. You can read more about narcissistic parents here and more from my own personal blog here.
I hope this helps you understand why parents can sometimes do this. I recently watch an episode of QI (501 Engineering) where Rob Briden states how he has sex and Stephen Fry replies "Rob, can I remind you of something? Your father is in the audience." Rob replies after saluting to his father: "He's up there going 'That's My Boy!'" (He quotes his father using a Scottish accent.) In this example, is this not the point of, forgive my vulgar pun, 'sex'? Only recently has the word sex changed from a gender term to a 'sex'ual term.
To understand why parents do this, I believe looking towards the psychopath and how they only 'empathize' for them is highly important. Of course they are not actually empathizing, but what they are doing is puting their own goals into the child's eyes. Psychopaths have right-hemisphere amygdala damage and from this, they are not able to 'receive' eye contact and also cannot recognize the disgust expression; this evidence possibly indicates that psychopaths can't feel disgust. This stops them from having any concern for others and being able to develop any self-conscious emotions. The psychopath uses self-deception as a technique to 'self'-empathize with their child.
Teacher: Thank you for the links!
In particular I was quite interested in the parent/narcissism article as that was one thing that occurred to me when reading about the parents (especially the Toronto couple) that this seemed more like a stunt than something they really believed in. This is also something that concerns me when Reality TV shows like Toddlers and Tiaras become so popular. As a society, are we rewarding parents for their selfishness?
Me: Before I begin a rant, I'm first going to define selfishness in my context. Selfishness is to build one's self values only, not to increase social, safety, or physiological needs. On the terms of selfishness, is the person focused on building self-esteem or self-identity. Self-esteem focuses on an external locus where they act for the concern of what others are thinking or feeling. Self-identity focuses on an internal locus where they act for the concern of how they feel or think of the value of their own self. Self-esteem could be a university degree, while self-identity could be a set of morals. When one feels a sense of gusto for either the self-esteem ot self-identity motive and becomes ashamed of who they are for it, then one can pin them down as having an addiction, but if one is unable to recognize they have a problem, or rather, are deviating from the norm of society and society are noticing rather than the person, then they themselves are selfish. (I think I just concluded that people cannot call themselves selfish in certain areas... this paragraph is therefore entitled to some development.)
Anyhow, I think I would say that although parents receive that instant 'high' from being "rewarded" by society, I wouldn't say it to be long term. I would feel that although the society is giving them their needed fame, the child will go on to probably degrade them. Although, simple counteractions could be taken to stop this such as instilling a religious belief into them that loving one's parents is mandatory for some afterlife reward. Many things can be counter-productive to remove the religious belief and so on.
Anyhow, these parents have raised a transsexual cultural child, and on a personal note, I'm not very accepting of transsexuals who wear another sexes clothes because they were raised to or because they like it. I'm accepting of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, asexuals and so on, but when someone wears another persons clothes, that's like a guest at your wedding wearing a wedding dress (if I were female, I wouldn't find it very 'attractive'). Or, how about an atheist wearing a priests uniform, or maybe an anti-nationalist wearing that nations military outfit; is this not displeasing? Society has set rules and people who break them obviously get attention, but is this selfish? Above, I believe I accidentally defined selfish as being societies word for another, not a word one can use onto themselves. If they are using it on themselves, they have what I believe an addiction and the only reason it is an addiction, is because they are feeling shame, not guilt; where guilt is an emotion that focuses on evaluating events and often leads to repairative actions. since they aren't feeling guilt, they conduct a societal disgrace, enjoy it, and then feel bad because they did something that went against society's rules. This is constantly recurring and they feel evermore ashamed the more they do it. The more they do it, the less enjoyment they receive and therefore after a series, they can't stop an action that will give them no happiness, but a deep sense of shame.
These parents have degraded the child's values towards society and the parent will soon identify the shame they have placed. Perhaps they may receive their 'high', but as time goes by, they will have paid a dear price: the world's evaluation of their family and it's lineage, the deep and intrinsic addiction that will no doubt lead to chronic suicidal thoughts, and the failure to create the fully functioning self that they paradoxically went about to actually mature.
