Emotion at the expense of cognition: psychopathic individuals outperform controls on an operant response task

The impact of emotional stimuli on a simple motor response task in individuals with psychopathy and comparison individuals was investigated. Psychopathy was assessed using the Psychopathy Checklist Revised (Hare, 1991). Participants were presented with the Emotional Interrupt Task, in which they responded with left and right button presses to shapes that were temporally bracketed by positive, negative, and neutral visual images taken from the International Affective Picture System. The comparison group showed increased response latencies if the shape was temporally bracketed by either a positive or negative emotional stimulus relative to a neutral stimulus. Individuals with psychopathy did not show this modulation of reaction time for either positive or negative emotional stimuli. Results are discussed with reference to current models regarding the modulation of attention by emotion and the emotional impairment seen in individuals with psychopathy.     

Emotional intelligence in incarcerated men with psychopathic traits

The expression, recognition, and communication of emotional states are ubiquitous features of the human social world. Emotional intelligence (EI) is defined as the ability to perceive, manage, and reason about emotions, in oneself and others. Individuals with psychopathy have numerous difficulties in social interaction and show impairment on some emotional tasks. Here, the authors investigate the relation between EI and psychopathy in a sample of incarcerated men (N = 374), using the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; Hare, 2003) and the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT; Mayer, Salovey, & Caruso, 2002). The MSCEIT is a well-validated ability-based EI measure that does not rely on self-report judgments of emotional skills. The Hare PCL-R is the gold standard for the assessment of psychopathy in clinical populations. Controlling for general intelligence, psychopathy was associated with lower EI. These findings suggest individuals with psychopathy are impaired on a range of EI abilities and that EI is an important area for understanding deficits in psychopathy.     

Response perseveration in psychopaths: Interpersonal/affective or social deviance traits?

In order to clarify the role of the two broad components of psychopathy (interpersonal/affective and social deviance; R. D. Hare, 2003) in explaining maladaptive response perseveration in psychopaths, as well as the role of reflection after punished responses in this deficit, the authors administered a card perseveration task to 47 Spanish male inmates assessed using the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991). Hierarchical regressions showed that psychopaths' maladaptive perseveration (more cards played and less money earned) was uniquely predicted by the social deviance features of psychopathy (PCL-R Factor 2)--particularly by its impulsive and irresponsible lifestyle facet (PCL-R Facet 3)--and not by its interpersonal/affective features (PCL-R Factor 1). Moreover, perseveration was related to a lack of reflection both after punishment and after reward feedback. The authors' results, in conjunction with previous evidence indicating perseverative deficits in several impulse control disorders, suggest that response perseveration may not be specific to psychopathy but rather is associated more generally with the externalizing dimension of psychopathology.     

Recognition of facial affect in psychopathic offenders

The authors examined the reliability of facial affect processing deficits found in psychopathic individuals (R. Blair et al., 2004) and whether they could be modified by attentional set. One hundred eleven offenders, classified using the Psychopathy Checklist--Revised (R. Hare, 2003) and Welsh Anxiety Scale (G. Welsh, 1956), performed a facial affect recognition task under 2 conditions. On the basis of research linking psychopathy, amygdala dysfunction, and deficits in facial affect recognition, the authors predicted that psychopathic offenders would display performance deficits when required to identify the emotional expression of particular faces. In addition, given evidence linking the affective processing deficits in psychopathy to focus of attention, the authors predicted that any deficits in facial affect processing would disappear when participants could anticipate which affective cues would be relevant on a given trial. Contrary to expectation, psychopathic offenders performed as well as controls in both conditions. The authors conclude that the conditions that reveal affective deficits in psychopathic individuals require further specification.     

Psychopathy, risk taking, and attention: a differentiated test of the somatic marker hypothesis

A. R. Damasio's (1994) somatic marker hypothesis relates psychopathy to deficits in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex. Using the gambling task (A. Bechara, A. R. Damasio, H. Damasio, & S. Anderson, 1994), the authors tested this premise and the role of attention as a moderator. Forty-nine male prison inmates were assessed with the Psychopathy Checklist--Revised (R. D. Hare, 1991), the gambling task, and standardized tests on attention-concentration, and intelligence. Results revealed no general relation between psychopathy and gambling task performance. However, psychopathic inmates with low attention scores gambled worse than did the attentive ones. They also had more previous convictions. In nonpsychopathic individuals, attention had no impact. Different processing strategies for psychopathic and nonpsychopathic individuals are proposed to explain these findings.     

