Psychopathic Individuals Research Articles

Would you? Effects of oxytocin on moral choices in forensic psychopathic patients

Psychopaths are suggested to be more likely to favor utilitarian outcomes over non-utilitarian (i.e., deontological) choices. Here we re-test this hypothesis and investigate whether oxytocin, a hormone associated with empathy, can counter this utilitarian effect. Forensic psychopathic patients and non-psychopathic controls participated in a sacrificial moral decision-making paradigm. Psychopathic patients performed the task in a double-blind cross-over placebo-controlled oxytocin administration paradigm. We found no evidence for psychopathic patients to act more utilitarian (or sacrificial) or any effect of oxytocin administration. Psychopathic traits within the control group, particularly traits associated with lack of empathy and failure to consider consequences, were however associated with more utilitarian choices, but only when these actions were low in emotion. In contrast, psychopathy severity in psychopathic patients, particularly impulsivity-related traits, predicts deontological choices, but only in highly emotional actions. Thus, although psychopathic traits do predict utilitarianism when emotional investment is low, this is not the case in full-blown psychopathy. Instead, there is a link between impulsivity and deontological choices in psychopathic patients, but only when emotional investment is high, and self-interest is not at stake. These preliminary results are discussed to whether utilitarian outcomes align with the personal goals of psychopathic individuals.

In the I of the beholder: an attempt to capture the implicit self-concept regarding psychopathy.

This article explores the implicit self-concept pertaining to psychopathy. Two online studies showed inconsistent results, with Study 1 (n = 243) suggesting that psychopathy is linked to an implicit self-concept marked by low empathy and Study 2 (n = 230) implying no such relationship. In a sample of offenders and community controls (Study 3a, n = 166), higher scores on the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) were related to an implicit self-concept of being less rather than more antisocial, and the implicit self-concept showed incremental validity compared to the explicit self-concept. The retesting of an offender subsample (Study 3b, n = 47) yielded no evidence for temporal stability or convergent validity. The implicit self-concept of highly psychopathic individuals thus appears to vary, depending on the social context. Future studies should replicate these results in different samples, using additional external correlates.

Understanding empathy deficits and emotion dysregulation in psychopathy: The mediating role of alexithymia.

Psychopathy is a severe personality disorder marked by a wide range of emotional deficits, including a lack of empathy, emotion dysregulation, and alexithymia. Previous research has largely examined these emotional impairments in isolation, ignoring their influence on each other. Thus, we examined the concurrent interrelationship between emotional impairments in psychopathy, with a particular focus on the mediating role of alexithymia. Using path analyses with cross-sectional data from a community sample (N = 315) and a forensic sample (N = 50), our results yielded a statistically significant mediating effect of alexithymia on the relationship between psychopathy and empathy (community and forensic) and between psychopathy and emotion dysregulation (community). Moreover, replacing psychopathy with its three dimensions (i.e., meanness, disinhibition, and boldness) in the community sample revealed that boldness may function as an adaptive trait, with lower levels of alexithymia counteracting deficits in empathy and emotion dysregulation. Overall, our findings indicate that psychopathic individuals' limited understanding of their own emotions contributes to their lack of empathy and emotion dysregulation. This underscores the potential benefits of improving emotional awareness in the treatment of individuals with psychopathy.