Although, maybe they felt this was society's norm?
Or, what if the parents themselves deeply believe to be split from society?
Or, what if the parents feel that their shame increases the hubristic value of themselves?
Or, what if the parents are doing it to not just to receive attention for themselves, but to prove to society that they are split from society?
There is of course many questions one can ask to explain why some people do certain things, but in the above paragraphs, I think you yourself are equipped with the needed information to answer all four questions and any others you can think of.
Teacher: "Although, maybe they felt this was society's norm?"
Ah, yes see, this is what is both curious and alarming - has this become a norm? Has this level of selfishness and narcissism become a norm in our society? Have we, in the past decade in particular, rewarded people for their narcissism? I doubt you waste you time watching TV, but I also teach the Media courses, and in the past decade I have seen the rise of Reality TV along with a marked rise in narcissism. As we reward people with money and increasing fame (attention); when we reward the participants in these "games" (which we confuse people by calling them "reality"), do we condone anti-social behaviors as being the characteristics of "winners"?
And it is interesting that in the past three years we are now seeing former contestants or people who tried to get onto these shows who failed - are committing suicide. (Paula Goodspeed being the most notable in the media, but in your personal studies I think you would find the case of Ryan Alexander Jenkins to be more interesting as he committed suicide after brutally murdering his girlfriend). Is this because failure on TV has no privacy and the participant can not live with their public shame? Is it because once the media attention is no longer feeding their narcissism do they lose their "reason" for living?
This is just something I've noticed and been curious about...
Me:I wouldn't say that this has become the norm, I would rather say that this has become the norm. Has the media caused this epidemic or has media alerted us of this
I actually waste a lot of my time watching TV. That being QI, Criminal Minds, Mental, the once powerful and all great: Rubicon, and my new addiction, In Treatment. If you've figured out my genre, then I should continue to say my favorite movies are Dark Knight, Inception, Memento, and Following; all done by the omnipotent screen writer: Christopher Nolan.
The real definition of narcissism is simply to lie about ones capabilities and say that they are greater than they really are. Here, the definition of lie is quite ambiguous as many identify deception as cooperative. It is not. You do not have to believe the lie to be lied to, you just need the lie teller to believe their own lie for them to tell it as if its the truth. I remember a study where professors took hundreds of people and asked what the worst lie had ever been told to them. For their conclusions, only lies of betrayal rather than lies of harm were spoken. It is interesting though that if I were asked this, I would say whenever I think of something that I have an emotional connection to and have found out that it is false, I blow it away. The fear of it not being true is very painful, so I have to say that I am the betraying rather than those around me. It seems that this is much confirmed externally, so when ones supposed life is flipped into a completely different one when someone finds out a lot of what binds their life together. The binding of their life is like an emotional thread, which has now been broken with a quick snap. Please read this carefully: a participant in their study told the experimenters that the worst lie she was ever told was when she was looking for laundry to clean in her husband's briefcase, but instead found ladies underwear that weren't her own. Why was she searching for dirty laundry in her husband's briefcase anyway?
What I'm trying to get at here is how emotionally connected people will become to deny even reality itself. When it comes to games, we have the losers and the winners. Is the winner a narcissist? No, because if they were, they would not have won, they would have been a loser and complained about how there was mistake as to avoid their own shame. A narcissist rarely feels guilt, so repairative actions such as practicing to have a better chance at winning is actually quite rare. Although many say hubris is bad, it is quite prosperous for an individual. Take in this example: a confident and successful looking businessman walks in asking to make a deal, you take his positive voice head on and give him the deal; later on you find out that he actually has barely any background, but his expensive suit and loud voice got him the deal. This is hubris for an individual, but hubris is toxic for society. Imagine fifty million people screaming a lie... is that pleasant? No. The lie encompasses the group and no production is made. There are no deals to made because the group has isolated itself to its own esteem. In a sense, it can't find anyone to make a deal with.