The content validity of juvenile psychopathy: an empirical examination

This study examined the content validity of a juvenile psychopathy measure, the Childhood Psychopathy Scale (CPS; D. R. Lynam, 1997), based on a downward translation of an adult instrument, the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991). The CPS was compared with two other indices of juvenile psychopathy: (a) an index derived from expert ratings and (b) an empirical index based on correlations with adult psychopathy. The 100 items of the Common Language Q-Sort (CLQ; A. Caspi et al., 1992) provided a common metric for the comparison. Psychopathy and personality were assessed at age 13 years with the mother-reported CPS and the CLQ. Psychopathy was assessed at age 24 years with the interviewer-rated Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version (PCL:SV; S. D. Hart, D. N. Cox, & R. D. Hare, 1995). Data from over 250 participants of the middle sample of the Pittsburgh Youth Study were used to examine these relations. Item content analyses demonstrated considerable overlap among the three indices, indicating that the downward translation utilizes criteria similar to those of experts and the empirically-derived measure. In addition, these indices, even after removing overlapping items, demonstrated considerable convergence, also supporting the content validity of the downward translation. These results suggest that the downward translation method is adequate for understanding the juvenile psychopathy construct.     

Psychopathy and Identification of Facial Expressions of Emotion

The authors examined the association between psychopathy and identification of facial expressions of emotion. Previous research in this area is scant and has produced contradictory findings (Blair et. al., 2001, 2004; Glass & Newman, 2006; Kosson et al., 2002). One hundred and forty-five male jail inmates, rated using the Hare Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version participated in a facial affect recognition task. Participants were shown faces containing one of five emotions (happiness, sadness, fear, anger, or shame) displayed at one of two different levels of intensity of expression (100% or 60%). The authors predicted that psychopathy would be associated with decreased affect recognition, particularly for sad and fearful emotional expressions, and decreased recognition of less intense displays of facial affect. Results were largely consistent with expectations in that psychopathy was negatively correlated with overall facial recognition of affect, sad facial affect, and recognition of less intense displays of affect. An unexpected negative correlation with recognition of happy facial affect was also found. These results suggest that psychopathy may be associated with a general deficit in affect recognition.     

The inclusion of antisocial behavior in the construct of psychopathy: A review of the research

The psychopathic personality, or the construct of this disorder, has a long and contentious history. Psychopathy has been identified anecdotally for centuries; however, the ability to accurately define this construct continues to challenge researchers and clinicians. Of preliminary concern is the relevance of antisocial behavior to this disorder. Theoretical conceptualizations of psychopathy have changed over the past 65 years. Some have stressed the interpersonal and affective deficits of psychopathy [Cleckley, H. (1941). The mask of sanity (1st ed.). St. Louis, MO:C.V. Mosby.], while later conceptualizations have included both personality traits as well as antisocial behavior as criteria of psychopathy [Hare, R. D. (1991/2003). The Hare Psychopathy Checklist—Revised. Toronto, Canada: Multi-Health Systems]. This article will review the literature, particularly the relevance of antisocial behavior to the core personality structure of the psychopath. In doing so, historical theories will be reviewed, followed by later theoretical and empirical research. A great deal of this research has been conducted over the past 15 years, since the publication of the Psychopathy Checklist (PCL) and the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; [Hare, R. D. (1991/2003). The Hare Psychopathy Checklist—Revised. Toronto, Canada: Multi-Health Systems]). The PCL-R has provided the field of psychopathy research with a consistent measurement device, and, therefore will be discussed at length. The limitations of the psychopathy construct will be discussed as well as needed future research and the policy implications of such research.     

Psychopathy and recidivism from mid-adolescence to young adulthood: cumulating legal problems and limiting life opportunities

This study examined the ability of psychopathy as indexed by the following 4 scales: Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version (A. E. Forth, D. S. Kosson, & R. D. Hare, 1996/2003), Antisocial Process Screening Device (P. J. Frick & R. D. Hare, 2001), Hare Self-Report Psychopathy Scale-II (R. D. Hare, 1991), and Personality Assessment Inventory-Antisocial Scale (L. C. Morey, 1991, 2007) to prospectively predict antisocial outcomes including general and violent recidivism across a 3- to 4-year time span. Results indicated that psychopathy was predictive of both general and violent recidivism from mid-adolescence to young adulthood even after accounting for 14 variables theoretically linked to offending. These findings add to the recent research showing stability in the psychopathy traits across time by also demonstrating that psychopathy in adolescents also has a real-world effect, including a cost to society with higher rates of offending in the community and a cost to youth with cumulating legal records that are likely to narrow their potential for prosocial growth in the community.     

