Hostname: page-component-6bf8c574d5-t27h7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-17T00:01:22.773Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The neuropsychology of prefrontal function in antisocial personality disordered offenders with varying degrees of psychopathy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 December 2011

M. Dolan
M. Dolan*
Affiliation:
Centre for Forensic Behavioural Science, Monash University, Clifton Hill, VIC, Australia
*
*Address for correspondence: Professor M. Dolan, Centre for Forensic Behavioural Science, Monash University, 505 Hoddle Street, Clifton Hill, Victoria 3068, Australia. (Email: [email protected])
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Background

Despite methodological differences between studies, it has been suggested that psychopathy may be associated with a ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC) deficit and antisocial personality disorder (ASPD), as classified in the DSM-IV, with a broader range of deficits in dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and VMPFC function.

Method

Ninety-six male offenders with ASPD who were assessed using the Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version (PCL:SV) and 49 male right-handed healthy controls (HCs), matched for age and IQ, completed a neuropsychological test battery.

Results

Offenders with ASPD displayed subtle impairments on executive function tasks of planning ability and set shifting and behavioural inhibition compared to HCs. However, among the offenders with ASPD there was no significant association between executive function impairment and scores on the measure of psychopathy.

Conclusions

Psychopathic traits in offenders with ASPD are not associated with greater executive function impairment.