The Relationship between Emotional Recognition and Psychopathic Trait

The ability to recognize and understand emotions plays a fundamental role in human social interaction and is essential for effective communication and interpersonal relationships. Psychopathy, a personality disorder characterized by persistent antisocial behavior and impaired empathy, holds significant relevance in understanding criminal behavior, societal impact, and the implications of psychopathic traits on social functioning. In the intricate interplay between psychopathic traits and emotion recognition, prior research has highlighted the profound role of emotional processing in an individual's social functioning and development, alongside the considerable impact of psychopathic traits on these facets of life. To develop further into this complex relationship, this paper synthesizes existing research findings while elucidating current research gaps. These studies collectively revealed the diminished accuracy and efficiency in the emotional processing capabilities of high psychopathic individuals, as well as the emergence of atypical automatic emotional responses and subjective selection of emotional information in their interactions with emotional stimuli. Additionally, this review emphasizes the critical role played by primary psychopathic traits in shaping abnormal attention patterns, particularly the tendency of highly psychopathic individuals to divert their attention away from crucial emotion-carrying cues, such as the eyes of facial stimuli, especially when confronted with negative emotional expressions. The present review also recognizes certain limitations, mainly arising from sample size, self-report assessments, and the lack of comparison between clinical and nonclinical populations with high psychopathic traits. To address these constraints and further enrich people’s comprehension, future research should focus on conducting longitudinal studies within high-risk populations.

Effects of two treatments on interpersonal, affective, and lifestyle features of psychopathy and emotion dysregulation.

This study investigated the relative efficacy of Mentalization-based therapy (MBT) and United Protocol (UP) in reducing symptoms of psychopathy and emotion dysregulation in a sample of Iranian community residents with concurrent diagnoses of antisocial and borderline personality disorders (PDs). Interpersonal, affective, and lifestyle features of psychopathy were measured post-treatment and at 6-, 12-, 18-, 24-, and 36-months follow-up using the 13-item version of the Psychopathy Revised-Checklist (PCL-R), which excluded, by design, criminal history features. Emotion dysregulation was measured using the Deficits in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS) developed by Gratz and Roemer (2004). After treatment, both UP- and MBT-treated individuals showed significantly fewer features of psychopathy and significantly less emotion dysregulation. Compared with those treated with MBT, UP-treated individuals showed significantly less emotion dysregulation in all DERS subscales and a greater reduction in psychopathy features, particularly affective features. It is suggested that this likely reflected the particular emphasis placed by UP on improving emotional self-regulation and facilitating the therapeutic alliance. These results suggest that, despite the traditional pessimism that surrounds psychopathic individuals' treatability, they can be successfully treated.

Individual Difference Correlates of Being Sexually Unrestricted Yet Declining an HIV Test

Which individual differences accurately predict one’s decision to get tested for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), and do individuals who have regular short-term sex get tested at higher rates? Two studies—one lab study (total valid N = 69, with n = 20 who were tested) and one involving a student health center (valid N = 250, n = 4 who were tested)—involved participants (total valid N = 319, with n = 24 who got tested) taking a number of personality and individual difference measures, including the dark triad (Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy). Then, in both studies, participants had the opportunity to actually get tested for HIV. After analyzing data from Study 1, for Study 2 we preregistered the prediction that narcissistic participants would tend to (a) show disinclination to get tested for HIV, and (b) show proclivity for unrestricted short-term sexual behavior, manifesting in (c) a significant difference between these two correlations. As predicted, such a difference in correlations was evident for narcissism as well as psychopathy (the latter, however, was not predicted), suggesting that such individuals are not likely to seek HIV diagnostic information, but are taking more sexual risks. A research synthesis was consistent with these ideas (although controlling for demographic factors diminished the effects). Narcissistic and psychopathic individuals may be undetected hubs in the network of sexually active individuals with HIV. These results are silent on whether the typical HIV patient is narcissistic or psychopathic; the results merely implicate narcissistic and psychopathic traits in the spread of the virus.

Triarchic psychopathy and affective picture processing: An event-related potential study

