Psychopaths are villains associated with antisocial personality disorder, otherwise known as psychopathy. They lack and/or have an absence of empathy, guilt and/or emotional connections; as a result, they tend to be violent, twisted and with very few exceptions, not able to feel remorse. They are rarely in love, because they are mostly incapable of true love, although some of them are protective towards a select few while still being ruthless and uncaring toward everyone else. More often than not, Complete Monsters tend to be psychopaths, as they generally have little to no redeeming qualities. Because of their inability to feel remorse, they are unlikely to redeem themselves. For obvious reasons, it is very rare for anti-villains, extremists, morally ambiguous villains, villains by proxy, affable villains, redeemed villains, and incompetent villains to be psychopaths, though exceptions exist.

Psychopaths are not crazy or psychotic and are often mistaken for being so. However, they are dangerously unstable and highly capable of hurting others without hesitation and compunction due to their lack of restraint and empathy, regardless they are still completely aware of reality while psychotic people are the polar opposites; they hear voices, hallucinate, suffer from violent and/or delusional episodes or breaks from reality and often do not fully understand or are aware about what they are doing.

In fiction, it is common for Psychopaths to come in two different forms:

• High Functioning: The cold-hearted and, in theory, more dangerous kind of social predator. If a villain is consistently apathetic towards other people's feelings but is capable of using a facade to blend in with society, you have a high functioning psychopath. These kinds of psychopaths maintain high impulse control and are able to recognize the consequences of their actions, but are generally more cunning, calculating and manipulative. They exercise superficial charm to adapt to society and tend to be expert liars. When committing wrongdoings, they may plan them in advance to avoid getting caught easily or at least carry them out when in a situation where they are guaranteed to not get caught. Though they try to make themselves look normal to the public, they are often emotionally hollow, callous, possess a grandiose sense of entitlement and care little for anyone but themselves, seeing people as tools to use for their own benefit. However, this does not mean that every psychopath is villainous; in fact, psychopaths in real-life may be people living completely normal lives and, in fiction, some may even be heroic (though as anti-heroes). Exetior, Dimentio, King Tempest, Dream, CyborSpy, and King Stiron are good examples. In the uncommon cases where a psychopath redeems themselves, they are almost always from the high functioning type.
• Low Functioning: Usually, low-functioning psychopaths, also known as “sociopaths", do not conform to basic social standards. They are eager to flaunt their pride, act on destructive impulse and have very little regard for the consequences of their actions. As such, these variants are hot-headed villains who seemingly live without shame and may or may not bring harm to others or themselves depending on the circumstances of their situation through careless misdeeds. While minor symptoms of a high-functioning psychopath may be present in a low-functioning one, such as a constant need for stimulation, grandiose self-importance or habitual lying, these kinds of psychopaths do not usually hide behind a facade and easily become openly hostile (if not violent) when things do not go their way. If caught or confronted for committing villainous deeds, it is very easy for them to show no genuine remorse or outright refuse to accept responsibility for their actions. Examples are Magic Mann, Dabi, Sark, Shin Godzilla, Turbo Mecha Sonic and Lawyer Kong.

It isn't necessary for a psychopath to fully conform to the high-functioning or low-functioning categories. Psychopaths can have traits of both types (e.g. Nightmare Medic, Entity 01, Molalla).

Antisocial personality disorder is usually a persistent condition from birth, but it can be induced by a succession of horrific events that twisted the sanity of said characters. Furthermore, psychopaths may have redeeming qualities (even if it doesn't lead them to redemption), as long as the aforementioned qualities don't contradict their lack of empathy.

Psychopaths are the opposite of sympathetic heroes.

Notes[]

• Do not add this category to organizations or species. It is an individual affliction only and thus only individuals can be diagnosed with it.
• NEVER, under any circumstances, add villains who are mentally ill or psychotic under this category because, as mentioned above, those types of villains are not completely aware of reality or their identity and suffer severely from various other mental health issues while psychopaths though they have a twisted moral center are completely aware of their reality at all times and don't present the crippling effects of mental illness associated with the other neurotype categories.
• Do not add a villain to both psychopath and sociopath if they display both traits, just the one they lean more towards.
• Supernatural beings, aliens, monsters, demons, plants or artificial Intelligence (e.g. Fatal Error) normally do not count because their psychological mindset may often differ from humans (e.g. Sonic.exe, Red, Freddy Fazbear, Monika and Black). They could count if it is explicitly made clear that their minds function and behave in a similar manner to humans.
  • Also, Anthropomorphic Characters can also count if they display all the requirements (e.g. SpongeBob SquarePants).
• Not all Complete Monsters and Near Pure Evils are antisocial. They can display social behaviors and emotion while still lacking empathy. They can also be Mentally Ill just as long as it doesn't affect their moral agency.
• Not all Psychopaths are Neutral Evil or overvalue themselves by default. They can be Lawful Evil if their hunger for power is so they can oppress others, and Chaotic Evil if they use their manipulation only to destroy the peace. They can even be Nihilists whose lack of empathy or care for others, themselves included, makes them particularly dangerous.
• Psychopathy can only apply to villains with defined personalities and characterization. Insufficiently characterized villains do not count.