Interpersonal Relationships as Protective and Risk Factors for Psychopathy: A Follow-up Study in Adolescent Offenders

Abstract

Friendships and romantic relationships may function as protective and risk factors for psychopathic traits. To better understand potential causal associations, we investigated whether within-individual changes in relationship characteristics were related to changes in psychopathic traits over time. Data were derived from ten repeated measurements of the Pathways to Desistance longitudinal study of 1354 offending adolescents (14.3% female; 40.1% Black). Analyses were adjusted for age, gender, ethnicity, self-reported offending and living facilities. Relationships of high quality were associated with lower psychopathic traits, whereas antisocial behavior and antisocial influence in relationships were related to higher psychopathic traits. Within-individual analysis indicated that time-invariant individual characteristics did not confound these associations. The findings suggest that the quality and antisocial activities of interpersonal relationships can affect positively or negatively on the levels of psychopathy.

Interpersonal skills scale: Development and validation in urbanized sample of adolescents

“…Interpersonal changes during adolescence play a significant role in growth, development, and adjustment of adolescents and successful development of interpersonal skills during this period lead toward positive consequences like school performance and adjustment, well‐being, quality of life, self‐esteem, and lower level of mental health issues (Backman et al, 2018; Bester, 2019; Mestre et al, 2019). One of the most significant factors that form interpersonal skills is culture.…”

“…Social interactions are central to the developmental process during adolescence and human abilities like rational thinking, helping behavior, cooperation, social manners, social etiquettes, sharing qualities, and confidence are only develop in the process of social interaction (Gottlieb & Halpern, 2002; Sadovnikova, 2016; Washington, Cohen, Berlin, Hsueh, & Zhou, 2018). Both individual and family theories have identified that development and maintenance of dynamic and stable interpersonal relationships as a key developmental task for adolescents (Backman, Laajasalo, Jokela, & Aronen, 2018; Mufson et al, 2018). From a family system theory’s viewpoint, Carter and Mc‐Goldrick (1988) explained that the fundamental task of adolescents is to separate from their family, seeking autonomy and independence, developing a sense of self, and new relationships with peers.…”

“…Independence from adults is generally accompanied by an escalation of friendships with peers and these relationships play a vital role in the construction of social and interpersonal skills that are essential for personal growth, development, and adjustment of adolescents (Sadovnikova, 2016). The successful development of interpersonal skills during this period are associated with many positive outcomes including overall well‐being, a better quality of life, high academic achievement and performance, better adjustment, high self‐esteem, and lower mental health problems (Backman et al, 2018; Lin & Tsai, 2016; Padilla‐Walker, Memmott‐Elison, & Coyne, 2018; Sadovnikova, 2016; Xia, Ding, Hollon, & Yi, 2015; Zhang & Eggum‐Wilkens, 2018). On the contrary, poor interpersonal skills during adolescence are associated with negative outcomes including a sense of loneliness, low self‐esteem and self‐confidence, high dropout rate, and a higher level of mental health problems (Hamilton et al, 2016; Malaquias, Crespo, & Francisco, 2015; Owens et al, 2019; Ranta, Greca, Kaltiala‐Heino, & Marttunen, 2016).…”

Longitudinal Associations between Callous-unemotional (CU) Traits and School-based Affiliative Relationships among South Korean Children

“…As such, South Korean children may be less willing to express their preferences, producing restricted variability in the range of peer acceptance levels. Peers may also play a less significant role in East Asian cultures, as studies of East Asian children have not found a significant association between CU traits and deviant peer affiliation (Ang et al, 2015;Chu et al, 2014), whereas there is consistent support for this link in Western samples (Backman et al, 2018). More research is needed to compare Western and Asian countries to provide a better understanding of the implications of cultural differences regarding CU traits and social affiliation (Sng et al, 2020).…”

Maturation as a Promoter of Change in Features of Psychopathy Between Adolescence and Emerging Adulthood

“…Parents' messages and reactions to their child's behavior are considered important to the child's moral development, avoidance learning, and expressions of remorse (Hoffman, 2001;Krupić et al, 2020). This research, often focusing specifically on CU traits, showed that parental warmth/hostility and parenting style were important to between-group differences and within-individual change in features of psychopathy (e.g., Backman et al, 2018Backman et al, , 2021Deng et al, 2020;Flexon et al, 2020;Ray, 2018;Salihovic et al, 2014;Zhong et al, 2020). However, parents may have a less important role to play in within-individual changes in features of psychopathy between adolescence and early adulthood.…”