Abigail Marsh has found that many psychopaths don't want to be cruel and uncaring, and argues that they deserve support to help them get there Think of a psychopath and you probably picture someone dangerous, someone whose ruthless self-interest leads to great harm for others and considerable success for themselves. Perhaps unsurprisingly, while only around 1 per cent of people in the general population have psychopathy, roughly 1 in 5 men in prison show signs of it, and research has also found a link between corporate leadership and psychopathic traits . But just as it is painful to know a psychopath, it isn't necessarily fun to be one either. Abigail Marsh, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Georgetown University in Washington DC, studies those with psychopathic traits who largely lead ordinary lives among us. She has uncovered something surprising: many don't want to be psychopathic at all. Researchers are still honing the precise definition, but psychopathy is characterised by callousness, a lack of empathy, glib social charm and impulsivity.

For thousands of years, philosophers have pondered the question of whether humans are born with a'moral compass', or if we learn one as we grow older. Now, researchers have found that young babies can make moral judgements and punish antisocial behaviour – suggesting we're'inherently good' from birth. In experiments, the Japanese experts used eye-tracking technology to give eight-month-olds the power to punish a human-like blob on a computer screen. The babies were more inclined to give a punishment after they had seen it being violent towards a victim, the researchers found. Results suggest the motivation to give a punishment when it's due is intrinsic – something that we're born with – as opposed to learned.

Psychopathy is a personality disorder characterised by antisocial behaviour, remorselessness, deception, and interpersonal manipulation. Automated techniques that analyse non-verbal behaviours may be useful to evaluate the presence of these nefarious tendencies, the experts believe. The results are interesting because excessive non-verbal cues like head movements, blinks and hand-gestures have been linked to deception. The study, published in the Journal of Research in Personality, represents an'important first step' in demonstrating the feasibility of using computer vision in conjunction with psychology, the authors claim. 'I've been interviewing individuals high on psychopathic traits for more than 20 years,' study author Kent A. Kiehl, a psychology professor at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, told PsyPost.

At Christmas I was avoiding adult responsibility and leftovers by playing an online video game. Wandering in a post-apocalyptic wilderness, I happened upon a group of guys playing together. They didn't even steal my meagre possessions. Actually, I soon learned, they were a bunch of dads. They visited my base and instead of destroying it they started making it over: new walls, new lights, new stairs.

Recently, my application for insurance for a classic car I'd bought was refused. It was a first for me and when I inquired why, I was told that the insurance company was concerned that I associate with'high-value individuals'. I don't, but even if I did, how could this possibly impact my access to insurance? The broker kindly investigated on my behalf and discovered that a robot -- or more accurately an'automated decision-making machine' -- used by the insurance company had scoured the internet and discovered that in the distant past I'd been the motoring editor of a national newspaper. I was no wiser as to why this might suddenly have made me a liability.

You may think of psychopathy as an antisocial behaviour, but a new study suggests that people with these traits may actually be good for society. Researchers have found that while most people struggle to make moral decisions, psychopaths are more cut-throat about making pragmatic choices for the greater good. The findings show that, in certain circumstances, psychopathic traits could be considered beneficial. The researchers compared a questionnaire with actions in immersive moral dilemmas created using a robotic device that measures force, resistance, and speed, whilst simulating the action of harming a human. In several dilemmas, participants had to decide whether to sacrifice a person by performing a harmful action against them, in order to save a larger group of people.

In a world-first, scientists have genetically engineered ants to lack their sense of smell, affecting the animals' ability to communicate. Scientists used the controversial CRISPR technology to disrupt the ants' ability to communicate, forage or compete to be a queen, as their antennae and brain circuits failed to fully develop. While the system has not yet been tested in humans, the researchers believe that it could one day be used to treat conditions that affect social communication, including schizophrenia and depression. In a world-first, scientists have genetically engineered ants to lack their sense of smell, affecting the animals' ability to communicate Crispr technology precisely changes small parts of genetic code. Unlike other gene-silencing tools, the Crispr system targets the genome's source material and permanently turns off genes at the DNA level.

The words we use and our writing styles can reveal information about our preferences, thoughts, emotions and behaviours. Using this information, a new study from the University of Eastern Finland has developed machine learning models that can detect antisocial behaviours, such as hate speech and indications of violence, from texts. Historically, most attempts to address antisocial behaviour have been done from education, social and psychological points of view. This new study has, however, demonstrated the potential of using natural language processing techniques to develop state-of-the-art solutions to combat antisocial behaviour in written communication. The study created solutions that can be integrated in web forums or social media websites to automatically or semi-automatically detect potential incidences of antisocial behaviour with high accuracies, allowing for fast and reliable warnings and interventions to be made before the possible acts of violence are committed. One of the great challenges in detecting antisocial behaviour is first defining what precisely counts as antisocial behaviour and then determining how to detect such phenomena.