I'm curious just how common this is. I was talking to my 8 year old stepson about the main difference between him and his twin sister, besides the obvious, being that she actually cares if someone is mad at her and he does not. He fully agreed. He even made it sound like something was wrong with his sister for caring. In a mocking voice he said "She's like oh no someone's mad at me boohoo" and seemed quite proud of himself for not being like that. He also told me he doesn't care if he gets in trouble because it happens so often, he knows what his punishment is and knows tomorrow it'll be like it never happened. The boy has no ability to connect the consequence to the action at all, or at least doesn't care that what he's doing is wrong. He's not completely without compassion, he shows remorse when he harms someone physically and cares when other people get hurt, but he'll only recoil at getting in trouble if it's someone he doesn't live with. Basically, he doesn't fear anyone at home, so it's ok if they get mad because they'll never physically hurt him. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad he feels safe enough at home to never fear for his own safety, and my goal is never using fear to discourage bad behavior, but if that feeling of safety is preventing him from seeing his behavior is causing turmoil with his family, what will drive that message through to him?