Abstract
Offenders with psychopathy have often committed crimes violating social norms, which may suggest a biased moral reasoning in psychopathy. Yet, as findings on utilitarian decisions remain conflicting, the current study investigated different aspects of fairness considerations in offenders with psychopathy, offenders without psychopathy and healthy individuals (N = 18/14/18, respectively). Unfair offers in a modified Ultimatum Game (UG) were paired with different unselected alternatives, thereby establishing the context of a proposal, and made under opposing intentionality constraints (intentional vs. unintentional). As in previous studies, unfair offers were most often rejected when the alternative was fair and when the offer was made intentionally. Importantly, however, offenders with psychopathy demonstrated a similar rejection pattern to that of healthy individuals, i.e., taking the unselected alternative into account. In contrast, delinquents without psychopathy did not adjust their decision behavior to the alternatives to an offer, suggesting stronger impairments in social decision-making. Crucially, the mechanisms and processes underlying rejection decisions might differ, particularly with regard to cognitive vs. emotional competencies. While preserved cognitive perspective-taking could drive seemingly intact decision patterns in psychopathy, emotional empathy is likely to be compromised.
Highlights
Social deficits are evident in various psychiatric disorders with their expression ranging from withdrawal in e.g., social phobia to antisocial behavior and even social predation as observed in psychopathy
Offenders with psychopathy tend to maximize overall benefit in these scenarios, i.e., demonstrate utilitarian choice patterns (Koenigs et al, 2012), there is no consistent evidence that individuals with psychopathy differ from healthy groups in explicit moral judgments (Blair et al, 1995; Cima et al, 2010; Aharoni et al, 2012)
Findings on differences in moral reasoning between incarcerated populations with and without psychopathy are inconsistent (Cima et al, 2010; Koenigs et al, 2012) and a recent meta-analysis reported a negative relation between moral development and recidivism for offenders in general, irrespective of psychopathic traits (Van Vugt et al, 2011)
Summary
Social deficits are evident in various psychiatric disorders with their expression ranging from withdrawal in e.g., social phobia to antisocial behavior and even social predation as observed in psychopathy. Offenders with psychopathy tend to maximize overall benefit in these scenarios, i.e., demonstrate utilitarian choice patterns (Koenigs et al, 2012), there is no consistent evidence that individuals with psychopathy differ from healthy groups in explicit moral judgments (Blair et al, 1995; Cima et al, 2010; Aharoni et al, 2012). Findings on differences in moral reasoning between incarcerated populations with and without psychopathy are inconsistent (Cima et al, 2010; Koenigs et al, 2012) and a recent meta-analysis reported a negative relation between moral development and recidivism for offenders in general, irrespective of psychopathic traits (Van Vugt et al, 2011). It remains important to compare individuals with psychopathy to a healthy, and to another forensic reference group which has been convicted for serious offenses that essentially violate social and moral norms
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