Psychopathy and its precursors appear to be associated with abnormal affective response. For example, individuals high in psychopathy show reduced psychophysiological response to unpleasant stimuli, which might explain low levels of empathy in psychopathic individuals, and their pursuit of individual goals without regard for others’ wellbeing. In keeping with the notion that psychopathology is best represented on a continuum, the triarchic model suggests that psychopathy is characterized by elevations on three traits: boldness, meanness and disinhibition. Understanding how these traits relate to psychophysiological response to emotional stimuli would help validate the triarchic model, while also bridging to other psychopathological spectra (e.g., internalizing psychopathology, which is characterized by low boldness). Here, N = 123 young adults passively viewed unpleasant, pleasant and neutral pictures while subjective and electrocortical response were recorded. Controlling for the other triarchic traits, individuals with higher self-reported meanness had smaller late positive potentials (LPPs) to both pleasant and unpleasant pictures, whereas individuals higher in boldness had larger LPPs to unpleasant pictures. In addition, those higher in meanness rated unpleasant pictures as more pleasant and less emotionally arousing. Disinhibition was not associated with the LPP or ratings. Meanness appears to drive blunted response to unpleasant pictures that has previously been observed among those high on psychopathy, and may also be associated with reduced engagement with generic pleasant stimuli. Moreover, results converge with prior work on other traits of transdiagnostic relevance (e.g., extraversion), as well as internalizing symptoms, providing a bridge between psychopathy and other forms of psychopathology.

Unique Moral Judgements of Psychopathic Individuals

Emotions are important in human moral judgment and behavioral decision making. In the case of psychopaths, emotional deficits due to low fear response and dysregulated control prevent them from feeling the consequences of wrong behaviors, and therefore they cannot fully understand social moral behaviors or internalize the public's social moral system. Thus psychopathic individuals have their own unique moral judgment system based on their emotional deficits.

A Moderated Mediation Analysis to Further Examine the Role of Verbal Intelligence in the Association Between Psychopathic Personality and Crime.

The current study examined the association between psychopathy, criminal behavior, and the role of verbal intelligence. One promising approach is to examine alternative links between psychopathic traits and criminality like moderation and mediation effects by considering the potential relevance of verbal intelligence as a possible moderating variable. We hypothesized that psychopathic traits linearly predict antisocial behavior (ASB) but that a conviction because of ASB is moderated by verbal intelligence. To test a path model of this hypothesis, N = 305 participants (42% women; n = 172 inmates of German correctional facilities) filled in questionnaires to assess psychopathic traits, ASB, criminal behavior, and verbal intelligence. The moderated mediation analysis revealed that high psychopathic traits go along with a higher number of ASB, whereas individuals with higher verbal intelligence were more likely to evade detection, thus being more successful in their antisocial acts. These results sheds further light on the construct of adaptive psychopathy, supporting the notion that also non-incarcerated psychopathic individuals act highly antisocial. Only separate factors like verbal intelligence might mitigate negative consequences. Further implications for the concept of successful psychopathy are discussed.

Cultural Influences, Cultural Differences, and Psychopathy

Along with the booming of psychopathic research, cross-cultural generalisability on psychopathy arose. Considering the number of potential justifications for cultural differences, however, the generalisable conclusions remained a puzzle. Little attention had been paid to psychopathy with regard to the impact of cultural differences and similarities. In this paper, we provide an overview of how cultures have influenced psychopathic individuals and present an introduction to cultural psychology and psychopathy. We display and analyze the current situation in the field and come up with guidance for future studies.

Dangerously Intelligent: A Call for Re-Evaluating Psychopathy Using Perceptions of Intelligence.

Primary psychopathy (i.e., unemotional and callous predisposition) is associated with career, educational, and general life success, whereas secondary psychopathy (i.e., impulsivity and risk-taking) relates to criminality, hedonistic lifestyles, and detrimental behaviours. Although psychopathy sub-types have differential relationships to career and life success, how these traits are perceived by others relating to intelligence has not previously been researched. It is also unclear what role an individual's own psychopathy score plays in perceptions of intelligence. In an online experiment (n = 458), we investigated perceptions of intelligence (via a combined proxy of whether the rater thought the character in the vignettes had a high IQ and had attended university), using 12 vignettes of high and low primary and secondary psychopathic individuals. High-secondary-psychopathy vignettes were perceived as least intelligent (in agreement with the literature which states people high in secondary psychopathy traits are usually involved in petty crimes, risk taking, and substance abuse, and therefore perceived as socially undesirable). Low-secondary-psychopathy vignettes were perceived significantly more intelligent than high-primary-psychopathy vignettes (in-line with the literature suggesting the placidity and kindness which comes with being low in psychopathic traits is an amenable quality in our society). There was evidence for assortative intelligence perceptions: those high-primary psychopathy self-scorers perceived primary psychopathy vignettes as intelligent (which could be evidence of a 'likes attract' phenomenon, whereby those high in primary psychopathy admire others who are similarly high in primary psychopathy). The results suggest individuals demonstrating risk-taking behaviours are perceived as least intelligent, supporting previous research associating secondary psychopathy with poor academic or career success.

