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    The Sociopath Next Door: The Ruthless Versus the Rest of Us
    The Sociopath Next Door: The Ruthless Versus the Rest of Us
    The Sociopath Next Door: The Ruthless Versus the Rest of Us
    Audiobook7 hours

    The Sociopath Next Door: The Ruthless Versus the Rest of Us

    Written by Martha Stout

    Narrated by Shelly Frasier

    4.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Who is the devil you know?

    Is it your lying, cheating ex-husband?

    Your sadistic high school gym teacher?

    Your boss who loves to humiliate people in meetings?

    The colleague who stole your idea and passed it off as her own?

    In the pages of The Sociopath Next Door, you will realize that your ex was not just misunderstood. He's a sociopath. And your boss, teacher, and colleague? They may be sociopaths too.

    We are accustomed to think of sociopaths as violent criminals, but in The Sociopath Next Door, Harvard psychologist Martha Stout reveals that a shocking 4 percent of ordinary people-one in twenty-five-has an often undetected mental disorder, the chief symptom of which is that that person possesses no conscience. He or she has no ability whatsoever to feel shame, guilt, or remorse. One in twenty-five everyday Americans, therefore, is secretly a sociopath. They could be your colleague, your neighbor, even family. And they can do literally anything at all and feel absolutely no guilt.

    How do we recognize the remorseless? One of their chief characteristics is a kind of glow or charisma that makes sociopaths more charming or interesting than the other people around them. They're more spontaneous, more intense, more complex, or even sexier than everyone else, making them tricky to identify and leaving us easily seduced. Fundamentally, sociopaths are different because they cannot love. Sociopaths learn early on to show sham emotion, but underneath they are indifferent to others' suffering. They live to dominate and thrill to win.

    The fact is, we all almost certainly know at least one or more sociopaths already. Part of the urgency in reading The Sociopath Next Door is the moment when we suddenly recognize that someone we know-someone we worked for, or were involved with, or voted for-is a sociopath. But what do we do with that knowledge? To arm us against the sociopath, Dr. Stout teaches us to question authority, suspect flattery, and beware the pity play. Above all, she writes, when a sociopath is beckoning, do not join the game.

    It is the ruthless versus the rest of us, and The Sociopath Next Door will show you how to recognize and defeat the devil you know.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateJun 1, 2005
    ISBN9781400171569
    The Sociopath Next Door: The Ruthless Versus the Rest of Us

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    Reviews for The Sociopath Next Door

    4.5/5

    156 ratings58 reviews

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    • 5/5
      The best book on sociopaths i've read so far, and I have read quite a few by now. I initially passed over this one because i thought the cover and title seemed shallow and not serious enough. This was a mistake, it should have been my first choice. Most of the books I read previously was about narcissists/psychopaths in relationships. This book deals with all kinds of situations. For more on sociopaths in the workplace i would recommend "Snakes in Suits".This book takes a wide perspective on conscience, what it is, what it's good for and why some people dont have it. It deals with several situations where you can meat a psychopath. One of the cases described in the book was spot on what I went through which was very validating. It also contains some advice for targets. Very interesting read.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      This book is well-written, in simple language that anyone can understand. (Unlike many books written by psychologists.) Martha Stout uses stories from her own psychology practice and experiences to illustrate the various ways a sociopath operates within the world. I found the information extremely interesting. Stout gives us great insight into human nature.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      Stout's brief book is designed to help laypersons identify the sociopathic persons around them. Often charming and charismatic, the sociopath plays on the emotions of others while he himself is devoid of any conscience or sense of empathy for others. They feel no sense of guilt, shame. or remorse and look at life as a series games designed to dominate and "win" over others. Stout provides several extensive examples to illustrate the primary traits of sociopaths. Her goal is to warn "the rest of us" to be wary of the 4% of the population who are sociopaths. If you've ever found yourself in a relationship--with a colleague, friend, or even family member--that leaves you wondering what happened and how you didn't see through this person's sick game, you will appreciate Stout's tips and the explanations that leave you knowing that you are not alone.And it's not a bad read for Americans in the midst of the Trump regime . . .