Pride for an individual is bad. It makes one look snotty and although they have had success, other people looking at them see their own despair and don't prefer to bear the mortification, but prefer to attack him with anger. Pride in a society just increases the societies prosperity. People willingly out of free choice and no peer-pressure will join a society if it is prosperous. If you are a researcher at a university and are interested in a subject the university isn't putting a lot of money into, would you go to another university that is putting a lot of money into the subject you are interested in? Absolutely, there must be a reason why this other university is gambling their money away to these other professors; perhaps they are better and have had greater success.
Public shame is embarrassment and this is a degrading in ones ethical abilities. Humiliation is the public degrading of ones reputation. This is why people feel humiliation is worse than embarrassment, because humiliation hurts ones value to society, rather than embarrassment hurting ones value to one self. One can continue life when one believes everyone loves them except themselves, but can one continue life if everyone around them put them low on the grape vine? Obviously not. It is much harder to heal from humiliation than from shame, much harder. For embarrassment to heal, you need to change your perspective of yourself, but for humiliation to heal, you must change everything: you, the environment, and anything that may remind you of it (even the memories may have to go in extreme cases).
If one is trying to receive media attention, what is one trying to accomplish? Fame obviously. What else than strutting your name and to be high on the grape vine? It is what we all work towards. In deception, a lie can be discovered simply by examining the evidence, but the lie teller may not clean up the evidence because they are cognitively exhausted. Here, I believe this path to humiliation may be caused due to exhaustion, possibly from constant self-deception and planning to achieve the "crown". Now they are out in the world as the failures everyone believes them to be and what happens when the humiliation is greater than one can bear? They attack those who constantly remind them of they are either not capable of or what they are unwilling to demonstrate out of shame. In the last sentence, the scene is set for that brutal murder and from there, the deconstruction of reality. RAJ can keep lying to himself, but he knows reality has finally come and he can no longer betray himself, hence is suicide. No more humiliation. No more.
Just to add, in groups embarrassment and pride are good. In individuals, humiliation and hubris are good. Humiliation usually leads to repairative actions and in RAJ's case: murder as the action and suicide as the reaction. Unfortunately, when successful suicide is a reaction, you don't get the chance to learn from the mistake.
Monday 26 March 2012
Rage, Parenthood, and Narcissism
When you hear about serial killers and mass murders think of the word you're going to use to define them. Just take an actual second and think of the word. Did sociopath, *ssh*l*, major depressive, anti-social, narcissist, or possibly psychopath ever come to mind? FYI psychopath is the word I'm looking for if you seem to have missed the italics that magically appeared around the word "psychopath". Yes, they can be manipulating, cunning, angry, liars and just plainly awful people, but here's one thing that they are amazing at: parenting. Ever want a husband or a wife who'll protect their child even if it requires a lengthy and painful removing of an arm and a leg, well, Papa psychopath is there for you!
Now, this doesn't apply to all, just the statistical majority. So, why might a psychopath might be good parents? well my imaginary questioner who thinks too much as they read, psychopaths, like the narcissist, are self-absorbed; I think I just related a person who has a conscience to someone who doesn't. Listen, I mean read, carefully! The psychopath is a person who is devoid of sympathy and empathy, a narcissist is just devoid of sympathy. Psychopathy is genetically set in (before age two) while narcissism is environmentally set in (before age eighteen). Starting to see the differences? Good, because I'm going to explain narcissism fairly briefly. A narcissist is someone who is so enveloped in their own shame that they... wait for it as this is the site topic... lie to themselves (not others as every oddly believes) about what they're capable of. This lying to the self allows the narcissist to accumulate a sense of hubris making them feel that they're capable of anything. (I think in my next post I'll write about narcissism and addictions.)
Psychopathy is basically someone who has an underdeveloped amygdala. The amygdala is what we use to feel certain emotions, not all, but just some. These emotions include anger, fear, sadness, surprise, happiness, disgust, and possibly - I repeat possibly - contempt. Contempt seems to be Universal in expression, but I have a bit of trouble accepting it as Universal because I feel more research is needed since it has an asymmetrical facial expression and seems to require self-evaluation. If you know of a good reference, COMMENT! That way I can edit this post and include it for it to be properly shared as some people don't read the comments; these people are probably psychopaths in disguise BTW. The amygdala's developmental neurobiology is fairly simple. As we grow, the greater amount of eye contact the caregiver gives, the greater the growth of gray matter in the amygdala. The psychopath is empathy-less and has a difficult time dealing with the facial expressions of disgust which is probably due to right-hemisphere dysfunction; I looked this up BTW if you check the bibliography. Also, psychopaths aren't actually all serial killer this and violent criminal that, they're just pathological liars who never seem to learn their lesson.
