So see the perpetrator puts you into this position  where you and I have a trust relationship. I'm  

going to do something wrong to you and if you  leave that or tell people that breaks our trust.  

You see how that works? It's pretty powerful for  sure. It can look so pro-social and masked is  

so positive, but underlying the the reason that  they're there is is not for what they're saying  

or what they're acting like or what. And that's  why you'll see these cases where they're like,  

"Well, we had no idea. He, you know, he seemed  like he was just a nice guy looking out for  

this person or looking out for this kid or  he seemed like a a grandfather figure when  

the kid doesn't have any grandkids." I mean,  yeah, they're they're very good at masking  

it and and using sort of pro-social means  to keep themselves in that position where  

they can have control over the victim. So,  there's an intensity of the involvement. Yes,  

it doesn't typically happen in most interpersonal  situations because it is a breaking them down.  

Someone can be nice to you, that doesn't  mean they're trying to perpetrate on you,  

right? But when they're nice to you for  3 hours straight, that's a little weird.

Dr. Jeff Kieliszewski, you are a forensic  psychologist. What does a day in the life of  

a forensic psychologist look like? So forensic  psychology is the application of psychological  

science to legal issues. So I work a lot with  the courts. I'm a PhD doctoral level licensed  

psychologist who went further on in my training  and specialized in forensics. So if you you use  

that definition that forensic psychology is  application of psychological science to legal  

system. I work in courts and I do I do criminal  forensics which I'll do typically do evaluations  

for competency to stand trial, insanity, um  sometimes evaluations for pre-sentencing,  

for example, sex offenders, uh sex offender  risk assessments for pre-sentencing. Uh also  

I do some family law where I might be involved  evaluating parents who are litigating custody and  

parenting time over children. I do a little bit  of neglect and abuse. If someone's children are  

placed in foster care due to um neglect and abuse  allegations that are substantiated, they'll need a  

psychological evaluation in order as part of the  treatment plan to reunify with their children.  

I do some disability work that's a legal issue  as well. So, if people have applied for certain  

types of disability, I do some probate law, which  is guardianship. If someone needs a guardianship,  

I'll do a little bit of uh civil litigation of  lawsuits and things like that. I do a fair amount  

of consulting. So, a typical day for me can vary  quite a bit. So,am, for example, I might come in  

on a typical day, look at my schedule. In the  morning, I have a juvenile competency to stand  

trial evaluation that takes a couple of hours. And  then I may have someone who was referred through  

uh a child protective services agency because  their child was removed. Uh and then I might  

have a two-hour block in my schedule where I'm  consulting on a on a lawsuit. And then uh you  

know later in the day I might have to go out to  a jail to evaluate someone for lack of criminal  

responsibility or insanity. And then there may  be days where I'm called to testify in court.  

Uh so it can vary quite a bit. Um over the years  there are certain things I um sort of change my  

interest and start doing more of and then I can  back off on others. So that would be a typical  

day for a forensic psychologist. If you practice  is primarily forensic, you you know you typically  

have to work in a lot of different um different  types of law and different courts to really build  

a full practice with that. And Dr. Jeeoff, you  mentioned a sex offender risk assessment. What  

is that assessment? Right. So many times um the  courts if a plea bargain is made, for example,  

someone is plead guilty to a sex offense,  the court will want a forensic psychological  

evaluation to determine the person's risk for  reoffending. And a lot of times a court will  

utilize that in the sentencing. Now it varies  quite a bit by jurisdiction here in well in the  

US and it can even vary county by county. Some  prosecutors like to use it, some don't. Um for  

example, in Canada, uh pretty much anyone who gets  convicted of a sex offense is going to have to go  

through a forensic u risk assessment to offend.  And these assessments are pretty technical,  

uh pretty complicated. There's a variety of  factors that you look at. There are actuarial  

models that you apply in order to determine risk  and then advise the court of the risk and then the  

court can make a sentence based on that. And and  that is risk of what exactly of reoffending? Risk  

for reoffending. The idea would be that if someone  is a high risk to reaffend, they would likely get  

a higher sentence to keep them incarcerated  longer, to keep the public safer longer.  

If someone has a lower risk to offend uh that  that person could theoretically just be managed  

in the community. I can give you an example. When  you look at the research on people who are called  

exclusive exclusive pedophiles, that means they  meet the criteria for pedophilia. They have a  

sexual interest in children and only children.  Um they tend to have a higher risk to reoffend.  

On the other end of the spectrum, you will  have these folks that expose themselves and  

get busted for illegal for a decent exposure.  When you look at the research on those folks,  

that's actually very treatable. Most people don't  realize that. So the idea would be and this is  

particularly the Canadian I practice here in  the US and Michigan, but in the Canadian system,  

their whole idea is we want to make better use of  taxpayer dollars. So from a research perspective,  

if I see someone who's been caught exposing  themselves, I know that's something that's very  

treatable. And with treatment, there's a low risk  to offend. So it makes sense that the courts would  

likely want to manage that person in the community  so they could work go to their specialized  

treatment, their counseling, and they would  likely be a lower risk to reoffend. And you know,  

bottom line is, why would you want to incarcerate  that person for thousands of dollars a month when  

they can be managed in the community? So, I've  always pushed that it makes fiscal sense to do  

these types of valuations, but some prosecutors  have no interest in it and they just want to  

throw the book at everyone regardless of the  type of offense or the level of potential risk.  

So your risk assessment is is breaking down sort  of category categories and then determining risk  

from those categories. Are there other factors  as well? Yeah, there's a lot of factors. So one  

of them is the type of offense and um you know  again if you have a diagnosis of pedophilia that  

in the research you have to base everything on  the science and the research that will bump you  

up in your risk. Um but so you look at there are  all kinds of variables that you look at and then  

the actuarial models. If you think of an actuarial  model, insurance companies use actuarial models.  

They put all these variables into an equation and  try to determine your risk, the age of the driver,  

right? Anyone who's a teenagers, they know if  you have a teenage driver on your insurance,  

your insurance goes up. Well, they use actuarials  in in risk assessment of sex offenders.  

Some great studies came out 25 years ago and you  know they update these but you look at certain it  

could be age of victim can be a risk factor age of  offender uh if offender has had previous criminal  

convictions for violence that increases risk. Um  then you actually do during the evaluation you do  

a sexuality history and you look at if there are  any sort of problematic sexual behaviors or even  

problematic behav um sexual appetites that have  developed in this person's along their development  

of their sexuality because these can be additional  factors that could up the risk. So it's pretty  

complicated. There's a whole set of factors  that actuarial based whole set of factors that  

um there are things called dynamic versus static  factors. Dynamic factors change if the person has  

a substance abuse disorder that would actually  an active substance abuse disorder that would  

actually increase their um risk to offend. Um,  so you have to look at all these factors to come  

up with an opinion of their risk to reoffend  and a potential rehabilitation program if one  

um if one would would actually work uh and  you advise the court on that and they make  

their decision about the sentence. And Dr. Jeff,  we've talked about one of the categories. What  

are those categories? Uh categories of offender.  Yes. Right. So, actually on my YouTube channel,  

uh, I have a a video that's called type of sex  offenders. I put it out probably five years ago  

and it's probably has 200,000 hits now where I  go through all that in detail. There's a lot of  

different types of offenders. You have people  who offend children prepubescent. Those are  

pedophiles. They meet the criteria for pedophilia.  You may have um pedophile, same-sex offender,  

pedophile, opposite sex offender of the the victim  is opposite sex. All those load into different  

um risk weights, you could say. You may have  someone who has offended against a a teenager  

and under, you know, someone under the age of  consent. You may have incest versus non incest.  

uh you may have stepchild offending um versus  biological child offending and then you can  

move into adult on adult sex crimes. There are um  folks who um you know you hear the term rapist.  