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      I found this book to be incredibly interesting, not just for the information about sociopaths and sociopathy, but also because of the information in here about how the rest of us...work, for lack of a better word. I really think this is the type of book that you can get something new out of every time you reread it. Interesting insight into the human mind and what motivates us as individuals and a species.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      If you have someone in your life who constantly does inexplicable things, things which lead you to wonder if you're overreacting or if the person is mentally ill and deserving of sympathy; who is constantly trolling for pity, lying, and has a pattern of behavior which makes people you describe it to think you must be making things up: do yourself a favor and read this book. The person in question may be among the 1 in 25 who have no conscience or remorse and for whose actions there is no "reason" recognizable to most of the people around them. People like this, often so skilled at subtle manipulation they hide in plain site, are called sociopaths or psychopaths. Trying to understand them and playing by their terms by trying to accommodate, cure, or help them, will lead to only one result: your pain and their success. The author concludes that the number one method of combating damage from a connection to a sociopath is avoidance. The book is pop psychology and some parts may be skimmed depending on your interests, but the author definitely portrays accurately the frustrations, fear, and difficulties of having someone like this in your life. For me, the book reinforced and strengthened my own approach to someone like this in my own life: AVOID, AVOID, AVOID. It took me years to get to this point, and luckily I have someone else who is dealing with the same person and with whom I can compare notes and encouragement, but for someone floundering around thinking they are in an impossible position, this book offers hope. You may not be dealing with a psychopath, but it's worth checking out. It certainly helped me solidify my certainty in the path I've chosen.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      As much as I liked the book, I was looking for a way to deal with my grandmother, who happens to be a sociopath herself (and doesn't care, btw). It doesn't offer enough advice for me to classify it as self-help.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      An excellent book about sociopathy. A must read for anyone interested in the topics of sociopathy and psychopathy.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      I picked up The Sociopath Next Door because I so admired Martha Stout’s The Myth of Sanity. Myth was a helpful, hopeful book, reminding us that all of us have moments of dissociation, when we drift off into another world (in a movie, perhaps) and that we are not so very different from those who are diagnosed with DID (dissociative identity disorder, formerly multiple personality disorder). Though every bit as readable, informative, and generally helpful, Sociopath is not so hopeful. “1 in 25 ordinary Americans secretly has no conscience and can do anything at all without feeling guilty,” the cover warns. That’s the definition of a sociopath, Stout explains, someone who has no conscience. Sociopaths are consummate liars and usually charming, she says, spending their lives trying to blend in, to look like they give a damn. After describing the various faces of sociopathy, using case studies as she did in Myth, Stout offers a list of ways to spot a sociopath and advises the only way to deal with them is to avoid them altogether. Stout’s description is so eerily like someone I know, someone her family and friends often describe as “evil,” that I launched into a reading frenzy on evil. Simon Baron-Cohen in The Science of Evil and William Irvine in On Desire share Stout’s advice to simply steer clear of sociopaths (or at least minimize contact if you’ve got one in the family). What emerges, though, in these latter two books based on the authors’ own research, is that there may be hope for the future. Though psychotherapy is useless with sociopaths -- a fact upon which all three authors agree -- there may actually be a way to train sociopaths to be “good.” It’s a societal goal right up there with world peace. It may take a long time, but it’s worth the effort.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      The Sociopath Next Door was a great read by Martha Sout. She does an excellent job explaining what a sociopath is and then gives 4 examples throughout the book. I never gave this disease a thought until I read this .