Now, why is a psychopath such a good parent? Well, I have to come clean, they aren't. They can be wife beaters,child beaters, cheaters, drug addicts, liars, pocket burners, but, they are good at protecting their child. Why? Well IQ (Imaginary Questioner), its because they see their child as an expansion of who they are. The psychopath only cares about themselves, and if they only care about themselves, then they are certainly going to care for their child.
Little Girl: "Daddy, I want a doggie!"
Papa Psychopath: "Alright sweetheart." Hmm... The neighbors have a dog. Maybe I can 'borrow' theirs?
As you read, they're probably not the best parent for getting along with society, but they're great when you need the child to be protected. They'll do better than the average mother. Hell, they're probably the only thing better than the mother in child protection. Now you're wondering, "hey, you wrote child beating up there?" Yes, yes I did. Consider the following:
Little Girl: "Daddy, I want a doggie!"
Papa Psychopath: "No f*ck*ng way in Hell! They're awful and disgusting animals!" Raises his arm,.. but by doing so leaves mid-section unprotected... (This is to leave open a chance for you to mulch over your fantasy of being Little Girl or saving Little Girl from evil Papa Psychopath.)
See, are you starting to understand the "child protection" part? Notice I put "disgusting" into his statement? I did this because I just want you to know that not all psychopaths know that they're psychopaths and that some may be saying the words "disgusting", "revolting", or "scornful" when they really mean "frustrating", "bad childhood experience", or "trepidation". Now we get into narcissism. The psychopath doesn't and never has actually cared for the child at all, they just see themselves in the child. And from here, we enter the real topic of what the post is about: Rage, Parenthood, and Narcissism.
The psychopath protected their child from what they believed to be bad or in-congruent with a successful life. I personally believe all parents do this. All. No parent wants to teach their child to become a bad person and unsuccessful at life; honestly, who does? But, where did the psychopath go wrong? Well IQ, the psychopath went wrong because they forgot to protect their mid-section. No, I'm just joking. They went wrong because they can't see the child as someone else, someone who isn't them. Ever seen Black Swan? The mother in this movie is completely self-absorbed about who her daughter becomes and doesn't see her as a different person. Maybe, you might recall a time when your caregiver once said "Oh, my sons/daughters (becoming) a..." or "s/he got this amazing achievement!" This is referred to psychiatrists as the narcissistic parent, but I don't agree as this can only happen when the parent truly believes the child is dysfunctional, but lies to themselves about it because they can't handle the shame. The correct word for this is naches. Naches is Yiddish and means to feel proud of what a parent has accomplished in raising their child. The expression of naches is kvell by the way.
"I'm feeling naches pride right now."
"I'm expressing kvell pride right now."
This is the word that I'll be using in place of narcissistic parent as I can't agree with their line of thought. You can probably work it out from here, but what happens when a person doesn't agree with what their parent believes? Well, you find that rage. People become enraged by what their child does because think they can change it. If they didn't believe it was on-purpose, why get angry? Why not get sad if they believed it was accidental? And now you know why parents get angry: because they believe they can change the child's behavior for the better, or rather, raise the child as society has it defined.
Well, that's quite all nice, but about naches and kvell? Well IQ, I must say that as I have read, there are three parents who become chronic in the feelings of naches and kvell.
In summary, I have introduced you to the psychopath, a perfect embodiment of the chronic 1 parent. I never spent much time writing about the number 2 or 3 chronic parent as I felt they're pretty self-explanatory. It is in my belief that the chronic 1 parent is in need of a bit of research as it deals heavily with this sites topic: self-deception. From the grandiosity of thinking to the reverence of shame, we all deceive ourselves and I want to know: why?