Um there can be different types of sexual assault.  There can be violent sexual assault. There can be  

restraints used. There can be um um for example  someone gives someone a rupee or drugs them and  

sexually assaults them. There could be date what  we used to what we call date rape situations.  

All of these factors are taken into account and  you can talk about a type of offender but u not  

every offender is the same for so for example  you could have a certain type of offender but  

there are all these other um static and dynamic  risk factors that you also have to put into the  

equation in order to make a determination of risk.  I I hope I answered your question. Yeah. Yeah. And  

I've heard you speak about grooming and how that  works. Um before we get into exactly how it works,  

are there particular types of offenders  that are more likely to use grooming? Oh,  

that's a great question. Um I'm not  sure about the research on that. M  

uh I will tell you grooming is is typically most  of the time part of the scenario for sure unless  

it's stranger violent sexual assault. There's no  grooming there obviously but but a lot of the sex  

offenders I see grooming is definitely an aspect  of it. Yeah. Yeah. It seems that some people get  

the idea it's only with children and and yet from  from what I've heard it seems that it can be it  

can be used by adults and adults and in all kinds  of environments. Oh, absolutely. You know, there's  

a body of research and the laws have changed over  you know I've been doing this a long time and I  

I remember when a lot of these laws weren't in  existence where for example clergy in some states  

if clergy have sexual relationship with people  in their congregation it's considered sex abuse.  

um if teachers, college professors, um if  you're in a position of power over someone,  

well, if you're a therapist or a psychologist and  you have a sexual relationship um with a patient,  

that's considered sexual abuse in most if  not all states. Now, uh typically that will  

involve a process of grooming for sure. Um and  you know again we can get into the definition  

of grooming but um yeah what what what is that?  Yeah. So definition the definition of grooming  

basically is um a bit of a systematic approach and  aligning or getting close to the alleged victim.  

It it usually uh starts out as um kind of being a  support um developing a friendship and then what  

happens is there'll be kind of small boundary  violations that occur. And if the perpetrator  

gets along gets away with these small boundary  violations, then they can move into actually um  

um victimizing the person. And then they tend to  sort of wrap that up with this idea that um this  

is a secret. This is something special between the  victim and the perpetrator. Um so they shouldn't  

share that or tell anyone about that. It's a  it's a whole psychological process which really  

is based on sort of um manipulating someone's  vulnerabilities um into developing what the victim  

sees as a close relationship. But the reality is  is they're just being used and victimized. Yeah.  

With adults or with kids for sure. Yeah. And I  think our listeners will will be interested in  

in understanding that manipulation and how to how  to spot it and defend against it and things. You  

have an excellent video that really breaks this  down. And my notes um you have different phases  

that you talk about or steps rather. Um so they'  be targeting, gaining access, trust development,  

desensitization, and maintaining control. Could  we start with targeting? Yeah. Yeah. So, targeting  

will be that um a perpetrator will typically  look for what could what what person could be  

more more vulnerable to being abused. The classic  example that we we would see and see many times  

is the child of a single mother. It's sort of a  stereotyped example of they don't have a dad. this  

person's gonna step in and be a father figure.  And typically, they're not even old enough to be  

the father. For example, um the classic case is  um uh the guy who coaches youth sports teams and  

I've seen a million of these cases and I remember  before I became a psychologist in my hometown,  

I was an athlete and I saw some of the stuff that  and it turned out that there was abuse occurring.  

So, you pick out the target um and the class. I'm  sort of these are sort of stereotyped examples,  

but I've just seen them repeatedly. Help the mom  out. Oh, I'll pick the boy up from school. Uh oh,  

you know, if you're going to go out with your  girlfriends, why don't you have him stay at  

my house? So, you they pick out a victim. Yeah.  Yeah. I I know a woman who when she was a child,  

she went through this and the way it happened was  she was in foster care and then um a guy with a  

two seat car came into the life of the woman who  was sort of babysitting her and uh you know he  

would take this this woman then girl um in his two  seat car to places because there just wouldn't be  

enough room for other people to ride with him and  that was how he began to isolate her. Right. Well,  

yeah, that's a great point. Isolate her. So  yeah, again, part of the grooming process is is  

um the the perpetrator says this is you and I  together and it's a special time. You know, if  

a kid's vulnerable, they don't have two parents or  there's some problems in the house. Um you know,  

I'll take I'll take you away from this. You  know, let's go out to McDonald's. Let's go  

get you some candy. I mean, that's the way it  starts. So, we're kind of um moving between  

steps here. We've talked about targeting and now  we're talking about gaining access. Yeah. What  

else might gaining access look like? uh getting  access is u so you'll often see this and again  

we're using the example of a kid where um the  perpetrator will always be available to help  

um the perpetrator I've seen cases where the  perpetrator is been signed on at the school that  

they can pick the child up at school um another  way to gain access is um taking on an advocation  

or um an an advocation where you have access to  children. Um in fact, I did my dissertation on  

sex offenders of children that were incarcerated  and one of the variables I looked at was do they  

have an avocation? Are they a coach? Uh do they  volunteer at the church? seen a lot of cases where  

perpetrators will volunteer at churches in order  to have access to victim and that's how they gain  

that access and they gain a a level of trust as  well because they're affiliated with the church.  

Yeah. So so when you say an advocation that's  that's some sort of role that um that lends itself  

to a certain authority. Well, well, it can lend  to a certain authority, but what it mainly does  

is it allows you access to potential victims and  and someone who's who's looking for targets would  

would volunteer to take on this and and step right  into it and not need a compensation or anything  

like that. Very common. You know, the the the  stereotype about the scout master. I mean I mean,  

how many cases have been in the media of that over  decades? Um, that'd be an that'd be an example.  

And what I'm learning from speaking to you is  that we can talk about this in steps, but really  

they're all running together because the next one  is trust development. But how much trust would you  

have of somebody in that role already? But what  what else can can be done to develop trust? Well,  

trust development um you know really it can really  based on well I can depend on the perpetrator um  

to help me out. So for example, to get trust with  the parents, to get trust with the child. Another  

way they'll do this is um sort of be the listening  ear for the child. You can tell me whatever you  

want. You you can tell me things about your mom.  That's fine. It we'll just it'll just stay between  

you and I. You know, you can trust me. They'll say  that you can trust me. Again, having a position,  

an avocation that gives you trust right away, that  helps that process along too. But they'll really  

develop that, you know, I'm a trustworthy person  that you can depend on to the victim and to,  

for example, a parent. Yeah. Yeah. And and we're  talking about this in children. I' I've seen this  

in adults, too. Absolutely. And you know, one  guy who I've seen, he would he would tell people  

things, you know, people would start to confide  in him and then they'd say, "But, you know,  

don't tell anybody." Or, you know, something like  that. He would say, "Don't worry. I I used to be  

in the Air Force. I handle top secret information.  I'm I'm already compartmentalizing and and really  

reassure them you can trust me. And that was  one of his lines, right? Because what that  

trust sets up is once the victim understands  that boundaries are being violated. Now,  

in order to to report that or in order to leave  that situation, now you're breaking the trust. So,  

see, the perpetrator puts you into this position  where you and I have a trust relationship.  