      1 person found this helpful

    • 3/5
      This book presents the sociopath in its various guises with some hints as to how to recognize them which is its value. Other than that it's moralistic and simplistic.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Only wish I had come across this book much earlier in my life.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      This book was great. It explained a lot about different kind of sociopaths and just how different even neurotypical people think from one another. A good read. Interesting vignettes and slices of different peoples stories used to illustrate points, ideas and interactions between people with conscience and people without. It also discusses other culture's and religions takes on sociopaths.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      The author makes a good point in that the public tends to assume that psychopaths are only the superbad guys: murderers, rapists, or drooling serial killers one sees on the nightly news. Most sociopaths/psychopaths are chameleons adept at hiding in plain sight. With a prevalence of 1 in 25, the odds are you know more than one. Could be a date, family member, neighbor, co-worker, student, teacher, doctor ... Think of the person that sets off your antennae, that you like least tho you might not be sure why, and - of all the people you know - you already avoid this particular person as much as possible. Odds are s/he's one. They look just like you and me. And their charm is legendary... til you cross them. Sooner rather than later you come to regret any interaction with them. The most important thing is learn how to spot them, avoid them when possible and protect yourself from them. They come in every age, race, creed, color and sex. The good news is that 96% of the world's population are good decent people so don't get all paranoid. Just educate yourself. Speaking from experience, you'll be glad you did. An excellent survival manual on how to spot, avoid or get unentangled from these initially charming but amoral predators. Life is good when you only allow good people be part of it.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 2/5
      I was expecting more information than white American xtian propaganda, where outsiders are bad and Americans are good. The author talks about foreigners sociopaths but conveniently forgets of African American lynching or the trail of tears where real people had been massacred but never been charged as genocide.
    • 3/5
      If you would like a good read to understand just what a sociopath is and how they think and operate, this would be a good read for you. It even offers suggestions for dealing with sociopaths in your own life.
    • 5/5
      These days, with the abundance of books, movies, and television programs available on demand for instant entertainment, our knowledge tends to be informed by popular culture rather. Because of this,our intake of the dramatic simplification of most topics is outweighed drastically by factual representation.With this in mind, it is no wonder that most of us envision dangerous people as wild-eyed lunatics noticeable a mile way, disheveled madmen that are encountered far and few between.As Martha Stout demonstrates in The Sociopath Next Door, there are people capable of unimaginable atrocities all around us, and not only do they appear like everyone else, but they might even be less conspicuous than one would hope.If Good and Evil are opposites of the same coin, and Good people are those who care and feel for others, then it stands to reason that evil exists as people lacking the ability to care or love. These people exist, cold and calculating sociopaths unfettered by the restrictions of guilt or conscious, and they do so in alarming numbers reaching epidemic proportions. 4% of the US population are afflicted with Sociopathic Personalities, far greater than those afflicted with cancer. Meaning one out of every twenty-five people you meet feel no remorse or regret, and are capable of anything.Martha Stout's book strikes an elegant balance between clinical facts and anecdotal examples, making this book an easy read that manages not to come off as either a fluffy fear-mongering diatribe or a stuffy jargon-laden medical tome. The examples created from personal case studies perfectly illustrate the points of each chapter, but don't detract from the factual or philosophical topics discussed.Despite chapters warning of the realities of the sociopaths among us, such as their alarming ability to blend in and even charm us into their confidence, her tone never reaches an alarmist level. This is a book that informs and prepares, with instilling false hope or blind panic in its audience. Also, while this topic is heavy with emotion, Stout never descends into supermarket tabloid prose. Apart from a slight detour into 9/11, which almost has no bearing on the topic at hand, the examination of the origins and ramifications of the human conscious remain informative and exploratory without becoming preachy. Especially interesting is the chapter that delves into the nature vs. nurture debate, in which she examines the genetic, environmental, and cultural influences that can help create or subdue a growing child's sociopathic tendencies.If you have ever witnessed someone behaving extraordinarily ruthlessly or cruelly, and have wondered how someone could even bring themselves to act in such a manner, this book will go a long way towards satisfying your curiosity.
    • 5/5
      5 Stars for Subject matter; authority of research and quality of writing; and the narrator — she was great.
    • 4/5
      The sociopaths who come to public attention are often violent criminals, but sociopaths are 4% of the population overall, and most of them aren't violent criminals.

      That doesn't mean that they're nice or even non-harmful people to be around. Or that you're not likely to meet any. 4% of the population means roughly one in every twenty-five people you know will be a sociopath. They'll all be equally ruthless in pursuing what they want, but sociopaths differ as much in goals, drives, and intelligence as anyone else. They don't all want to be dictator of small nations, or captains of industry. Stout talks about the sociopaths we're likely to meet in our everyday lives, how we can recognize them, and how to defend ourselves.

      She does this in part by looking at anonymized cases of real sociopaths whose behavior mostly didn't, or at least hadn't yet at the time of writing, landed them in jail. In their single-minded pursuit of what they want for themselves--desires as different as business success and the money it brings, or the ability to lounge by a pool with no effort expended--they do enormous damage to the people around them, with complete indifference. The people that in theory they should care about the most wind up feeling guilty because they think they're the ones responsible for any failures in the relationshipsame.

      The other part of explaining what's going on with sociopaths is talking about what we've learned about the development of conscience and moral reasoning. Even in healthy, normal people, cultures and individuals develop moral reasoning in different ways, along different paths. Despite these differences, there are similarities and commonalities too, and we learn to negotiate our different ways of understanding.