Psychopathy and fear: Specific impairments in judging behaviors that frighten others

Psychopathy is a disorder associated with antisocial behavior and deficits in responding to emotional stimuli, particularly fear-related stimuli. This research demonstrates that these deficits extend to judgments about behaviors that cause fear in others. We assessed whether psychopathy is associated with the ability to identify the emotional consequences of social behaviors and with judgments about these behaviors' acceptability. We found that psychopathy, as indexed by the Psychopathic Personality Inventory, is associated with impairments in identifying behaviors that cause fear and in judging the moral acceptability of these behaviors. Ratings of emotional consequences and moral acceptability were also correlated, such that individuals who less accurately identified behaviors that cause fear also judged these behaviors to be more morally acceptable. Psychopathy scores mediated the relationship between these two variables. These findings suggest that understanding that frightening others is unacceptable relies on understanding this type of behavior's emotional consequences, and have significance for understanding the relationship between psychopathy, empathy, and antisocial behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

Psychopathy and Trait Emotional Intelligence

Psychopathic individuals are infamous for their chronic and diverse failures of social adjustment despite their adequate intellectual abilities. Non-cognitive factors, in particular trait emotional intelligence (EI), offer one possible explanation for their lack of success. This study explored the association between psychopathy and EI, as measured by the Psychopathy Checklist - Revised (PCL-R; Hare, 2003) and Trait Meta-Mood Scale (TMMS, Salovey, Mayer, Golman, Turvey & Palfai, 1995). Consistent with the Response Modulation (RM) model of psychopathy (Newman & Lorenz, 2003), low-anxious psychopathic individuals had significantly lower scores on TMMS Repair and Attention compared to controls. Consistent with proposals by Patrick and Lang (1999) regarding PCL-R factors, these EI deficits related to different aspects of the psychopathy construct. Correlations revealed significant inverse associations between PCL-R factor 1 and Attention and PCL-R factor 2 and Repair. We propose that the multi-dimensional EI framework affords a complementary perspective on laboratory-based explanations of psychopathy.     

Use of the Personality Assessment Inventory to assess psychopathy in offender populations

The authors investigated the validity of the Antisocial Features (ANT) scale of the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI; L. C. Morey, 1991) with respect to assessments of psychopathy in 2 offender samples. Study 1 included 46 forensic psychiatric inpatients who were administered the Screening Version of the Hare Psychopathy Checklist (PCL:SV; S. D. Hart, D. N. Cox, & R. D. Hare, 1995). In Study 2, 55 sex offenders were administered the Hare Psychopathy Checklist--Revised (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991). ANT scores correlated highly with the PCL:SV total score (r = .54) and moderately with the PCL-R total score (r = .40). ANT tapped primarily behavioral symptoms of psychopathy rather than interpersonal and affective symptoms. Also, ANT had low to moderate diagnostic efficiency regarding diagnoses of psychopathy, suggesting that it may be better used as a dimensional rather than categorical measure of this construct.     

Validating the factor structure of the Self-Report Psychopathy scale in a community sample

Currently, there is no standard self-report measure of psychopathy in community-dwelling samples that parallels the most commonly used measure of psychopathy in forensic and clinical samples, the Psychopathy Checklist. A promising instrument is the Self-Report Psychopathy scale (SRP), which was derived from the original version the Psychopathy Checklist. The most recent version of the SRP (SRP-III; D. L. Paulhus, C. S. Neumann, & R. D. Hare, in press) has shown good convergent and discriminate validity and a factor structure similar to the current version of the Psychopathy Checklist (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991, 2003). The analyses in the current study further investigated the viability of the SRP-III as a PCL-R-analogous measure of psychopathy in nonforensic and nonclinical samples by extending the validation process to a community sample. Using confirmatory factor analyses and logistic regressions, the results revealed that a four-factor oblique model for the SRP-III was most tenable, congruent with the PCL-R factor structure of psychopathy and previous research in which the SRP-III was administered to a student sample.     

Brain potentials implicate temporal lobe abnormalities in criminal psychopaths

Psychopathy is associated with abnormalities in attention and orienting. However, few studies have examined the neural systems underlying these processes. To address this issue, the authors recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) while 80 incarcerated men, classified as psychopathic or nonpsychopathic via the Hare Psychopathy Checklist--Revised (R. D. Hare, 1991, 2003), completed an auditory oddball task. Consistent with hypotheses, processing of targets elicited larger frontocentral negativities (N550) in psychopaths than in nonpsychopaths. Psychopaths also showed an enlarged N2 and reduced P3 during target detection. Similar ERP modulations have been reported in patients with amygdala and temporal lobe damage. The data are interpreted as supporting the hypothesis that psychopathy may be related to dysfunction of the paralimbic system--a system that includes parts of the temporal and frontal lobes.     

