Empathic competencies in violent offenders

Abstract

Violent offending has often been associated with a lack of empathy, but experimental investigations are rare. The present study aimed at clarifying whether violent offenders show a general empathy deficit or specific deficits regarding the separate subcomponents. To this end, we assessed three core components of empathy (emotion recognition, perspective taking, affective responsiveness) as well as skin conductance response (SCR) in a sample of 30 male violent offenders and 30 healthy male controls. Data analysis revealed reduced accuracy in violent offenders compared to healthy controls only in emotion recognition, and that a high number of violent assaults was associated with decreased accuracy in perspective taking for angry scenes. SCR data showed reduced physiological responses in the offender group specifically for fear and disgust stimuli during emotion recognition and perspective taking. In addition, higher psychopathy scores in the violent offender group were associated with reduced accuracy in affective responsiveness. This is the first study to show that mainly emotion recognition is deficient in violent offenders whereas the other components of empathy are rather unaffected. This divergent impact of violent offending on the subcomponents of empathy suggests that all three empathy components can be targeted by therapeutic interventions separately.

Does emotion matter? The role of alexithymia in violent recidivism: A systematic literature review

“…Lack of empathy relates directly to alexithymia—as individuals with a high level of alexithymia have difficulties in experiencing compassion and sympathy for others in need (Beadle, Paradiso, Salerno, & McCormick, ). In offender samples, violent offences have been associated with deficits in empathy (Seidel et al, ). Emotion dysregulation. Based on clinical observations, individuals with alexithymia are prone to violent bursts of emotional behaviours (Wise, Mann, & Hill, ), but are unaware of the underlying feelings expressed and thus might experience no empathy for the other person (Kroner & Forth, ; Nemiah et al, ).…”

“…Lack of empathy relates directly to alexithymia-as individuals with a high level of alexithymia have difficulties in experiencing compassion and sympathy for others in need (Beadle, Paradiso, Salerno, & McCormick, 2013). In offender samples, violent offences have been associated with deficits in empathy (Seidel et al, 2013).…”

Trait psychopathy and utilitarian moral judgement: The mediating role of action aversion

“…Primary psychopathy is associated with reduced ability to experience others' emotions and pain, in an isomorphic manner (affective empathy). For instance, elevated levels of trait psychopathy are associated with weaker affective response to fearful faces and happy stories (Seara-Cardoso, Craig, et al, 2012;Seara-Cardoso, Dolberg, et al, 2013) and reduced affective resonance with others' emotions in general (Lockwood, Bird, Bridge, & Viding, 2013;Seidel et al, 2013). Psychopathy is associated with inappropriate empathic response to the emotional display of others, for instance, both subclinical and forensic psychopathic personalities report feeling more positive affect when looking at sad and fearful faces and report more negative valence when looking at happy faces (Ali, Amorim, & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2009;Wai & Tiliopoulos, 2012).…”

Emotion Recognition and Perspective Taking: A Comparison between Typical and Incarcerated Male Adolescents

“…Impaired recognition of anger, disgust, happiness, and/or surprise has been observed in incarcerated adolescents and adults [17,18,25–27]. These results were further reported in children with conduct disorder [23] and in children, adolescents, and adults with high psychopathic traits from the general population [20,28].…”