Executive function in psychopathy: The Tower of London, Brixton Spatial Anticipation and the Hayling Sentence Completion Tests

The Psychopath Next Door: How Similar Are They to Those Behind Bars? Criminality, Executive Functioning, and Emotion Processing in 'Noncriminal' Psychopathy

“…The longer subsequent completion times may be attributed to impulsively moving the first disc without thoughtful consideration of the sequence of moves required to complete the problem. Bagshaw et al (2014) found similar results when they examined planning ability using an adapted Tower of London (TOL) task in a small sample of male offenders. They found that PCL-R psychopathy was related to more moves on misleading trials of the TOL and that Factor 1 (interpersonal and affective) and Factor 2 (impulsive and antisocial) were negatively related to planning times.…”

“…In addition to the impairments in affective functioning, there is now a large body of research that suggests that psychopathy is associated with abnormal cognitive processing (Bagshaw, Gray, & Snowden, 2014;Baskin-Sommers, Curtin, Li, & Newman, 2012;Hiatt, Schmitt, & Newman, 2004;Jutai, Hare, & Connolly, 1987;Kosson, 1996;Newman, Patterson, & Kosson, 1987). Studies have shown that psychopathic individuals display attentional deficits, such as reduced interference on Stroop-like tasks (Hiatt, et al, 2004) and reduced physiological reactivity to irrelevant auditory stimuli (Jutai, et al, 1987).…”

“…Studies have shown that psychopathic individuals display attentional deficits, such as reduced interference on Stroop-like tasks (Hiatt, et al, 2004) and reduced physiological reactivity to irrelevant auditory stimuli (Jutai, et al, 1987). There is also some evidence of executive dysfunction in criminal psychopathic individuals, such as poor behavioural inhibition (Newman & Brinkley, 1997) and set-shifting (Bagshaw et al, 2014), with research suggesting this is primarily associated with elevated levels of secondary psychopathy. Conversely, there is some research that suggests that noncriminal psychopathy (Ishikawa, Raine, Lencz, Bihrle, & Lacasse, 2001) and/or higher levels of primary psychopathy are actually associated with superior executive functioning (Hansen, Johnsen, Thornton, Waage, & Thayer, 2007;Sellbom & Verona, 2007).…”

“…The intuitive appeal of the executive dysfunction hypothesis has led to a flurry of research examining executive function processes in psychopathic individuals (e.g., Bagshaw et al, 2014;De Brito, Viding, Kumari, Blackwood, & Hodgins, 2013;Dolan, 2012;Ishikawa et al, 2001;Mahmut, Homewood, & Stevenson, 2008;Mol, Van Den Bos, Derks, & Egger, 2009;Pham, Vanderstukken, Philippot, & Vanderlinden, 2003;Ross, Benning, & Adams, 2007;Sellbom & Verona, 2007;Snowden, Gray, Pugh, & Atkinson, 2013). However, research findings to date are contradictory and clouded by methodological inconsistencies in the measurement of psychopathy, the types of executive function studied (e.g., cool executive functions or hot executive functions), the measurement of executive function utilised, and demographic differences between samples (e.g., male criminal offender samples, male community samples, or mixed gender community samples).…”

“…However, the study possessed a number of methodological weaknesses (e.g., differences in substance abuse between the psychopathic and non-psychopathic groups, as well as the scale used to measure psychopathy), and subsequent studies failed to replicate these findings (Hare, 1984;Sutker & Allain, 1987;Sutker, Moan, & Allain, 1983). For example, Hare (1984) (Bagshaw et al, 2014;Heritage & Benning, 2013;Hoppenbrouwers et al, 2013;Kiehl, Smith, Hare, & Liddle, 2000;Kim & Jung, 2014;Mahmut et al, 2008;Sellbom & Verona, 2007). For example, Hoppenbrouwers et al (2013) examined dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and working memory functioning in male psychopathic offenders.…”