Keywords

Antisocial personality disordersdorsolateral prefrontal cortexpsychopathyventromedial prefrontal cortex
Type
Original Articles
Information
Psychological Medicine , Volume 42 , Issue 8 , August 2012 , pp. 1715 - 1725
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Berman, KF, Ostrem, JL, Randolph, C, Gold, J, Goldberg, TE, Coppola, R, Weinberger, DR (1995). Physiological activation of a cortical network during performance of the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test: a positron emission tomography study. Neuropsychologia 33, 1027–1046.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bezdjian, S, Raine, A, Baker, LA, Lynam, DR (2010). Psychopathic personality in children: genetic and environmental contributions. Psychological Medicine 41, 589–600.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blair, KS, Newman, C, Mitchell, DG, Richell, RA, Leonard, A, Morton, J, Blair, RJ (2006). Differentiating among prefrontal substrates in psychopathy: neuropsychological test findings. Neuropsychology 20, 153–165.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blair, RJ (2003). Neurobiological basis of psychopathy. British Journal of Psychiatry 182, 5–7.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blair, RJ (2006). The emergence of psychopathy: implications for the neuropsychological approach to developmental disorders. Cognition 101, 414–442.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blair, RJ (2010). Neuroimaging of psychopathy and antisocial behavior: a targeted review. Current Psychiatry Report 12, 76–82.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Casey, BJ, Trainor, RJ, Orendi, JL, Schubert, AB, Nystrom, LE, Gied, JN, Rappoport, JL (1997). A developmental functional MRI study of pre-frontal activation during performance of a go-no-go task. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 9, 835–847.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coid, JW (1992). DSM-III diagnosis in criminal psychopaths: a way forward. Criminal and Mental Health 2, 78–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Damasio, AR (1994). Emotion, Reason and the Human Brain. Avon Science: New York.Google Scholar
Devonshire, PA, Howard, RC, Sellars, C (1988). Frontal lobe functions and personality in mentally abnormal offenders. Personality and Individual Differences 9, 339–344.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dias, R, Robbins, AC, Roberts, AC (1996). Dissociation in prefrontal cortex of affective and attentional shifts. Nature 380, 69–72.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dinn, WM, Harris, CL (2000). Neurocognitive function in antisocial personality disorder. Psychiatry Research 97, 173–190.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dolan, M (1994). Psychopathy: a neurobiological perspective. British Journal of Psychiatry 165, 151–159.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dolan, M (2002). What neuroimaging tells us about psychopathic disorders. British Journal of Hospital Medicine 63, 337–340.Google ScholarPubMed
Dolan, M, Anderson, IM, Deakin, JFW (2001). Relationship between 5-HT function and impulsivity and aggression in male offenders with personality disorders. British Journal of Psychiatry 178, 352–359.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dolan, M, Deakin, WJ, Roberts, N, Anderson, I (2002). Serotonergic and cognitive impairment in impulsive aggressive personality disordered offenders: are there implications for treatment? Psychological Medicine 32, 105–117.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dolan, M, Fullam, R (2006). Face affect recognition deficits in personality-disordered offenders: association with psychopathy. Psychological Medicine 36, 1563–1569.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dolan, M, Park, I (2002). The neuropsychology of antisocial personality disorder. Psychological Medicine 32, 417–427.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dolan, MC (2010). What imaging tells us about violence in anti-social men. Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health 20, 199–214.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dolan, MC, Anderson, IM (2003). The relationship between serotonergic function and the Psychopathy Checklist: Screening Version. Psychopharmacology 17, 216–222.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Elliot, R, McKenna, PJ, Robbins, TW, Sahakian, BJ (1995). Neuropsychological evidence for frontostriatal dysfunction in schizophrenia. Psychological Medicine 25, 619–630.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Farrington, DP (1993). Motivations for conduct disorder and delinquency. Development and Psychopathology 5, 225–241.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
First, MB, Gibbon, M, Spitzer, RL, Williams, JB, Benjamin, L (1997 a). Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis II Personality Disorders (SCID-II). American Psychiatric Press: Washington, DC.Google Scholar
First, MB, Spitzer, RL, Gibbon, M, Williams, JB (1997 b). Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis I Disorders (SCID-I). American Psychiatric Press: Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Fray, PJ, Robbins, TW, Sahakian, BJ (1997). Neuropsychiatric applications of CANTAB. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry 11, 329–336.3.0.CO;2-6>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gao, Y, Glenn, AL, Schug, RA, Yang, Y, Raine, A (2009). The neurobiology of psychopathy: a neurodevelopmental perspective. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry 54, 813–823.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gao, Y, Raine, A (2010). Successful and unsuccessful psychopaths: a neurobiological model. Behavioral Sciences and the Law 28, 194–210.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gorenstein, EE (1982). Frontal lobe functions in psychopaths. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 91, 368–379.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gough, HG (1994). Theory, development, and interpretation of the CPI socialization scale. Psychological Reports 75, 651–700.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hare, RD (1984). Performance of psychopaths on cognitive tasks related to frontal lobe function. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 93, 133–140.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hare, RD (1991). The Hare Psychopathy Checklist – Revised. Multi – Health Systems: Toronto.Google Scholar
Hare, RD (1998). Psychopathy, affect and behaviour. In Psychopathy: Theory, Research and Implications for Society (ed. Cooke, D. J., Forth, A. E. and Hare, R. D.), pp. 105–137. Kluwer: Dordrecht.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hart, S, Cox, D, Hare, R (1995). The Psychopathy Checklist – Screening Version (PCL-SV). Multi-Health Systems: Toronto.Google Scholar
