Can bullying in children cause psychopathy?
We need more research to answer this question. But the preliminary evidence is suggestive. For instance, we know that kids are more likely to develop psychopathic traits if they have been subjected to multiple, traumatic life events (see below). And theres evidence that bullying in children can precede the onset of new, psychopathologic symptoms. In a longitudinal study of Korean kids, researcher Young Shin Kim and colleagues tracked over 1600 middle school students for 10 months (Kim et al 2006). To measure bullying in children, researchers asked students to identify peers who frequently bullied others, as well as peers who were frequently victimized. Researchers also interviewed each child to screen for symptoms of psychopathologic behavior, like cruelty, defiance, or conduct problems. At the end of 10 months, researchers compared each childs outcome with his or her baseline profile. The results were pretty interesting: Compared with students who were not involved with bullying, bull