Predicting dangerousness with two Millon Adolescent Clinical Inventory psychopathy scales: the importance of egocentric and callous traits

Psychopathy in youth has received increased recognition as a critical clinical construct for the evaluation and management of adolescents who have come into contact with the law (e.g., Forth, Hare, & Hart, 1990; Frick, 1998; Lynam, 1996, 1998). Although considerable attention has been devoted to the adult construct of psychopathy and its relation to recidivism, psychopathy in adolescents has been less thoroughly researched. Recently, a psychopathy scale (Murrie and Cornell Psychopathy Scale; Murrie & Cornell, 2000) was developed from items of the Millon Adolescent Clinical Inventory (MACI; Millon, 1993). This scale was found to be highly related to the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (Hare, 1991) and was judged to have demonstrated good criterion validity. A necessary step in the validation process of any psychopathy scale is establishing its predictive validity. With this in mind, we investigated the ability of the MACI Psychopathy Scale to predict recidivism with 55 adolescent offenders 2 years after they had been evaluated at a juvenile court evaluation unit. In addition, we devised a psychopathy scale from MACI items that aligned more closely with Cooke and Michie (2001) and Frick, Bodin, and Barry's (2001) recommendations for the refinement of psychopathy and tested its predictive validity. Results indicate that both scales had predictive utility. Interpersonal and affective components of the revised scale were particularly important in the prediction of both general and violent reoffending.     

Psychopathy and physiological response to emotionally evocative sounds

Despite considerable evidence that psychopathic criminals are deviant in their emotional reactions, few studies have examined responses to both pleasurable and aversive stimuli or assessed the role of different facets of psychopathy in affective deviations. This study investigated physiological reactions to emotional sounds in prisoners selected according to scores on the 2 factors of Hare's Psychopathy Checklist--Revised (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991). Offenders high on the PCL-R emotional-interpersonal factor, regardless of scores on the social deviance factor, showed diminished skin conductance responses to both pleasant and unpleasant sounds, suggesting a deficit in the action mobilization component of emotional response. Offenders who scored high only on the social deviance factor showed a delay in heart rate differentiation between affective and neutral sounds. These findings indicate abnormal reactivity to both positive and negative emotional stimuli in psychopathic individuals, and suggest differing roles for the 2 facets of psychopathy in affective processing deviations.     

P3 event-related potentials and childhood maltreatment in successful and unsuccessful psychopaths

Although P3 event-related potential abnormalities have been found in psychopathic individuals, it is unknown whether successful (uncaught) psychopaths and unsuccessful (caught) psychopaths show similar deficits. In this study, P3 amplitude and latency were assessed from a community sample of 121 male adults using an auditory three-stimulus oddball task. Psychopathy was assessed using the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (Hare, 2003) while childhood physical maltreatment was assessed using the Conflict Tactic Scale (Straus, 1979). Results revealed that compared to normal controls, unsuccessful psychopaths showed reduced parietal P3 amplitudes to target stimuli and reported experienced more physical abuse in childhood. In contrast, successful psychopaths exhibited larger parietal P3 amplitude and shorter frontal P3 latency to irrelevant nontarget stimuli than unsuccessful psychopaths. This is the first report of electrophysiological processing differences between successful and unsuccessful psychopaths, possibly indicating neurocognitive and psychosocial distinctions between these two subtypes of psychopathy.     

Turning a deaf ear to fear: impaired recognition of vocal affect in psychopathic individuals

The processing of emotional expressions is fundamental for normal socialization and interaction. Reduced responsiveness to the expressions of sadness and fear has been implicated in the development of psychopathy (R. J. R. Blair, 1995). The current study investigates the ability of adult psychopathic individuals to process vocal affect. Psychopathic and nonpsychopathic adults, defined by the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991), were presented with neutral words spoken with intonations conveying happiness, disgust, anger, sadness, and fear and were asked to identify the emotion of the speaker on the basis of prosody. The results indicated that psychopathic inmates were particularly impaired in the recognition of fearful vocal affect. These results are interpreted with reference to the low-fear and violence inhibition mechanism models of psychopathy.     

Are all psychopathic individuals low-anxious?

Theorists commonly assume that true or primary psychopathic individuals experience little anxiety or neurotic conflict. This study examined the relationship between psychopathy and anxiety in 104 Caucasian and 113 African American incarcerated men using the Psychopathy Checklist--Revised (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991) and multiple self-report measures to tap diverse interpretations of the anxiety construct (i.e., neuroticism, traditional definitions of anxiety, and fear). Analyses involving zero-order, semipartial, and point-biserial correlations indicate that PCL-R psychopathy and the anxiety construct are essentially independent. These findings suggest that either (a) the traditional belief that all psychopathic individuals are low-anxious is incorrect or (b) the PCL-R is not an adequate measure of primary psychopathy.