I'm going to do something wrong to you. And  if you leave that or tell people that breaks  

our trust. You see how that works. I mean, um,  it's pretty powerful for sure. Yeah. Dr. Jeff,  

the next step would be desensitization. Yeah. So,  that's part of that that um boundary violations.  

And so for example, the perpetrator would um first  violate boundaries that seem kind of benign, touch  

the person more than they would than they normally  would. Could be, you know, touching their arm, you  

know, put their arm around them, then it's arm on  the small of the back. So these minor violations.  

The other one would be um verbal discussions.  You see this a lot particularly on the online  

perpetration. Um, you know, somebody's talking to  a a pre-teen girl online and they ask, "Well, have  

you had experience doing this or that yet?" Grown  men shouldn't be asking 13-year-old girls what  

they've done sexually. But they they they already  have this trust and then they do that small  

boundary violation and then it gets bigger and  bigger. Um and and to the point where they move it  

into sexual behavior. Yeah. And then the the fifth  step would be maintaining control. That would  

Yeah. That we've already talked a little bit about  that. It's this idea that the perpetrator often  

builds that what we have is kind of um secret  and and and special and we just need to keep  

it between us. And then what you'll see is you'll  see this kind of manipulation where and sometimes  

the perpetrator could be kind of possessive of  the person. You know they once the the the the  

um the perpetration has happened then they need  to protect that right and how do you protect that?  

you know, one way you can isolate for sure,  particularly the adults. You'll see that where  

they'll isolate people from their support system  in order to continue the abuse. Um, so yeah,  

then they that's when the perpetrator um really  has to work to try to keep this all under wraps.  

And there's a variety of ways based on whatever  type of situation is, whether it's an adult,  

whether it's a child, whether it's a small child,  whether it's a teenage child. Um they they have to  

maintain that. Um I saw uh a substitute teacher  that was abusing pre-teens. This guy would never  

take a day off. Um he would show up and then he  would show up at all the kids extracurriculars all  

the time. He was always there. And let's say one  of the victims is at an extracurricular activity  

away from the perpetrator. And boom, there's the  perpetrator. And now all those feelings that the  

alleged victim had, I trust this person, but  they're doing this to me. I know it's wrong,  

but um you know, I really like this person.  They really help me. So it brings in all those  

emotions. So the more they can make contact. So  that's an interesting technique that I've seen of  

these perpetrators. They're they're there all the  time. Yeah. They have to be there all the time to  

keep that control because you're sort of keeping  the victim in an emotional state where they're  

not likely to disclose or or to separate from  the abuse. Right. And keeping keeping all the  

attention to on that that person who's trying to  to maintain control of them. Right. Right. I mean,  

it's a subtle way to control. They show  up on the weekends that want to, oh, look,  

your teacher's here. Oh, that's so nice. They're  not there for a nice reason. Yeah. I've spoken  

with a woman on the show, Dr. Karen Mitchell.  She's from Australia, and she's done a lot of  

research on how these things work mostly in  adults, I think, and she points out how the  

the main maintaining control tactics can be done  in ways that look very pro-social. So, it can be,  

you know, I'm protecting someone or, you know, if  it's um you know, if it's a a man abusing his wife  

or something, oh, she's really sick and you know,  I just I wouldn't want her to to be stressed out  

by being around you or something like that. And  that's how he ends up isolating his wife from her  

friends, family, whomever. It's it can be masked  as so positive. Oh, it and it's so subtle, too.  

Yeah. Like you said, it can look so pro-social  and masked is so positive, but underlying the  

the reason that they're there is is not for  what they're saying or what they're acting like  

or what. And that's why you'll see these cases  where they're like, "Well, we had no idea. He,  

you know, he seemed like he was just a nice guy  looking out for this person or looking out for  

this kid or he seemed like a a grandfather figure  when the kid doesn't have any grandkids." I mean,  

yeah, they're they're very good at masking  it and and using sort of pro-social means to  

keep themselves in that position where they can  have control over the victim. Yeah. Dr. Jeeoff,  

the the best example that I've seen in my  experience was a guy who had also trained as  

what's called a pickup artist. Are you familiar  with this? A little bit. Yeah. Yeah. You know,  

it's these it's these guys who they get many  many repetitions at approaching women. You know,  

they might live in a tourist town or something  where they can there is a new set coming through  

all the time and then they're always Yeah. getting  all these reps and approaching them and trying to  

very quickly um escalate a relationship and and  things like that. And I I see so many similarities  

here. I wonder um you know if you if you think  about the differences between someone who's  

aggressively dating and aggressively approaching  women um and these sort of um these situations  

that we've been talking about. Yeah. I mean what  we're really talking about here is interpersonal  

manipulation. Mhm. Uh, and the pickup artist guy,  I know who you're talking about. And you know,  

they tend to be real aggressive. Um, well,  they don't care if they strike out. Um,  

but what they do is every once in a while they'll  find someone that that connects with. Yeah. And  

then they exploit that connection in order  to to use the person basically. Yeah. So,  

it's interpersonal manipulation 101. Um, a pickup  artist versus um someone grooming it. It's all  

about finding the person in the situation that  you can manipulate in order to use the person  

for whatever means you want. And it seems that  having um for lack of a better term sort of a  

pipeline is is very valuable to you know if  you're if you're someone who is say the the  

school teacher then you're you're around lots of  children. for for this guy who I'm thinking of  

the the pickup artist type. He's he sets up events  that that look very positive and pro-social again,  

but he's really using them to filter um and  to find who is that vulnerable person who  

he can target next. Um what can we look for  in in the social environment to know what's  

a great place to just be with people and what's  a place where people are funneling for targets?

