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It seems that a lack of response to punishment is often considered useful in diagnosing conditions or symptoms. A good example of this may be in diagnosing psychopathy, in which a lack of response to punishment seems to be a defining characteristics. For example:

Their behavior does not reform in response to punishment; they will impulsively commit crimes despite knowing the consequences they will likely face. They are among the worst of repeat offenders.”

It seems odd to me that punishment is considered significant, since in many cases a person we consider capable of making their own decisions may not agree with a punishment, in which case why would the punishment be expected to have any effect?

My question is, how is observing a lack of response to punishment useful? Is the assumption that most people will respond in an expected way to punishment? If so, what is that based on?

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significant to what? I would try to rephrase the whole question in terms of diagnosing psychopathy or similar conditions and avoid vague words like 'significant'. I also retagged your question, cognitive-psychology is not a catch-all tag. – Artem Kaznatcheev Mar 11 '12 at 0:31
@ArtemKaznatcheev I am asking about punishment and the normal response, and why a deviation is considered significant. Why punishment is used at all for measuring or diagnosing. Asking why it is significant covers all of those question without being too general. I don't see something that applies to everybody being abnormal psychology. What I am asking certainly comes under psychology. I don't know how to make the question clearer and don't understand the downvote. – Sonny Ordell Mar 11 '12 at 0:34
How is cognitive psychology a relevant tag? – Artem Kaznatcheev Mar 11 '12 at 1:27
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@ArtemKaznatcheev How is it not? How is abnormal psychology relevant? I am asking why a lack of response to punishment is considered significant. It seems to be the norm/baseline that people will respond to punishment, so abnormal psychology doesn't make sense to me. Going by the tag description for cognitive psychology, it seems fitting. Why do you disagree? – Sonny Ordell Mar 11 '12 at 13:38
"It seems odd to me since in many cases a person we consider capable of making their own decision may not agree with a punishment, in which case why would the punishment be expected to have any effect?" - Even if you don't agree with the reason the punishment is given, you might still change your behavior accordingly. That is, if I'm punished for playing the piano, even if I don't agree with the reasons for this, I'll probably stop playing it to avoid future punishment. Could you include some solid (i.e. Links? Journals?) references so we can analyse the statements you give further? – Speldosa Mar 14 '12 at 10:53
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