King Richard III is in the news, since his bones have been found under a Leicester parking lot, and what was really missing was psychologists capitalizing on that media attention.
Not to worry, University of Leicester psychologists have made an analysis of Richard III's character – aiming to get to the man behind the bones. They call is forensic psychology and they have put together a psychological analysis of Richard III based on the consensus among historians relating to Richard's experiences and actions.
Professor Mark Lansdale, Head of the University's School of Psychology, and psychologist Dr. Julian Boon have determined that, while there was no evidence he was a psychopath, importance science works like Shakespeare lead them to speculate he had "intolerance to uncertainty syndrome" – which may have manifested in control freak tendencies.
Their analysis aims to humanize Richard, one of the most reviled and controversial kings in English history - and among Plantagenet's and Tudors that is really saying something.
Firstly, they examined one of the most persistent and critical depictions of Richard's personality – the suggestion that he was a murdering psychopath. This reputation – portrayed most famously in Shakespeare's play – does not seem to have any basis in the facts we have about his life. He showed little signs of the traits psychologists would use to identify psychopaths today – including narcissism, deviousness, callousness, recklessness and lack of empathy in close relationships - but a whole University of Colorado neuroscience department had a psychopath as a grad student and they didn't notice anything wrong, so a lack of clinical understanding is expected about something hundreds of years ago.
However, the academics speculate that Richard may have exhibited a common psychological syndrome that psychology, which puts a label on virtually every behavior, as an intolerance to uncertainty.
Professor Mark Lansdale said, "This syndrome is associated with a need to seek security following an insecure childhood, as Richard had. In varying degrees, it is associated with a number of positive aspects of personality including a strong sense of right and wrong, piety, loyalty to trusted colleagues, and a belief in legal processes - all exhibited by Richard.
"On the negative side it is also associated with fatalism, a tendency to disproportionate responses when loyalty is betrayed and a general sense of 'control freakery' that can, in extreme cases, emerge as very authoritarian or possibly priggish. We believe this is an interesting perspective on Richard's character."
In addition, the pair speculate on how his disability – evident in the curvature of the spine of the King's remains – may have had an impact on his character. Specifically on the way he interacted with people who he did not know well.
In medieval times, deformation was often taken as a visible indication of a twisted soul. As a result, it is possible that this would have made him cautious in all his interactions with others.
Professor Lansdale added, "Overall, we recognise the difficulty of drawing conclusions about people who lived 500 years ago and about whom relatively little is reliably recorded; especially when psychology is a science that is so reliant upon observation.
"However, noting that this is the problem historians work with as a matter of routine, we argue that a psychological approach provides a distinct and novel perspective: one which offers a different way of thinking about the human being behind the bones."
Presented Saturday, March 2nd at the University of Leicester.