This sounds like a simplistic  answer, but the reality is

Trust your intuition. If something seems weird,  it's probably weird. And if someone says, "Oh, no,  

no, the person who's trying to manipulate you."  Oh, no, no, this isn't weird. It is weird. Um,  

and trust your intuition. A lot of  people don't trust their intuition.  

takes some level of confidence to trust your  intuition um in the in the in the perpetration  

on kids. I think it's better now than it was, you  know, decades ago. Common sense. 35year-old single  

guys typically aren't super interested in hanging  out with nine and 10 year old boys all the time.

you know, unless it's well, their  own kids or nephews, for example,  

they're typically not that interested. I love  kids, but if it feels weird and looks weird,  

there's something probably weird going on there.  Not saying the person is perpetrating, but  

um I've seen lots of um situations where it never  got to the perpetration because the parents said,  

"No, this is weird. You're not going to  spend the night at your coach's house,  

just you and him or you and him and another  boy." I just seen dozens of cases like that. So,  

trust your intuition. If you're an adult and  you're at one of these events and it seems sort  

of too good to be true and it feels weird, trust  your intuition. Um, you might feel like you look  

pretty good and you're desirable, but are you that  desirable that this guy comes across the room,  

bypasses 10 people, and comes right to you? That's  not typically the way social interaction occurs.  

particularly it's going to move on to a romantic  or intimate level. Yeah. So if it feels weird,  

it's probably weird. So it sounds simplistic, but  I think there's a lot of power in that. I agree so  

much. That too good to be true thing. Um really  resonates with me. You know, the guy who I'm  

thinking of, I've I've seen him just he's he's  got a skill set and he's a teacher in a lot of  

ways. And so he'll just meet a stranger and give  them three hours of his time. Um it just seems  

too good to be true. Why would he want to spend 3  hours teaching me? Because he's really using that  

time to break them down to to give them criticism  and then praise so that they become rewarded by  

him so that he can put them into group chats and  things so that then he he has this social proof,  

you know, and he's he's giving them constant  messaging in the group chats so they're always  

seeing him, being aware of him. He's always  on their mind. It's it's too good to be true  

and it's really a funnel more than anything is  what it seems. You bring up a really good point,  

Brad, when you use the term break them down. So,  there's an intensity of the involvement. Yes. That  

doesn't typically happen in most interpersonal  situations because it is a breaking them down. So,  

someone can be nice to you, that doesn't mean  they're trying to perpetrate on you, right? But  

when they're nice to you for three hours straight,  that's a little weird. Again, that intuition,  

right? If someone hits on you, but they're hitting  on you for four hours or they text you 30 times  

in a day, that's a little weird. Trust your  your your um your inhibition. I mean, your um  

your intuition for sure. Yeah. Don't trust your  inhibition. Trust your intuition. Right. Yeah.  

It's so tricky because, you know, like you said,  things are subtle and there are so many layers.  

So what I've seen too is that this guy is looking  for personalities who are amendable to ideas like  

fate and then he can we can warm them up as though  it's their idea like oh it's fate that we met. We  

have so much in common. You know we we we went  to this place when we were younger. We both now  

live in this city. Isn't this amazing? And so  people who are amendable to these ideas of oh  

yeah it's it's the universe bringing us together  then they want to get caught up in the story too.  

And also it puts you in the position of the  old saying, a leap of faith. Well, okay,  

it's kind of weird what this guy did. And uh I  noticed the way he's looking at me sometimes,  

but you know what? There it's fate. We kind  of met. There must be a reason, right? So,  

I'll take this leap of faith and um you know, go  out on his boat. Yeah. Right. Does he have a boat?  

This guy. He might boat or the hot tub? That's  another sort of good isolation tool. A tool that's  

used quite a bit for um Yeah. perpetrating.  Yeah. Yeah. The the guy who I'm thinking of,  

it's funny. He's he's not so much looking for, you  know, fast sex. It's it's control of people that  

he really wants. And so he's he's building a set  of people to control. And that's another thing,  

too, is that he can have a reputation in advance  because eventually, much like a cult, he can turn  

people into deployable assets on his behalf, send  those people to warm up a target. And so by the  

time he gets to them, he already has this aura,  this reputation, and then he can play on that.  

It doesn't seem too good to be true. It's, oh, of  course, this is who he is. I've heard about this  

from others. That Well, that's what Epstein did.  Mhm. Yes. Um I think um yeah, if you looked at I  

had a YouTube video on I I was involved in um the  Epstein story uh before he even got charged in in  

federal court. Um I was u hired to do to work on  a um a docu series. It eventually became Netflix,  

Filthy Rich. And uh we had a lot of information  about him from a private investigator and from  

law enforcement before the federal charges when  he had state charges. And that's what he did.  

He had some victims and then he eventually was  able to deploy them to bring in more victims.  

So some of his early victims actually would  befriend other girls at malls and things like  

that and say, "Hey, I know this rich guy and if  you need some help, he'd be more than willing to  

help you out. He's a really nice guy." And so he  was able to deploy the girls that he was abusing  

uh in order to go out into the community and  and find other victims. So that's pretty common  

technique. Yes. And it it seems to to work so well  because we we want to trust people who are like  

ourselves. We want to believe if there's a crowd  that it, you know, around someone that the crowd  

can't all be wrong, right? Oh, yeah. Oh, there's  a bunch of social psychology going on there. It's  

dissipation of responsibility. Um, and if I'm  in a crowd and I'll just go along with the crowd  

rather than sort of stand up for myself. Right.  So, Dr. Chef, when you are assessing people,  

what are you looking for um to make sure that  someone is is okay to go? We've talked about,  

you know, if they're a certain type, if they're  a certain risk factor, these actuarial tables.  

It also seems that perhaps you're looking  for people who might use interventions  

as ways to just better understand the game  and and further enhance their manipulation.

All right. So your your question is what do I  look at or what do I you know look at or examine  

when I see someone to evaluate someone about how  they use these games or I'm wondering what do you  

look for that might help you spot whether someone  is going to use an intervention to just enhance  

their manipulation skills. Oh I see what you're  saying to to basically set up a ploy. Yes. Um,  

well, right, a lot of times that fits in again  with the grooming. The intervention is a tool.  

Whatever intervention you'd like to use, that's  your tool for grooming. So, the intervention could  

be something as simple as, hey, I know that you're  busy working um, and if your kid needs a ride to  

school, I'm I can do that, right? or you know I  know you've been working hard and you know you can  

have him stay at my house Saturday night that's  fine get a break and yeah so the intervention is a  

tool for grooming and manipulating the person the  interventions that that people get when they're  

on their way out of the system I mean if if say  someone oh oh the treatment basically is being  

treated yes but I'm I'm I'm getting into the mind  of the extremely deceptive, extremely dangerous  

person. Yeah. And for them to go to some sort of  treatment would be an opportunity to learn the  

language, to learn the behaviors, and then to to  perhaps be more dangerous. Yes. Absolutely. So,  

I can give you a great example, please.  When you look at sex offender treatment,  

and I I was a I was a prison psychologist for  seven years before I went into private practice.  

So I used to actually have to do sex offender  treatment to people that were in prison.  

Part of the process was to do uh an assessment  of whether or not they would be amendable to  

treatment and you know the department of  corrections where I worked they had you  

know the the procedure and the paperwork but  and I was a new graduate so I was kind of up  

on the research and I read some great research on  how sex offenders who are psychopaths there's a  

great body research on how they will utilize  treatment in order to make them to make them  

sort of a more well-armed opponent. So there's uh  research about psychopaths going into treatment.  

Then they learn the language. They learn uh to  say what the mental health clinician what they  

think the mental health clinician wants to hear to  demonstrate some behaviors that would present that  

they are reformed. Okay. So, when I was working  um in the Department of Corrections and I had to  

do my screenings for the sex offender treatment  program, the only way to get parrolled was to  

get to successfully complete that program. And um  this was in Michigan where they had indeterminate  

sentences. So, you could come in on a 10 to 20  year sentence. That means you're going to do a  

minimum of 10 years, maximum of 20. So, you'd be  eligible for parole, you know, around 10 years.

What I did is I had training on with on um how  to assess for a psychopaths. It's called the  

psychopathy checklist by Robert Hair and it's  empirically validated. It's a great instrument.  

I went to a training. He gave the training. So, I  would do when I would see things in the file that  

would make me concerned that this individual was  a psychopath, I'd do the psychopathy checklist  

and they would get a score and then I would deny  them treatment and then they would appeal it and  

then I'd have to go in front of, you know,  the administration and I'd say, "Here's a  

psychopathy checklist score. here's a bunch of  research on how if we put him into treatment,  

it's going to make him more dangerous. There's  good research on it. And so I said, "So I'm not  

accepting him in my treatment because I don't  want to turn out someone who's more dangerous."  

Never lost an appeal, right? Because and then  I'd write it up that way too in the report.  

So that's so when when you find uh someone who  has psychopathy, they will utilize treatment  

interventions in order to become a more well-armed  opponent and it actually makes them more dangerous  

because most of these guys will be released. So  when it so I didn't want to be involved in an  

intervention that made someone more dangerous  and again that worked every time. Yeah. I'm  

curious about how that research would even work.  Would you would you assess a a sample of people,  

find who the psychopaths are, run them through  treatment, and then see who reaffends and who  

was is more sophisticated in the future?  Yeah. So, some of the earlier research um  

on the psychopathy checklist was done in the  prisons in in Canada and uh there's a bunch of  

great research on based on even that psychopathy  checklist score how likely they were to reoffend.  

But the idea behind they will utilize things  that's more of kind of a qualitative analysis  

of how so for example these guys with a high  psychopathy checklist score would come out and  

they do this treatment and they'd look great  on all the treatment. they could say what they  

were supposed to say to look good and they'd be in  treatment and the the the notes from the therapist  

on their progress in treatment like excellent.  Some of these guys would re would lead treatment  

groups within the treatment facility. Yeah. And  then uh then they'd get out and they'd reaffend.  

So what we found was is there is some research  that talks about uh the ones who successfully  

completed treatment and have higher and have  psychopathy were offending higher than the ones  

who didn't have treatment but had psychopathy if  that makes sense. Yes. So that's kind of evidence  

that did they get more confident in their ability  to offend after they knew all the language? Again,  

it was another tool that or technique that  they would be able to try to utilize. You know,  

they also I've seen cases where so these guys  would talk with the police and they would be able  

to talk in a way to try to convince the police  that it was a false allegation. And a lot of times  

the cops would run their history and say, "Oh,  they've been to prison for sex offending." Well,  

they're going to assume that something went on,  you know. So it sounds like the psychopath who who  

gets the treatment is basically getting an inside  look at what people are expecting and then can  

become a better actor. Right. There is also some  research on it's not psychopathy but antisocial  

personality disorder. Mhm. And like you said  you do a lot of stuff on personality disorders.  

Uh there's some research that that that talks  about how um these people um for just general  

regular mental health treatment, it actually it  actually makes them more likely to continue their  

antisocial ways because again they've learned the  language. They have a new tool in their toolbox  

on how to um act out and manipulate or cause  crimes in society. So, in the way that we're  

talking about this, it seems that the psychopath,  the person with antisocial personality disorder,  

they're they're actors. They're presenting a  front. You know, there's that great book, The  

Mask of Sanity. This idea that they they put up a  front, but there's something different behind it.  

Um, what is your definition of a psychopath? Well,  first of all, I'm really impressed. You know,  

the book, The Mask of Insanity. I spend a lot of  time on this stuff, Dr. Cleley. I think Cleley.  

Yes. very quickly. Yeah. Wow, that's impressive. I  haven't heard that in a while. Thanks. So, what's  

my definition of a psychopath? The best way to  describe a psychopath is um basically that these  

are people that do not have the same or typical  connection that most of us have. They don't have  

um typically an emotional response. um to humans.  So, give let me give you an example. People always  

talk about why can a a psychopath killer cut  a body up. For a psychopath killer, cutting a  

body up is like cutting their chicken sandwich in  half at lunch. There's no emotional connection. If  

most of us were tasked with dismembering a body,  it would probably make us upset. They don't have  

that. There were some great studies that came out  probably in the 70s where they uh tested people  

for psychopathy and then they put them in a little  movie theater and they would put words up on the  

screen that were typically emotionally laden words  and then you'd hear it. These would be things like  

um you know disparaging racial comments, you know,  racist stuff or violent stuff. We know we can test  

your brain and see when you have a physiological  response to certain words because what happens is  

that that that word goes into your brain, your  brain attaches an emotion to it and you have a  

physiological response. Psychopaths didn't have  that response and it freaked the experimenters  

out. They couldn't believe it. So they would  put them in a room, put up these words that  

would for most people elicit elicit an emotional  response. But you could be sitting back and go,  

"Oh, I yeah, I know that word. That doesn't  bother me." But your brain had a response.  

Psychopaths did not have the response. So  they don't have the emotional response to  

human beings the way that most people do. To  psychopaths, people are objects. Yeah. Again,  

how could a psychopath cut a body apart? It's  like cutting a piece of wood apart. They have  

no feelings or connection to that. They can fake  feelings, but they don't have the same connection,  

human connection that that non-csychopaths have.  It seems that the power to fake feelings is is  

really um the skill of a successful psychopath.  And I've heard things anecdotally that they seem  

to gravitate to things where they are sort of  performers um acting, dance, figure skating,  

these kind of things. um any evidence to  that or or what do you think of that? Oh,  

right. So, you know, just by presenting social  skills or faking uh empathy or faking emotion,  

um they can express emotion, they just don't have  at a biological level the feel for emotion that  

most of us have. So, by and again this becomes  social skills. So they can fake emotion. Uh and  

this helps them socially because most of us have  emotion. We express emotion. They express emotion.  

They don't feel it. They express it. And that  helps them socially. And it can help them to  

manipulate people as well. Yeah. And I mentioned  earlier the work of of Dr. Karen Mitchell.  

Something else that she found is is that because  they don't necessarily emote like the rest of us,  

sometimes it's mistaken for gravitas and we think,  "Oh, this this person is what an authority. He's  

so cool under pressure. And then it's it's one  more thing that actually makes them um effective  

at deceiving people. Oh, for sure. Uh yeah, a lot  of times folks who are psychopaths um others see  

them as calm, cool, collected. They're not calm,  cool, collected. There's just no emotion. M and  

this can absolutely be interpreted particular  if they're in a position of power can be um  

interpreted as um something that's positive about  them or a strength about about them when again  

they're people are interpreting their presentation  through the lens of the way most of us emote and  

think but psychopaths are different and then  another trouble with this is that if they're  

manipulating the people around them those people  can become um very upset and and eventually,  

you know, become stressed out, sick from the  manipulation and appear to be out of control. So  

then the psychopath looks good by comparison, too.  If you know, say a psychopathic husband is abusing  

his wife, she could look distraught, right, while  he looks chill. Oh, right. And that that's a great  

technique, too, right? Because if your victim  seems distraught or not mentally stable and you're  

now you're the stable one. Yes. Right. They're  not going to believe her. No, because you're the  

stable one. They're going to believe you. Yeah.  Again, and when you're viewing as a non-csychopath  

person, you're viewing it through that lens.  Um, and thinking this person's just calm, cool,  

collected, together, but they just don't have that  emotional their lens is very different than yours  

for sure. So, Dr. Jeeoff, if this is a lack of  emotional connection to people, what do you think  

makes for that lack of emotional connection in  the first place? There's a lot of controversy  

about that, right? Because we know we've when  we've studied psychopaths, some of them grew up  

with horrific abuse. So, the theory is, oh, they  just dissociated from human emotion. But a lot of  

them grew up in nurturing with nurturing parents  and regular typical households. My hunch, and  

there's no scientific certainty to this, my hunch  is that there's something biological that's sort  

of missing in the brain. Mhm. You know, do we have  psychopath animals, right? Because when you look  

at, you know, are there any biological substrates?  Um, one thing when you study when you study  

neuroscience, one thing that gets interesting and  particularly neurobiology is sometimes sort of  

and it sounds simplistic but sometimes certain  things don't get hooked up in the brain. That  

makes sense. We think about an example would be  adolescence, right? Adolescence their frontal  

loes aren't really connected yet, right? Not  fully developed. So they can think about really  

dumb things to do but they have no idea about the  potential consequences. So that part of the brain  

sort of not hooked up yet. I suspect this is my  own Dr. Jess's hunch that something in the brain  

did not connect because biologically it makes  sense for us to have compassion for others to  

have nurturance and and um um caring abilities  for others because that keeps the species alive,  

right? But for psychopaths, I suspect, and we  don't have, you know, maybe I don't know if  

it'll be in my lifetime, but maybe at some point  we'll be able to do neuroiming or some type of  

um analysis of, you know, neurological systems  in the brain to see why that is not working or  

not hooked up, right? If that makes sense. Yes.  Yeah. And this is putting nuance on this question  

that I' I've been working through with a lot  of professionals that I've interviewed. Yeah.

differences in the structures of the brain. Some  things are smaller, some things are different. Um,  

that's well cited in there books that bring that  up. I haven't read the studies, but I've read  

books that will cite studies, you know, women who  love psychopaths, snakes and suits by Robert Hair  

that point to these things about brain structures.  But then I talked to Dr. Gwen Adsid out of the UK.  

She's a forensic psychiatrist. Saying, well, the  brain doesn't just work in this modular system.  

This brain is this whole connected thing. So,  we want to have more flexibility about how we  

see the brain structure element. But your point  to the connection, yeah, you know, if there's a  

difference in the way that those elements are  connected. Um, that is very interesting. Yeah.  

The brain runs on systems. We have certain centers  in the brain that are more when I was a professor,  

you used to talk about this. It's not that this  part of your brain controls this. It's this  

part of your brain is implicated in this. So just  memory. If I hear a word that goes into my brain,  

it's visual. If I hear it, it's auditory. If  I see it, it's visual. It goes into certain  

areas of the brain. One's one looks at what one  is highly implicated in visual processing. One's  

highly implicated in auditory processing. make  sense of that and then all of a sudden another  

part of the brain comes out and that's sort of  the emotional part of the brain. Do I have an  

um an emotion associated with that particular  word and then a part of the brain comes in  

called the memory uh and a parts of the brain  are more heavily implicated in memory because  

we know when they get damaged you can't remember  anything and it'll go in and go oh I remember an  

experience I had that is related to that word.  So again, it's the brain is systems. So let's  

say theoretically a system that's involved in  empathy. It's going to be more than one system,  

by the way. It's going to be a bunch of systems  and there's going to be some biological elements  

to that, too. If that's disrupted in some in some  way, then does empathy not come online? If that  

makes sense. So yeah, the person you talk to, I  mean, that's a great point. It's just not there's  

one component or one little part of the brain  that is responsible. There are various symptom  

uh various systems in the brain that interact in  order to make meaning for us in order to help us  

deploy certain behaviors or even deploy emotional  responses. We're leaning into sort of the nature  

side of this nature nurture discussion. You did  briefly talk about the the nurture element that  

there's evidence that that some psychopaths go  through very rough childhoods. Yeah. Um, could  

that affect the connection structure that you're  talking about? That's a great that's a great  

question because we do know that there are studies  particularly with um PTSD. Yeah. That um there are  

and these are newer studies. I mean there's always  been theories and people suspecting this, but some  

newer studies are coming out that talks about how  sometimes traumatic experiences can affect and  

can affect your neuroanatomy for sure. And that  makes sense to me seeing people over the years  

who have PTSD from example for example from  childhood trauma because the reality is from  

a treatment perspective um people never get cured  of trauma. They just learn how to get past it and  

learn how to cope with it better and and then it  affects them less. So that would really kind of  

fall into that argument that there can be some  fundamental changes in either or at a biological  

level in the brain when exposed to trauma.  But from a practical perspective, one thing  

that fascinates me after all these years, I can  see people who go through similar circumstances,  

similar traumas. Sometimes kids who've all grew  up in the same home of abuse and they all or they  

they will frequently take sort of different paths  and how that affects them. The majority of people  

who go through abuse in childhood don't have  PTSD, but some do. Some go through some pretty  

horrific abuse and they come out, I wouldn't say  unscathed, but they don't have PTSD. Some people  

go uh uh through through, you know, we might look  at the situation and say, "Well, yeah, it was bad,  

but not that bad." And but they're wrecked.  Some people go the personality disorder route  

when they grow up in a, for example, a house of  abuse and neglect. They develop these personality  

characteristics early on in life that work in that  situation they're in, but when they become adults,  

these can be aberant traits that cause problems.  So the nature versus nurture. I'm fascinated where  

some people can come out of traumatic events and  it affects them in one way and another person can  

come through a similar event and it perfects them  in a profoundly different way. So again it's an  

interaction of nature and nurture. Um but we do  have a lot of research evidence particularly now  

that there can be some fundamental structural  or biochemical changes in the brain as a result  

of trauma. No doubt. Mhm. So Dr. Je, if trauma  could cause things like psychopathy, narcissistic  

personality disorder, would trauma therapies then  cure them or we you said you don't cure, but would  

they then resolve the trauma and and then resolve  the psychopathy, the narcissistic personality  

disorder? I think it's more than just they had  trauma that made their psychopathy. Yeah. So, we  

can we can most people because I don't hear of of  trauma therapies working for things like NPD. No,  

that's why I think you know this idea where you're  born a psychopath. Um I would probably fall more  

into agreeing with that category. You know, you  were born I I would argue and again I'm not a  

scientific total scientific expert on this. I'm  not a a brain neuroscient you know neuroscience  

person or I shouldn't say I'm not I'm not a  neurologist, right? I I study neuroscience.  

