mental illnesses and the autism-psychosis spectrum

[Guest guest]

At " Psychology Today " there is a research psychologist,

Badcock, Ph.D., who has an interesting theory proposing that mental illnesses

have a genetic component, and that the various mental illnesses fall into a

spectrum of dysfunction. A mentally ill individual either " hyper-mentalizes " or

" hypo-mentalizes " , which is (I think) this psychologist's way of referring to

how an individual perceives information, interprets it, and responds to it.

At one extreme end of this spectrum are those who " hypo-mentalize " , aka those in

the autism spectrum, and at the other extreme end are those who

" hyper-mentalize " , aka those in the psychosis spectrum,* and this latter group

includes borderline pd.*

Those in the autism spectrum under-analyze and under-react to incoming emotional

information (or are completely indifferent to it), while those in the psychotic

spectrum over-analyze incoming emotional information and over-react to it,

usually assigning a negative interpretation to it and becoming highly distressed

by it.

I find this author's studies very interesting and believable because he backs up

his theories with genetics studies, brain scan studies, neurobiology studies,

and other hard-science research studies.

I'm not sure I agree with all of his conclusions, and I'm also not clear on

where or how psychopathy falls into this autism-psychosis spectrum.

Psychopaths are on the one hand *excellent* at reading other people's wants,

desires, needs and feelings, which they then cheerfully and eagerly use to

manipulate and exploit others (which might put them more in the " psychotic " end

of the spectrum?) and yet on the other hand they are completely indifferent to

the pain, destruction and suffering they cause their victims (which might put

them more in the autism end of the spectrum?)

So maybe psychopathy is an anomaly that is completely outside of this guy's

theoretical paradigm. (?)

Anyway, for those who are interested in reading more about this author's

theories, here's the link to his blog at Psychology Today:

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-imprinted-brain/201110/identical-differe\

nt

-Annie