interview with murderer and six women in December 2007, a lack of affect but also rapist Paul Bernardo, his initially was on trial for 26 inappropriateor psychopaths, emotion not only powerful use of communica- counts of first-degree murder. may reveal the extent of their tion via his hand gesturing is He once bragged to a cellmate callousness. Recent research easily observable and often that he intended to kill 50 wom- suggested that much can be distracts from his spoken lies.2 en. Details provided in court re- learned about these individuals The authors offer their insights vealed brutal and heinous mur- by close examination of their into the unique considerations ders that often included torture, language. Their highly per- pertaining to psychopaths' degradation, and dismember- suasive nonverbal behavior communication. ment of the victims. The authors often distracts the listener opine that Mr. Pickton proba- from identifying their psycho- Psychopathy bly would meet the criteria for pathic nature. For example, Robert Pickton, convicted psychopathy, a destructive per- on a publically available police of the second-degree murder of sonality disorder that combines 28 / FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin a profound lack of conscience information regarding the mind- simple to sophisticated, but with several problematic inter- set of a psychopath.3 they all essentially identify lin- personal, emotional, and behav- Conning, manipulation, and guistic patterns and count their ioral characteristics. a desire to lie for the sake of frequency relative to a control Consistent with psychopa- getting away with it-often re- language. thy, Robert Pickton's self-report ferred to as "duping delight"- Considering the speech of and presentation during his are well known characteristics narcissists, they use language interrogation showed a man de- of the psychopath. These be- related to the self more than void of emotion. His demeanor haviors, combined with a self- nonnarcissistic people because during this lengthy questioning confident swagger and ability to of their primary concern with reflected detachment and bore- distract the listener with gran- themselves. To analyze this, a dom. During most of his trial, diose self-presentation, make it program could count the num- Mr. Pickton was described as difficult to properly follow their ber of times the words "I," emotionless. Individuals pres- self-report. "me," or "my" occurred in a ent in court expressed dismay person's speech and compare over his lack of emotion during that to the general population. A the reading of horrifying impact narcissist's speech should have statements. a higher percentage of these With the nonchalant and Individuals' types of words. emotionless demeanor of a psy- language is one of the Until recently, these tools chopath, Robert Pickton would best ways to glean have not been used to ana- make an interesting case study. insightinto their lyze the speech production of Reviewing his videotaped self- thoughts and general criminals and psychopathic report with the sound muted, it outlook. individuals. A previous study appeared that he was reporting using human coders found some mundane incident, rather that there are differences in than detailed accounts of the the speech of psychopaths and heinous murders he committed. nonpsychopaths. Experts found A psychopath recently in- Analysis and Technology that psychopaths more likely terviewed by one of the authors Individuals' language is one will exaggerate the spontaneity recounted a vicious murder he of the best ways to glean insight of their homicides. They may had committed. "We got, uh, we into their thoughts and general label a cold-blooded murder got high, and had a few beers. I outlook. Recent advances in as a crime of passion and omit like whiskey, so I bought some technology make it possible incriminating details of what whiskey, we had some of that, to examine more closely the occurred during the act.' and then we, uh, went for a language of various clinical Research on speech acous- swim, and then we made love populations through automatic tics indicated that psychopaths in my car, then we left to go get linguistic analysis programs. do not differentiate in voice some more, some more booze These applications can dif- emphasis between neutral and and some more drugs." A recent ferentiate between a variety emotional words. Other anal- study explained how this narra- of individual and personality ysis suggested that the speech tive might reveal important factors.' The tools range from narratives of these individuals July 2012 / 29 are organized poorly and inco- function words and focus on drugs the day he committed the herent.6 This is surprising be- content words (verbs and nouns, murder. cause psychopaths are excellent such as "kill" and "knife"). Psychopathic murderers storytellers who successfully Because psychopaths are skilled differ in other ways of speaking. con others. at manipulating, deceiving, Compared with nonpsycho- This finding leads to the and controlling their self-pre- paths, they make fewer refer- interesting question