Social decision-making in highly psychopathic offenders – A systematic literature review

Despite their decisions to frequently manipulate or even callously harm others in real life, highly psychopathic individuals often exhibit judgments comparable to individuals low in psychopathy when examined experimentally. This conundrum has generated a rich body of studies exploring social decision-making in psychopathy, but no systematic review to date has identified decision-making as measured in real-world or simulated social interactions in criminal offender samples assessed for psychopathic traits. Out of 807 studies provided by database searching in August 2022, 16 studies were included in this review and revealed behavioral economic games and paradigms for the assessment of aggressive behavior as the two main approaches to dissect social decision-making in offender samples regarding psychopathy. The specific paradigms exposed the multidimensional structure of both, the psychopathy construct and social decision-making. On one side, the distinct affordances of the social tasks, such as trust, power, or reactions to unfairness and provocation shed light on the inconsistent relations of decisions in experimental situations and psychopathy. On the other side, studies analyzing decision outcomes with respect to the distinct psychopathy subcomponents revealed nuanced interference effects with the social decision tasks. The review encourages a differentiated perspective to the psychopathy construct and social decision-making processes alike. • Decision-making of highly psychopathic offenders in social interactions are reviewed. • Economic games and paradigms of provocation are used to assess antisocial/aggressive decisions. • Decisions of highly psychopathic offenders depend on specific social affordances. • Social decisions vary as a function of psychopathic traits and specific experimental tasks. • Misrepresentation of psychopathy by general offender samples confuses social behavior evidence.

RESTORATIVE JUSTICE AND PSYCHOPATHIC TRAITS: THE PERSPECTIVE OF BELGIAN PRACTITIONERS

The literature on restorative justice practices and more specifically victim-offender mediation in psychopathic individuals is scarce. At first glance, restorative justice practices might not be possible or useful when dealing with psychopathic offenders due to inherent characteristics they possess. The present study examined the possibility and usefulness of restorative justice practices in Flanders (i.e. victim-offender mediation) with psychopathic offenders. It focused on how practitioners think and feel about working with psychopathic offenders during victim-offender mediation. Understanding if and how this practice can be used with psychopathic individuals can contribute to the literature of restorative justice in general. Practitioners are mostly unaware of the presence of mental health problems at the start of the process. However, despite the presence of dysfunctional traits such as psychopathic traits, most facilitators argued that everyone should be able to get involved in victim-offender mediation. Victim-offender mediation is possible and may be useful for everyone involved. Despite the presence of psychopathic traits, it are the expectations of both the victim and offender about the mediation process that is of uttermost importance. Both expectations need to align with one another in order for the mediation to be successful.

The importance of an exaggerated attention bottleneck for understanding psychopathy.

The psychopath has long captured the imagination. A name such as Ted Bundy evokes a morbid curiosity. The crimes committed by Bundy are so cruel that it is hard to imagine how someone could do such things. In this review we discuss evidence that exaggeration in an attention bottleneck is one mechanism that makes it possible for psychopathic individuals to be adept at focusing on a single stimulus feature or goal but struggle to process multiple streams of information simultaneously. This exaggeration may partly explain the behavioral, affective, and social deficits that are apparent among psychopathic individuals. Further research on this attentional mechanism may promote a science that adequately captures the complexity of psychopathic behavior and offers new avenues for intervention.