Hart, SD, Forth, AE, Hare, RD (1990). Performance of criminal psychopaths on selected neuropsychological tests. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 99, 374–379.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hoffman, JJ, Hall, RW, Bartsch, TW (1987). On the relative importance of ‘psychopathic’ personality and alcoholism on neuropsychological measures of frontal lobe dysfunction. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 96, 158–160.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kandel, E, Freed, D (1989). Frontal lobe dysfunction and antisocial behaviour: a review. Journal of Clinical Psychology 45, 404–413.3.0.CO;2-G>CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kempton, S, Vance, A, Maruff, P, Luk, EJ, Costin, J, Pantelis, C (1999). Executive function and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: stimulant medication and better executive function performance in children. Psychological Medicine 29, 527–538.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lapierre, D, Braun, CMJ, Hodgins, S (1995). Ventral frontal deficits in psychopathy: neuropsychological test findings. Neuropsychologia 33, 139–151.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Malloy, P, Bihrle, A, Duffy, J, Cimino, C (1993). The orbitomedial frontal syndrome. Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology 8, 185–201.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Marsh, AA, Blair, RJ (2008). Deficits in facial affect recognition among antisocial populations: a meta-analysis. Neuroscience Biobehavioral Review 32, 454–465.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McGuffin, P, Thapar, A (1992). The genetics of personality disorder. British Journal of Psychiatry 160, 12–23.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mitchell, DG, Colledge, E, Leonard, A, Blair, RJ (2002). Risky decisions and response reversal: is there evidence of orbitofrontal cortex dysfunction in psychopathic individuals? Neuropsychologia 40, 2013–2022.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Moffitt, TE, Henry, B (1989). Neuropsychological assessment of executive function in self-reported delinquents. Developmental Psychopathology 1, 105–118.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moffitt, TE, Henry, B (1991). Neuropsychological studies of juvenile delinquency and juvenile violence. In Neuropsychology of Aggression (ed. Milner, J. S.), pp. 131–146. Kluwer Academic Publishers: Boston.Google Scholar
Morgan, AB, Lilienfield, SO (2000). A meta-analytic review of the relation between antisocial behaviour and neuropsychological measures of executive function. Clinical Psychology Review 20, 113–156.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nelson, HE (1982). National Adult Reading Test (NART) Test Manual. NFER-Nelson: Windsor.Google Scholar
Newman, JP (1998). Psychopathic behaviour: an information processing perspective. In Psychopathy: Theory, Research and Implications for Society (ed. Cooke, D. J., Forth, A. E. and Hare, R. D.), pp. 81–104. Kluwer: Dordrecht.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newman, JP, Patterson, CM, Kosson, DS (1987). Response preservation in psychopaths. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 96, 145–148.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Owen, AM, Downes, JJ, Sahakian, BJ, Polkey, CE, Robbins, TW (1990). Planning and spatial working memory following frontal lobe lesions in man. Neuropsychologia 28, 1021–1034.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Owen, AM, Roberts, AC, Hodges, JR, Summers, BA, Polkey, CE, Robbins, TW (1993). Contrasting mechanisms of impaired attentional set-shifting in patients with frontal lobe damage or Parkinson's disease. Brain 116, 1159–1179.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Owen, AM, Roberts, AC, Polkey, CE, Sahakian, BJ, Robbins, TW (1991). Extra-dimensional versus intra-dimensional set shifting performance following frontal lobe excisions, temporal lobe excisions or amygdalo-hippocampectomy in man. Neuropsychologia 29, 993–1006.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pantelis, C, Barber, FZ, Barnes, TRE, Nelson, HE, Owen, AM, Robbins, TW (1999). Comparison of set-shifting abilities in patients with chronic schizophrenia and frontal lobe damage. Schizophrenia Research 37, 251–270.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Raine, A (1997). The Psychopathology of Crime. Academic Press: New York.Google Scholar
Raine, A (2002). Annotation: The role of prefrontal deficits, low autonomic arousal and early health factors in the development of antisocial and aggressive behaviour in children. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines 43, 417–434.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rezai, K, Andreason, NC, Alliger, R, Cohen, G, Swayze, V, O'Leary, DS (1993). The neuropsychology of the prefrontal cortex. Archives of Neurology 50, 636–642.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Robbins, TW, Owen, JM, Sahakian, BJ, McInnes, L, Rabbitt, P (1994). Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB): a factor analytic study of a large sample of normal elderly volunteers. Dementia 5, 266–281.Google ScholarPubMed
Roussy, S, Toupin, J (2000). Behavioural inhibition deficits in juvenile psychopaths. Aggressive Behaviour 26, 413–424.3.0.CO;2-Q>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rubia, K, Russell, T, Overmeyer, S, Brammer, MJ, Bullmore, TS, Simmons, A, Taylor, E (2001). Mapping motor inhibition: conjunctive brain activations across different versions of Go/No-Go and Stop tasks. NeuroImage 13, 250–261.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sahakian, BJ, Morris, RG, Evenden, JL, Heald, A, Levy, R, Philpot, M, Robbins, TW (1988). A comparative study of visuospatial memory and learning in Alzheimer-type dementia and Parkinson's disease. Brain 111, 695–718.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Schacher, R, Logan, GD (1990). Impulsivity and inhibitory control in normal development and childhood psychopathology. Developmental Psychology 26, 710–720.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shallice, T (1982). Specific impairments in planning. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London 298, 199–209.Google ScholarPubMed
Singleton, N, Meltzer, M, Gatward, R (1998). Psychiatric Morbidity among Prisoners in England and Wales. The Stationery Office: London.Google Scholar
Stevens, D, Charman, T, Blair, RJ (2001). Recognition of emotion in facial expressions and vocal tones in children with psychopathic tendencies. Journal of Genetic Psychology 162, 201–211.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sutker, PB, Allain, AN (1987). Cognitive abstraction, shifting and control: clinical sample comparisons of psychopaths and non-psychopaths. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 96, 73–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sweeney, JA, Kmiec, JA, Kupfer, DJ (2000). Neuropsychological impairments in bipolar and unipolar mood disorders on the CANTAB neurocognitive battery. Biological Psychiatry 48, 674–684.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Veale, DM, Sahakian, BJ, Owen, AM, Marks, IM (1996). Specific cognitive deficits in tests sensitive to frontal lobe dysfunction in obsessive-compulsive disorder. Psychological Medicine 26, 1261–1269.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Völlm, B, Richardson, P, Stirling, J, Elliott, R, Dolan, M, Chaudhry, I, Deakin, B (2004). Neurobiological substrates of antisocial and borderline personality disorder: preliminary results of a functional fMRI study. Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health 14, 39–54.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Winer, BJ (1971). Statistical Principles in Experimental Design, 2nd edn. McGraw-Hill: New York.Google Scholar
Zald, DH, Curtis, C, Foley, B, Prado, JV (2002). Prefrontal contribution to delayed spatial and object alternation: a positron emission tomography study. Neuropsychology 16, 182–189.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed