Episode Details

What happens when the traits we label as personality disorders — grandiosity, lack of empathy, exploitation — are exactly what gets you promoted on a trading floor? This episode stares directly at the DSM's oldest problem: tying diagnosis to social norms. We trace the 1973 removal of homosexuality from the manual (a political vote, not a scientific breakthrough), the "successful psychopath" problem that Robert Hare identified, and the field's best attempt at an answer: the Level of Personality Functioning Scale. Can we diagnose personality pathology without rubber-stamping whatever culture happens to reward — or imposing our own values in a lab coat?