A Five Year Follow-up of Untreated Psychopaths

Although the conviction rate falls with increasing age, at least three out of five psychopaths will not make a satisfactory adjustment, and there is a need for treatment to improve this figure.

Abstract

It is often said that psychopaths mature and settle down later in life. Authorities differ as to when this occurs; some say between 25 and the early thirties (Curran and Partridge, 1963); Henderson and Batchelor (1962) say that improvement may occur up to the age of 36; others say about the mid-forties (Davis, 1967); Cleckley (1952) held that the prognosis is almost hopeless. Most of their descriptions are of young adults, and one wonders what happens to them thereafter; do the majority settle down? and if they do not what happens to them?