What do they hope to gain by all their machinations and manipulations?
According to Ms. Stout, author of The Sociopath Next Door ... Pity.
"The most reliable sign, the most universal behavior of unscrupulous people is not directed, as one might imagine, at our fearfulness. It is, perversely, an appeal to our sympathy.
I first learned this when I was still a graduate student in psychology and had the opportunity to interview a court-referred patient the system had already identified as a "psychopath".
***
I asked, "What is important to you in your life? What do you want more than anything else?" I thought he might say "getting money" or "staying out of jail" which were the activities to which he devoted most of his time.
Instead, without a moments hesitation, he replied, "Oh, that's easy. What I like better than anything else is when people feel sorry for me. The thing I really want more than anything else out of life is peoples pity."
The Sociopath Next Door
by M. Stout. Chapter 6. pp.107.
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