I do some neurosych but um there are people that  could speak to this more than me but I I suspect  

that when they were born there was something that  was missing something that a system that didn't  

work properly or connect properly in the brain um  that would help that person develop a more typical  

um sort of um emotional process or center in  their brain and then they get into an environment  

already having that biological makeup and then  that environment can shape how they utilize or  

deploy that makeup. So if you were born, let's  say you were born a psychopath, but you're in  

an environment and you ended up in an environment  where there's a lot of neglect and abuse and a lot  

of bad things happen. You learn how to do those  bad things and you learn how to use those. And  

then when you become an adult, that's the way you  navigate your world, right? Let's say you grow up  

and you've got sort of that psych um you you were  born with that psychopathic brain, but you grew up  

in a really nice home with uh parents who had good  means and no struggle and you became a surgeon.  

Yeah. Because we know that when we look at  professions, surgeons have a lot of psychopaths.  

Now, are they out terrorizing the world? No. Would  you want your um surgeon to be a psychopath? That  

was a question I used to ask when I taught this  as a professor. You might want to. You know  

why? Because when things are going wrong, they  don't get emotional. It's all a technique. So,  

we could get into um my family law cases um a lot  of psychopathic surgeons and their divorces, but  

that's a whole other podcast because I had a lot  of those, too. I bet. I bet. Yeah. This idea of of  

the environment shaping it. So, also spoken with  Dr. Robert Plowman who's a behavioral geneticist  

and one thing that we got into is that perhaps  the psychopath is born and then we say oh well the  

their parents were so tough on them but if your  child is a young psychopath and you know it's it's  

very likely that a parent is going to struggle  to deal with that child and they may seem a very  

harsh parent and that that psychopath has the  story my parents were so tough on me but how else  

do you deal with them you know if you don't know  what you're dealing with um I I wonder what you  

make of of sort of a feedback between the parent  and child that makes this story that the child  

is abused when perhaps the child is born that way.  Right. So I mean if we if we assume that the child  

is born a psychopath um you know do they exhibit  antisocial behavior is really the question. You  

might have a child that's born a psychopath but  they can kind of get what they want or need.  

And this is met through pro-social behavior,  right? They learned good social skills. And we  

always always we always think of a psychopath  as evil. Um, which is fair, but there are a  

lot of psychopaths who are not evil and causing  crimes. They don't have that emotional connection  

to people, and people might be objects, but they  don't participate in antisocial behavior, per se.  

What do you what do you think makes that um  that more antisocial maybe sadistic nature?

Tough question. You know, again, if if you're  born with that psychopathic brain and then you  

get exposed to sadistic things, you sort of learn,  oh, this is the way you navigate life. You act  

sadistic. You do bad things. So, they can sort of  learn it that way. You know, I guess what I get a  

little worried about now, particularly with um how  much access we have to the world and social media  

with our computer in our hands. Yes. And I and I'm  seeing this a little bit in my practice now. When  

someone has an inkling or a thought, they can  go on their phone and find stories about other  

people who have had that inkling and thought. What  worries me is when I particularly when I've done  

evaluations I this is particularly salient when  I do evaluations for kids who um make threats  

at school or are developing plans in order for a a  school shooting or something. What they do is they  

have this thought and this idea and then they go  online and they research it and they learn about  

it. So, if you're a psychopath and you have an  interest in violent sexual assault, there's plenty  

of ways to learn about that that doesn't really  necessarily involve trial and error at first. So,  

they can go I mean, true crime is a gigantic uh  genre all over the place, right? It's in the news,  

it's movies, it's TV. Now, it's reality based. We  used to call reality TV. It's now reality online,  

right? They can go find these things  and learn about them. They can sort of,  

and I've talked about this in some of my videos,  where they can sort of utilize fantasy. What would  

it be like to do that? And they can feed that  fantasy by consuming things that fit in with that  

um interest that um is maybe destructive  or sadistic. Yeah, the fantasy thing is  

very important too. you talk with FBI profiler  types and and they'll say, you know, that the  

the fantasy changing the fantasy can often help  to change the behavior, but it can also be what  

spurs the behavior. So, managing the fantasy is  extremely important, too. I've heard a um someone  

I used to work with uh years ago who did a lot  of work with sex offenders. He uh talked about  

how fantasy is practice and it's practice without  consequences. Uh and and it and it really fit into  

the whole idea about particularly um um offenders,  sex offenders of children where now they can  

utilize child porn much easier than they could  20 years ago. And and what you'll see is they'll  

utilize child porn to feed that fantasy of what  would it be like if they had that experience.  

um unfortunately what happens is they get satiated  on the child porn and um it's not it doesn't give  

them the payoff. It doesn't feed the fantasy  as much anymore and then they kind of move into  

actual real behavior rather than fantasy. So  fantasy is a way to practice a behavior if you  

think about it to practice a behavior without any  consequences. So Dr. Jeff, we have talked a lot  

about psychopaths and narcissistic personality  disorder. What would you say is the distinction  

between those two? So, well, first of all,  narcissistic personality disorder is a diagnosible  

condition really. And um narcissistic personality  disorders, they they can't have an emotional  

connection to people. They they absolutely  do. Often times it's kind of a dysfunctional  

emotional connection, but they have the capacity  for emotional connection, if that makes sense.  

Um, psychopaths do not have that capacity for  emotional connection like most of us do and like  

narcissistic personality disorders can. Okay. And  you said that narcissist what was the first thing  

you said? Uh, narcissistic personality disorders  is a diagnosible condition. Diagnosible. So the  

the hair psychopathy checklist not a diagnosis.  Right. So psychopathy is not a formal diagnosis.  

uh they tried to get that into the DSM for  many many years. Um at that time that they  

were trying they really couldn't they didn't  really have the research base and then I think  

that attempt or that drive just sort of went  away. I think Robert here kind of gave up on  

it but I would argue it is very much a clinical  phenomenon and condition even though even if it's  

not diagnosible or it's not. So, we know what  it looks like. We can measure it. Um, I think  

it should be a subset of antisocial personality  disorder. That's just my two cents. But I don't  

think anyone's taking up that battle right now.  So, Dr. Jeff, the the narcissist can have more  

of an emotional connection to other people than  the psychopath, who you said could could cut up  

a body and not even notice it. Um, what makes  the narcissist more likely to commit murder?  

That's a great question and boy, I think I did  a video on that too. Narcissists who murder  

and because it seems like a lot of the television  shows and YouTube channels that I've been on um we  

talk about narcissists who murder. So, one of the,  you know, a couple of big problems with, well,  

big problems, a couple of things with narcissism,  narcissists who who will murder. Narcissists have  

such an inflated sense of selfworth. They feel  like whatever they're doing is the right thing  

to do and they can even justify it in their own  mind to take someone else's life as fitting in  

with what they want and what they need. And that  means the world should bend to that. Another big  

thing with narcissists, and this is what gets them  caught all the time, is they think they're smarter  

than everyone else. They think they can outsmart  the police. So, we have this very self-centered  

person who thinks they're smarter than everyone  else and everything they do is right. And I'm so  

wonderful, how could anyone even suspect me? So, I  don't know how many cases I've been on Nancy Grace  

where we have the narcissistic husband who murders  the wife. a bunch, you know, because their need  

they they they think their needs are um paramount  and above everyone else. So, whatever means to get  

their needs met, sometimes it moves into murder,  but they really have this false confidence that  

they're not going to get caught because they're  smarter than everyone else. And why would people  

suspect me? I'm so wonderful anyway. And and that  be ends up becoming their downfall. I talk a lot  

about that in the video. Yeah. So they have this  this idealized self and then it seems they'll go  

to any lengths to protect the idealized self and  and assume because of the idealized self that  

everything will work out. Oh yeah. Yeah. They they  think everything will work out. They think they'll  

get away with it. There's boy all these stories  that I worked on on TV shows just keep coming.  