Altered effective connectivity from the posterior insula to the amygdala mediates the relationship between psychopathic traits and endorsement of the Harm foundation

Psychopathic traits have been demonstrated to be associated with different moral foundations. However, the neuropsychological mechanism underlying the relationship between psychopathic traits and moral foundations remains obscure. Our study examined the effective connectivity (EC) of psychopathy-related brain regions and its association with endorsement to moral foundations (Harm, Fairness, Loyalty, Authority, and Purity)—combining questionnaire measures, resting-state fMRI (RS-fMRI), and Granger causality analysis. We administered the Levenson Self-Report Psychopathy Scale and Moral Foundation Questionnaire to 78 college students after RS-fMRI scanning. Our results showed that total and primary psychopathy negatively predicted endorsement of the Harm foundation. The EC from the posterior insula to the amygdala was negatively associated with primary psychopathy but positively associated with endorsement of the Harm foundation. Altered posterior insula-amygdala EC partially mediated the relationship between primary psychopathy and endorsement of the Harm foundation. Our findings demonstrated that individuals with elevated psychopathic traits may have atypical processes in recognizing and integrating bodily state information into emotional responses —leading to less concern for harm-related morality. Our findings deepen the understanding of the neuropsychological mechanism underlying the relationship between psychopathic traits and morality, providing potential neurobiological explanations for increased moral transgressions, especially those harm-related transgressions, committed by psychopathic individuals.

Larger striatal volume is associated with increased adult psychopathy

Prior studies have inconsistently reported increased volumes of the striatum in adults with psychopathy. A meta-analysis presented here indicates an overall effect size of d = 0.44. Nevertheless, variability in findings exist, and questions remain on confounding clinical conditions and generalizability to females. This study tests the hypothesis that striatal volumes are increased in adults with psychopathic traits, and that this relationship is mediated by stimulation-seeking and impulsivity. Striatal volume was assessed using magnetic resonance imaging in 108 adult community-dwelling males alongside psychopathy using the Psychopathy Checklist – Revised. Subsidiary, exploratory analyses were conducted on a small sample of females. Correlational analyses showed that increased striatal volumes were associated with more psychopathic traits (p = .001). Effects were observed for all striatal regions, controlling for age, substance dependence and abuse, antisocial personality disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, social adversity, and total brain volume. An analysis of 18 psychopathic individuals showed that striatal volumes were increased 9.4% compared with 18 matched controls (p = .01). Psychopathy in females was also significantly associated with increased striatal volume (p = .02). Stimulation-seeking and impulsivity partly mediated the striatal-psychopathy relationship, accounting for 49.4% of this association. Findings from these two samples replicate and build on initial studies indicating striatal enlargement in adults with psychopathy, yielding an updated effect size of d = 0.48. Results are consistent with the notion that striatal abnormalities in individuals with psychopathy partly reflect increased sensation-seeking and impulsivity, and support the hypothesis of abnormal reward processing in psychopathy.

So what'cha want? The impact of individualised rewards on associative learning in psychopathic offenders

Psychopathic individuals typically present with associative learning impairments under explicit learning conditions. The present study aimed to investigate whether the formation of stimulus-outcome associations, as well as updating of these associations after changed contingencies, could be improved by using rewards with sufficiently high subjective values. To this end, 20 psychopathic offenders, 17 non-psychopathic offenders and 18 healthy controls performed a passive avoidance task with a reversal phase under three motivational conditions, using naturalistic rewards. The subjective values of the rewards were assessed a priori for each individual participant using a visual analogue scale. The correspondence of these values to their internal representation was confirmed by analyses of brain potentials. Analyses using both signal detection theory and classical approaches indicated that psychopathic offenders performed worse compared to the other groups during passive avoidance learning. However, using the signal detection approach, we found this deficiency to be present only when a hypothetical reward was used (‘neutral reward’ condition), whereas psychopathic offenders performed similar to the other groups when naturalistic rewards could be obtained (‘low reward’ and ‘high reward’ conditions). Furthermore, traditional analyses suggested that psychopathic offenders had more hits than the other groups during reversal learning, but the signal detection approach indicated that no effects of group or condition were present. Analysis of win-stay and lose-shift behaviour showed that psychopathic offenders were less likely to stay with a rewarded response during passive avoidance learning in the neutral reward condition. In addition, regardless of experimental phase or condition, psychopathic offenders were less likely to stop responding to a particular stimulus after receiving negative feedback. Although the approaches employed did not lead to unequivocal results, our findings suggest that psychopathic offenders do have the ability to adapt their behaviour to environmental contingencies when positive reinforcers with sufficiently high subjective values are used.