      And then there are the people who don't have those emotional connections and shared moral reasoning, and don't have consciences. Decisions that are hard to most of us are easy to sociopaths, because there's nothing nudging them to think about how these choices will affect other people,

      Stout tells a compelling and readily understood story. Recommended.

      I bought this audiobook.
    • 4/5
      I was hoping for more individual stories rather than just an expanded treatise on sociopaths. Still an interesting read though
    • 3/5
      I now think everyone is a sociopath... Thanks! Just kidding.
    • 4/5
      Fascinating and frightening, this book dredged up a lot of the people have known and some that I still associate with. With the information in this book, much of it presented as anecdotes and stories about people and situations, I’ve made some armchair diagnoses and decided that one of the people I work with is a sociopath. I think I even dated one. The funny thing is that while not knowing their clinical illnesses, I was able to elude (and confront) the second one I met, but fell prey to the first. Those intervening years must have done something to hone my ability to sniff out bullshit and to grow spine enough to call them on it. I guess that first one was a training sociopath for me.I liked the style of the writing; clinical but not dry and very anecdotal. Some of the people described are or were her patients, others are from less direct sources, but all of the vignettes were fascinating and helped build the picture of each kind of sociopath quite effectively. Much more effectively than a list of traits and the forms those traits might take. Even more effective was the drawing of emotion from the reader. By having this inside/outside view of an operating sociopath, we can clearly see how the rest of us are manipulated, used and severely marginalized by sociopaths. Having been on the receiving end of this at least once, it made me feel small and stupid, but yet not alone. Later when I confronted my second known (to me anyway) sociopath, I was much better at dealing with her than the first one. I still didn’t know what she was, but I knew very well what she was trying to do and I watched her use and abuse others for years (some people really are blind to a sociopath’s methods). I work with her still and she’s still the same. Luckily, I can warn others of her now and by relating certain events of the last 14 years, my hearers put stock in my tales and stay safely away. Another bit of luck is that her outward rude and anti-social behavior is making its own reputation and not exactly making fans.At its heart, this book talks about conscience and the role it plays in our lives. How despite the surface appearance of selflessness and common-good as running counter to self-interest, conscience is actually an evolutionary adaptation to select for success. Considering that most sociopaths end their lives (most shorter than the rest of us) violently and/or alone, I think I would always vote for having a conscience. It is really the glue that holds society together. The lack of it forces people to cover themselves in the outward appearance of normality. They have friends, spouses and children, but in a sociopath’s eyes these people are only commodities that serve them. When they outlive their usefulness, the sociopath discards them without a second thought. Even for me, a borderline misanthrope, it’s chilling to think of how some people are wired to only think of themselves and what they can gain. When I first started listening to this one, I wondered if I had a touch of sociopathy. My ability to not care about certain things or not be affected by others is great. However, I don’t view people as objects to manipulate for my own benefit. I wouldn’t and haven’t gone out of my way to destroy someone simply because I could. Beyond the occasional dark fantasy brought on by a horrible deed done to me, I’ve never wanted to ruin someone’s life. Sociopaths do it all the time.At least some of them do. Another display of symptoms might be the average, unemployed loser who freeloads from friends and relatives until he’s kicked out. These are the men (or women, but usually men) who you always are shocked to find out that she’s with him. It’s passive-aggressive sociopathy. They fake being depressed to gain pity and an excuse for not working. They coast along with as little effort as possible. By playing on the conscience of others, they live out their perfect world of no responsibility and no duty. I can see how it would be difficult to tell the sociopath from the schizophrenic under these circumstances.The clinical symptoms of sociopathy are wide and deep and I learned that the term is pretty much interchangeable with psycopathy. Both define people with lack of conscience. This writer did not use them interchangeably, but did say that a percentage of the sociopath population is violent, just as a segment of non-sociopathic society is violent. Psychotic I think is different though – online sources say that these people also suffer from delusions and hallucinations borne of mental illness. Sociopaths do not.The advice the writer gives is to recognize and remove these people from our lives. To distance ourselves as much as possible from their influence or control. To spot them early in a romance, a job, a project or a family. She encourages people to go against the flow if someone (be it a community leader or just a co-worker) appears to be acting contrary to your conscience. Good advice, but oh so hard to do. We have to go against our conditioning to be conciliatory or polite. We have to stand out from the crowd and risk being unpopular or shunned. But sometimes, we can be vindicated when the predator is unmasked and the prey set free.
    • 3/5
      I picked up this book simply because of everything you see on the news these days. I wanted to read about what would push someone to do some of the things we see. After getting into the book I was really surprised to realize that sociopaths are not all criminals and evil-looking. They look like everyone else and most of the time are not confronted about their actions. It's scary to think that 4% of the population do not have any conscience. This was a great read and I would recommend it to anyone seeking info on this topic
    • 1/5
      Limited social view of the author limited the scientific credibility of its conclusions. Sad.
    • 4/5
      The title caught my attention because at the time I really did believe we had a sociopath living next door.