Now, this doesn't apply to all, just the statistical majority. So, why might a psychopath might be good parents? well my imaginary questioner who thinks too much as they read, psychopaths, like the narcissist, are self-absorbed; I think I just related a person who has a conscience to someone who doesn't. Listen, I mean read, carefully! The psychopath is a person who is devoid of sympathy and empathy, a narcissist is just devoid of sympathy. Psychopathy is genetically set in (before age two) while narcissism is environmentally set in (before age eighteen). Starting to see the differences? Good, because I'm going to explain narcissism fairly briefly. A narcissist is someone who is so enveloped in their own shame that they... wait for it as this is the site topic... lie to themselves (not others as every oddly believes) about what they're capable of. This lying to the self allows the narcissist to accumulate a sense of hubris making them feel that they're capable of anything. (I think in my next post I'll write about narcissism and addictions.)
Psychopathy is basically someone who has an underdeveloped amygdala. The amygdala is what we use to feel certain emotions, not all, but just some. These emotions include anger, fear, sadness, surprise, happiness, disgust, and possibly - I repeat possibly - contempt. Contempt seems to be Universal in expression, but I have a bit of trouble accepting it as Universal because I feel more research is needed since it has an asymmetrical facial expression and seems to require self-evaluation. If you know of a good reference, COMMENT! That way I can edit this post and include it for it to be properly shared as some people don't read the comments; these people are probably psychopaths in disguise BTW. The amygdala's developmental neurobiology is fairly simple. As we grow, the greater amount of eye contact the caregiver gives, the greater the growth of gray matter in the amygdala. The psychopath is empathy-less and has a difficult time dealing with the facial expressions of disgust which is probably due to right-hemisphere dysfunction; I looked this up BTW if you check the bibliography. Also, psychopaths aren't actually all serial killer this and violent criminal that, they're just pathological liars who never seem to learn their lesson.
Now, why is a psychopath such a good parent? Well, I have to come clean, they aren't. They can be wife beaters,
Little Girl: "Daddy, I want a doggie!"
Papa Psychopath: "Alright sweetheart." Hmm... The neighbors have a dog. Maybe I can 'borrow' theirs?
As you read, they're probably not the best parent for getting along with society, but they're great when you need the child to be protected. They'll do better than the average mother. Hell, they're probably the only thing better than the mother in child protection. Now you're wondering, "hey, you wrote child beating up there?" Yes, yes I did. Consider the following:
Little Girl: "Daddy, I want a doggie!"
Papa Psychopath: "No f*ck*ng way in Hell! They're awful and disgusting animals!" Raises his arm,.. but by doing so leaves mid-section unprotected... (This is to leave open a chance for you to mulch over your fantasy of being Little Girl or saving Little Girl from evil Papa Psychopath.)
See, are you starting to understand the "child protection" part? Notice I put "disgusting" into his statement? I did this because I just want you to know that not all psychopaths know that they're psychopaths and that some may be saying the words "disgusting", "revolting", or "scornful" when they really mean "frustrating", "bad childhood experience", or "trepidation". Now we get into narcissism. The psychopath doesn't and never has actually cared for the child at all, they just see themselves in the child. And from here, we enter the real topic of what the post is about: Rage, Parenthood, and Narcissism.
The psychopath protected their child from what they believed to be bad or in-congruent with a successful life. I personally believe all parents do this. All. No parent wants to teach their child to become a bad person and unsuccessful at life; honestly, who does? But, where did the psychopath go wrong? Well IQ, the psychopath went wrong because they forgot to protect their mid-section. No, I'm just joking. They went wrong because they can't see the child as someone else, someone who isn't them. Ever seen Black Swan? The mother in this movie is completely self-absorbed about who her daughter becomes and doesn't see her as a different person. Maybe, you might recall a time when your caregiver once said "Oh, my sons/daughters (becoming) a..." or "s/he got this amazing achievement!" This is referred to psychiatrists as the narcissistic parent, but I don't agree as this can only happen when the parent truly believes the child is dysfunctional, but lies to themselves about it because they can't handle the shame. The correct word for this is naches. Naches is Yiddish and means to feel proud of what a parent has accomplished in raising their child. The expression of naches is kvell by the way.