Psychopathy and the perception of the genuineness of facial expressions

Individuals with psychopathic traits are thought to have deficits in emotion recognition, yet they are also known for being manipulative and conning, a skill that necessitates sensitivity to social cues. One unanswered question is whether psychopathic individuals can recognize subtleties in the expression of emotion, such as whether an expression is genuine or not. We examined relationships between psychopathy and ratings of the “genuineness” of pictures of facial expressions. Undergraduate participants (n = 453; 32.5% identifying as men) completed the Triarchic Psychopathy Measure and the Self-Report Psychopathy Scale III. They viewed images that depicted faces displaying either fake (forced, posed) or genuine expressions of happiness, sadness, surprise, and fear and rated how fake versus real they thought the expression was. Controlling for gender, psychopathic traits on both measures were associated with making less of a distinction between fake and real images. Individuals higher in psychopathy rated genuine expressions as less real than those lower in psychopathy. Analyses of psychopathy factors revealed a distinct finding for Boldness (interpersonal dominance and fearlessness), which was associated with rating real smiles as more real. Overall, the findings suggest that individuals higher in psychopathy may perceive the sincerity of emotions differently, which may influence their social behavior.

Emotion expression abilities and psychopathy.

The ability to express emotion is considered a core socioemotional skill; however, most research is focused on receptive abilities, with little investigation of productive abilities. We present an investigation of individual differences in facial expression of emotion using observational techniques. Given descriptions of highly psychopathic persons as successful liars and manipulators, we investigate the ability to intentionally pose emotional expressions when no emotion is elicited. A mixed sample of adult men (N = 316 community volunteers, prison inmates, and forensic-psychiatric patients) ranging along the psychopathy continuum were asked to facially express a nonfelt emotion, specifically anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, and surprise, through either written instructions or through imitation of a target's facial expression. Through structural equation modeling, we evaluate relations between this emotion expression ability and general mental ability, interpersonal abilities, and psychopathy. We find that psychopathy is moderately associated with poorer emotion expression ability, meaning highly psychopathic individuals are poorer at imitating the expressions of others and poorer at expressing all emotions. However, this deficit is largely attributable to deficits in general mental ability. These results challenge the view that highly psychopathic individuals have the cognitive skills to support a superior ability to deceive or manipulate others. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

The need for domination in psychopathic leadership: A clarification for the estimated high prevalence of psychopathic leaders

In this article we hypothesize that psychopathic leaders may be attracted to positions of power because in such environments they can fulfill their need for domination and control over other people. Although social dominance is a well-established trait in psychopathy, social dominance as a motivational factor in those high in psychopathy has received surprisingly little attention in literature and research. In this article we propose that social dominance and dominance motivation may be part of the psychological profile of certain psychopathic subtypes, but not of others. Furthermore, the scarce theory and research on psychopathy and dominance motivation is reviewed. Finally, we will additionally analyze research on the different motivations between the larger group of the Dark Triad and propose new insights on the importance of the need for domination for those high in psychopathy in comparison to other fundamental life motivations. Based on these analyses we propose a clarification for the (estimated) high prevalence of psychopathic individuals in leadership positions.