of how sentation, a computerized tool ences to social needs relating psychopaths can have such examining subtle aspects of to family and friends. Research manipulative prowess. In their language represents a new indicated that the selfish, instru- addition to their skilled use of avenue to uncover important mental, goal-driven nature of body language, recent research insights into their behavior and psychopaths and their inability indicated that they are skilled at diagnosis. to focus on emotional aspects of faking emotional expressions, an event is discernable by close- approaching the skill level of ly examining their language.' emotionally intelligent individu- Psychopaths' language is less als, despite being largely devoid emotionally intense. They use of emotion.' They are capable more past-tense verbs in their of adopting various masks, narrative, suggesting a greater appearing empathetic and re- psychological and emotional morseful to the extent that they detachment from the incident. can talk and cry their way out The authors' study was the of parole hearings at a higher first step in using automated rate than their less dangerous language analysis to further counterparts. the understanding of the Language analysis tools psychopath's mind-set and to indicate that many aspects of begin developing a program language are not consciously for suggesting an individual's controllable by the speaker. Two automated text analy- psychopathy. An ongoing Words that linguists call func- sis tools-Wmatrix and the study is attempting to examine tion words are unconsciously Dictionary of Affect and Lan- language differences in non- produced by people. These guage-were used by research- criminal individuals who have include pronouns, such as ers to examine for the first time high psychopathic indicators. "I," "me," and "my"; preposi- the crime narratives of a group tions like "to" and "from"; and of psychopathic and nonpsycho- Interrogators and likewise, articles "a" and "the." pathic murderers.' The results Investigators Words can reveal the inner indicated that when describ- Considering the nature of workings of a person's mind, ing their murders, psychopaths psychopathy and the fascinat- such as the narcissist's focus on more likely would provide ing aspects of the psychopath's the self While word patterns information about basic needs, language, law enforcement offi- easily are measured by comput- such as food, drink, and money. cials should keep certain points er programs, they are difficult For example, in the earlier nar- in mind when interviewing or for human coders to determine rative, the offender talked about interacting with these individu- because people tend to ignore eating, drinking, and taking als. During an interview, Ted 30 / FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin Bundy once said, "I don't feel are face-to-face with a potential Conclusion guilty for anything. I feel sorry victim. Recent research illus- Considering some of the for people who feel guilt." trated that computer-mediated unique aspects of psychopathic Psychopaths are incapable environments, such as text- language, it might be pos- of identifying with or caring based chatrooms, enhance the sible to detect the psychopath about the emotional pain that ability of liars to get away with in online environments where they have caused victims or their lies." information is exclusively text their families, so any strategy Despite the difficulties pre- based. To catch a psychopath in to appeal to the psychopath's sented by Internet exchanges, this context, law enforcement conscience probably will be several opportunities exist. The agencies need to be aware of met with failure and frustration. majority of online communica- the subtleties of their deceptive This type of strategy will prove tion is text based, which means communication styles. Overall, a waste of time. It may irritate that unlike face-to-face con- there is a need for further sci- psychopathic individuals and tact, online interactions leave a entific research on the language cause them to be less inclined of psychopaths and training in to continue to engage with their statement analysis and decep- interviewers. tion detection techniques.+ Interrogators should remain aware of the psychopath's non- To facilitate the identificationof Endnotes verbal skills-body language 1 S. Porter, L. ten Brinke, and K. and facial expressions that cre- an individualas a Wilson, "Crime Profiles and Conditional ate displays of sincerity-used psychopath, it is Release Performance of Psychopathic for deceit in the interview room. important to collect and Nonpsychopathic Sexual Offenders," Psychopaths are master manipu- Legal and CriminologicalPsychology 14, as much language no. 1 (February 2009): 109-118. lators who have fooled many as possible. 2 Convicted Killer Paul Bernardo Inter- professionals. To facilitate the view on Elizabeth Bain, released for public identification of an individual viewing June 10, 2008, http://www.youtube. as a psychopath, it is important comwatch?v=V6F4 KIU55I. 3 to collect as much language as Y. Tausczik and J.W.