      Reading this book is like the adult equivalent of reading The Witches by Roald Dahl, in which you can very easily end up thinking you're surrounded by them, and end up reflecting on a few dodgy interactions from your past, convinced you've been in contact with a real, live sociopath. I remember being six years old and wondering if my own teacher were a witch. I watched her very carefully for evidence, but concluded no, since she never wore gloves. Thank goodness for that. This book can induce the same kind of thoughts as you wonder who in your life is among the four percent.

      Repeat to self: I am not a psychologist. I am not a psychologist. Reading a pop-psychology book does not make me a psychologist.

      Nevertheless, this is a fascinating book about human psyche, and if you loved The Witches as a kid you may well feel that same frisson of excitement reading The Sociopath Next Door as an adult, regardless of its merits, its accuracy or the research behind it, of which I know absolutely nothing.

    • 4/5
      Interesting look at the 4% of the population considered "sociopathic".

      The author shares (de-identified) stories from her long psychology practice. She gives a good working definition of sociopath as a person with no conscience.

      The book ends on a very hopeful note, with a description of people who are on the opposite end of the scale: moral exemplars who allow their conscience to drive their behavior.
    • 5/5
      After reading The Sociopath Next Door it just confirmed to me what I already knew about one of my brothers, that he is a sociopath without a conscience. From childhood he was a pathological liar, he lied for no reason whatsoever. He was always a crowd pleaser, people warmed to him and he is very manipulative.He conned me $9000.00 in a business deal and calmly told me "Do what you have to do" when I threatened to sue him. The good thing is, most of the advice this book offered regarding how to deal with sociopaths I already apply to my brother. I make sure and have limited contact with him and keep him a safe distance away from my family and I.This book also offered some helpful tips for identifying sociopaths which should come in handy because I do believe there are a few at the bank I am working at.
    • 4/5
      A well-written non-fiction text on sociopaths. The 13 techniques on how to protect yourself from a superficially charming but dangerous "sociopath next door" is excellent, and the rest of the text is a good balance between scientific research and subjective analysis, which makes it easy to read. At times I felt the example used were a bit dramatic, but the author did state upfront that to protect privacy of her clients and to make for easier reading the sociopaths she used as examples were more composites than any one person. Overall, this was a minor point and the book was informative, compassionate and encouraged readers to continue to believe in the good of a conscience, even when those without a conscience appear to be "winners." An interesting read
    • 3/5
      A brief observation of the 4% of Americans who are sociopaths. Interesting case studies, and suggestions on how to recognize and avoid a sociopath.
    • 4/5
      I give the book 4 stars primarily because it does what great books do; it makes you think. I also give the book credit for giving good advice as to how to recognize a sociopath, and what to do if you discover one in your life. However, I found myself disagreeing with Stout often throughout the book. She's the ph.d and psychologist with expertise in the field, but I think it's too simplistic to think that most people have a conscience but 4% have none. First of all, she never explains how she came up with the figure 4%. Secondly, it seems likely to me that conscience exists on a spectrum. Some people have more, some less; and a person's conscience waxes and wanes not only according to the person, but according to the situation. For example, good, thoughtful, caring people sometimes exhibit uncaring behavior toward other people when they are driving that they would never demonstrate if they were interacting with the other person face-to-face. But as I said, the book makes you think; and that's my favorite thing for a book to do.
    • 4/5
      3.75 starsThere are apparently more sociopaths among us than one would like to think (1 in 25 or 4% of the population). They aren't all serial killers, so you may not even realize they are there. In this book, the author (a psychologist) explains what a sociopath is (basically, someone who doesn't have a conscience and who doesn't feel), and uses case studies to help illustrate. Mostly, I found it very interesting (one really interesting thing I learned: culture/society may play a role in “creating” sociopaths), but there were a few tangents that kind of lost my interest (like the last chapter, that focused on various religions).