"I'm feeling naches pride right now."
"I'm expressing kvell pride right now."
This is the word that I'll be using in place of narcissistic parent as I can't agree with their line of thought. You can probably work it out from here, but what happens when a person doesn't agree with what their parent believes? Well, you find that rage. People become enraged by what their child does because think they can change it. If they didn't believe it was on-purpose, why get angry? Why not get sad if they believed it was accidental? And now you know why parents get angry: because they believe they can change the child's behavior for the better, or rather, raise the child as society has it defined.
Well, that's quite all nice, but about naches and kvell? Well IQ, I must say that as I have read, there are three parents who become chronic in the feelings of naches and kvell.
- "The one who merges with and exploits [the] child as a kind of narcissistic feed, with little or no capacity to empathize;
- "The one who completely abandons [the] child in pursuit of attention or admiration from others;
- "The one who envies [the] separating child for everything the child seems to possess but [the parent] does not." (Burgo, 2012)
In summary, I have introduced you to the psychopath, a perfect embodiment of the chronic 1 parent. I never spent much time writing about the number 2 or 3 chronic parent as I felt they're pretty self-explanatory. It is in my belief that the chronic 1 parent is in need of a bit of research as it deals heavily with this sites topic: self-deception. From the grandiosity of thinking to the reverence of shame, we all deceive ourselves and I want to know: why?
Bibliography and Works Cited
Burgo, J. (2012,
March 20). The Narcissistic Mother | After Psychotharapy. Retrieved
March 27, 2012, from After Psychotherapy:
http://www.afterpsychotherapy.com/the-narcissistic-mother/
Libby, J., Mayer, A. R., Suchy, Y., & Kosson, D. S.
(2002). Facial Affect Recognition in Criminal Psychopaths. Emotion,
2 (4), 398-411.
Tuesday 20 March 2012
New Research into Facial Expressions and Deception on People Who are Pleading
Now, the articles been going around the deception community very fast and I thought I'd put it into the Blog and into the Site. What is it? Well, researchers at the University of British Columbia have found that there are, from their abstract, two new ways to identify the liar. The deceptive pleader who could for example be pleading for their child's life, shows less contraction of the "grief "muscles (corrugator supercilii, depressor anguli oris) while an honest person would display full to maximum contraction. The other finding was that deceivers also have masking smiles (slight contraction of the zygomatic major) and attempt to appear sad using their eyebrows (full contraction of frontalis).
One frame was 1/30 of a second and the results are showed in the graph below that I have made for you. GP means genuine pleader while DP means deceptive pleader. M and SD are the mean and standard deviations respectively. The more the SD is offset by the M, that means the data isn't as reliable. BTW: SD can be learned usually in senior high school through a statistics or data management course for you young lads.
Now, they have some other results, but this I've already explained in the beginning, so don't worry about Table 2, as they have titled it. It's here so you can look, see the numbers, and go "Yeah I think I can understand that?" If you can't and you're saying you can, read the previous post as I talked a bit about self-deception and emotional connections. If you understand it, great, if you don't its up top somewhere.
Works Cited
 |
| This is a well detailed anatomy of the face, but as you can see, there are arrows. I have gone and place the two findings on here with their corresponding muscle. Green is for the masking of joy and the display of sadness and the red arrows and lining are for the pleading deceivers. The corresponding action units have also been placed inside. |
Now, they have some other results, but this I've already explained in the beginning, so don't worry about Table 2, as they have titled it. It's here so you can look, see the numbers, and go "Yeah I think I can understand that?" If you can't and you're saying you can, read the previous post as I talked a bit about self-deception and emotional connections. If you understand it, great, if you don't its up top somewhere.
ten Brinke, L., Porter,
S., & Baker, A. (2012). Darwin the detective: Observable facial muscle
contractions reveal emotional high-stakes lies. Evolution and Human Behavior, In press.
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