It's it's so it's so common where you'll see  these narcissistic husbands murder their wives,  

particularly if they're going through a  divorce. Um what would be an example? Well,  

the example would be um I I had uh one that I that  I worked on um I think it was a TV show. This guy  

was this bodybuilder type, good-looking guy, but  obviously was showing off his looks constantly,  

having numerous affairs. um his wife made most of  the money spending all the money, you know, he was  

and um he he killed his own wife and uh when the  police questioned him, I've never seen someone so  

confident in trying to convince the police that  someone else did the murder and the police just  

let him talk, which is a great technique with  narcissist. You just let them talk and they  

will talk and they'll tell you a lot. Um, so that  particular case, the guy was the quintessential  

uh sort of male, alpha male narcissist who thought  he was smarter than the police. Um, but you know,  

they caught him and he's doing life. I don't  remember where it was, but that was a couple  

years ago that particular episode. So, but it is  interesting that the narcissist gets to the level  

where they think murder is justifiable. You know,  you probably maybe you've covered this in your  

other programs, but you know, the the the history  of narcissistic personality disorder. Um when it  

first came out, they used to call it a psychosis  uh because they said these people believe things  

that are not based in reality like how wonderful  they are. They I think they used to call it  

narcissistic psychosis when it first came out in  one of the early versions of the DSM because it's  

like really you really believe that? That's not  reality. So, it's kind of funny how that when you  

study the history of psychology and psychopathy.  I mean um psychopathology you you get into those  

cool old writings about that stuff. Yeah. The  delusions. Yeah. It's a it's a delusion. They're  

so wonderful. You're not so wonderful. You're  delusional. So, Dr. Jeff, we've established the  

differences between narcissists and psychopaths.  And yet there are narcissistic psychopaths as  

well. There there are some who are both. What what  traits dominate or is it is it sort of um picking  

a little bit from here and there a buffet? Right.  Again, so the um at the the base level, right,  

the psychopath doesn't have that connection to  humans. Uh the narcissist has this idealized self,  

this um um a grandized idea of who they are.  They're overconfident. They tend to be socially  

skilled. They're very focused on their own needs.  So, that is a very dangerous com combination. We  

know, and you probably covered this, a narcissist  can be very good interpersonally manipulating  

others. Well, that just fits really well with a  psychopath who can just use you. Um, you know,  

a psychopath doesn't a narcissist will justify  using you because, um, this is what I want and I'm  

wonderful and I deserve it. A psychopath will be  I'm using you just because, well, I'm going to use  

you for this. So that's a dangerous combination  for sure. So it's the the lack of emotional  

connection to other people of the psychopath  carried into a person who has the delusions  

of the narcissist. Yeah. Melted together. Melted  together. Very dangerous character for sure. So it  

it seems that um things like personality disorders  get thrown around a lot these days. You know,  

it seems everybody's saying everybody's a  narcissist. Um what do you make of the the rate of  

diagnosis of the the popularity of these ideas? I  think we're good right now on personality disorder  

diagnosis because I think a lot of uh clinicians  understand that you you have to be very careful  

before you put a diagnosis like that on. Now,  someone can be narcissistic but not a narcissistic  

personality disorder. Yeah. Um and there's levels  of narcissism, right? Um and in fact when I in my  

practice we had a corporate psychologist for a  lot of years and he used to do um evaluations  

for executive selection for companies. He wanted  to see a little narcissism a little not too much  

and this person is going to lead a multi-million  dollar organization. It's an overconfidence. So,  

you know, so some of these narcissistic  features can be helpful or positive, but when  

it gets to a level of a narcissistic personality  disorder, I think the criteria is very good. Um,  

and for me, I I rarely diagnose a personality  disorder after one meeting. It usually takes a  

while. And you have to look at all the collateral  information that this is a characteristic that's  

wrecked or caused problems in their ability  to have relationships, their ability to work,  

their ability to um to move towards fulfillment.  It causes dysfunction. And that's where it gets to  

the level of a narcissistic personality disorder.  And it's pervasive dysfunction. Personality  

disorders have problems at work, have problems  with their family, have problems in relationships,  

have problems in friendships. They're problems.  It's pervasive. And that's the difference between  

a personality disorder, like a narcissistic  personality disorder versus someone who's  

just a narcissist. They might be a narcissist in  their relationship. They're crappy partner because  

they're a narcissist, but they do pretty well at  work and they do okay with their kids. So, um,  

that's the difference, the pervasive dysfunction  versus if you're a narcissist, you're gonna have  

some problems probably with a few people. Yeah.  Well, Dr. Jeff, I appreciate you putting so much  

nuance on these things. For people who want  to learn more about you before I ask my last  

question, where should they look for you online?  Uh, so I'm on all the social media outlets,  

Tik Tok, Facebook, um, Instagram, and Axe. Uh, the  main thing where I I have a YouTube channel, uh,  

Dr. Jeff Kieliszewski Forensic Psychologist. Uh,  hopefully maybe in the description they'll find  

my name so they can spell it. And, uh, I I keep  trying to keep up that channel. I enjoy doing it.  

takes some it takes time though. Uh but I get a  lot of great interactions with my subscribers.  

They send me questions. I'll do videos on the  questions. Uh I enjoy it. I wish I had more time  

to do it, but I have a pretty busy practice. But  that's the best place to find me. If you have any  

um interest in forensic psychology all  the way from things we talked about today,  

narcissistic murderers versus how do you become a  forensic psychologist. I cover a variety of topics  

and forensic psychology from the perspective  of someone who actually works every day in an  

office as a forensic psychologist, not just an  academic. And hopefully people tend to people  

seem to respond well to the channel. I don't get  too many haters, so check me out there. Well,  

we'll put links in the description for  people to check out. And and Dr. Jeff,  

my last question is really about that work that  you do in in media, you know, YouTube, television,  

things like that. Um, what do you hope that people  learn from you? It's it's I like to pass along the  

knowledge particularly based on my experience. I  know all the research. I know I've read the books  

but to connect that to my experience. So when I go  on these television shows I I try to help people  

connect these academic or intellectual concepts  to what really happens in the real world. because  

we know there's a lot of sort of psycho bababel  out there, a lot of glamorized or fictionalized  

uh things in psychology and particularly  forensic psychology and true crime. So,  

I I try to really make that connection between  what the research says, what really happens in  

the real world versus what you might consume uh in  in some of your media or your fiction. Yeah. Well,  

thank you so much, Dr. Jeff for doing that, for  for making the the media that you do. Yeah, it's  

my pleasure and and for taking this interview.  Um, I really appreciate this. Oh, no problem.  

To help raise awareness about narcissistic  abuse, please share this video. It helps a lot.

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Grooming: The Narcissist's System of Abuse | Dr. Jeff Kieliszewski

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Grooming: The Narcissist's System of Abuse | Dr. Jeff Kieliszewski