Abstract
Aggressive, violent behaviour is a major burden and challenge for society. It has been linked to deficits in social understanding, but the evidence is inconsistent and the specifics of such deficits are unclear. Here, we investigated affective (empathy) and cognitive (Theory of Mind) routes to understanding other people in aggressive individuals. Twenty-nine men with a history of legally relevant aggressive behaviour (i.e. serious assault) and 32 control participants were tested using a social video task (EmpaToM) that differentiates empathy and Theory of Mind and completed questionnaires on aggression and alexithymia. Aggressive participants showed reduced empathic responses to emotional videos of others’ suffering, which correlated with aggression severity. Theory of Mind performance, in contrast, was intact. A mediation analysis revealed that reduced empathy in aggressive men was mediated by alexithymia. These findings stress the importance of distinguishing between socio-affective and socio-cognitive deficits for understanding aggressive behaviour and thereby contribute to the development of more efficient treatments.
Highlights
Aggressive behaviour towards others is a severe societal problem
Deficits in social understanding are associated with a number of mental disorders and conditions that are characterised by aggressive and violent behaviour, including antisocial personality disorder, psychopathy, and autism spectrum disorder[10,11,12]
We found a significant interaction of group and valence (F(1,57) = 7.910, p = 0.007, η2 = 0.122, d = 0.746)
Summary
Aggressive behaviour towards others is a severe societal problem. More than 1.1 million cases of violent crimes occur per year in the US alone (such as assault, grievous bodily harm, homicide)[1]. It is hypothesised that aggressive behaviour is inhibited when we correctly represent the related consequences for others[9] This link seems plausible, assuming that those who are neither capable of feeling another person’s pain nor understanding their motives, intentions, and goals are more likely to cross personal boundaries and inflict bodily, psychological or material harm. Social psychology and social neuroscience have identified two critical routes to understanding others: an affective route that allows for sharing others’ emotions and feeling for them (including empathy, and compassion) and a cognitive route that enables the representation of and reasoning about others’ mental states (Theory of Mind [ToM], perspective-taking)[13]. Experimental studies are needed that allow us to assess both empathy and ToM in a group of individuals with aggressive tendencies Both empathy and aggression have been related to alexithymia, a personality trait describing difficulties in identifying and expressing one’s own emotional states. Aggressive behaviour may be linked to lower empathy capabilities owing to an elevated manifestation of alexithymia
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