Moral Judgment and Conduct Disorder Intensity in Adolescents Involved in Delinquency: Matching Controls by School Grade

Abstract

Most studies that have found associations between delinquency and moral judgment generally compare incarcerated juveniles with adolescents in normal schooling. However, this comparison is subject to two criticisms. First, a large number of adolescents in school who are not charged with any crime in the legal system are still involved in unlawful behaviour. Second, adolescents involved with delinquency often have difficulties at school. The aim of the present study was to measure this association by matching a sample of adolescents involved with delinquency (n=18, M age=15.8, SD=1.1) to adolescents not involved in delinquency (n=42, M age=15.8, SD=0.8) according to their school grade and Conduct Disorder Intensity as measured by a self-report index using DSM-IV diagnostic criteria. Participants who met four or more criteria were assigned to the High Conduct Disorder group (n=28), and the rest were assigned to the Low Conduct Disorder group (n=32). Their level of moral judgment was evaluated with the French version of the Sociomoral Reflection Measure-Short Form by Gibbs, Basinger, and Fuller, inspired by Kohlberg's model of moral development. Findings demonstrate that in both samples, adolescents in the High Conduct Disorder group presented moral judgment that was significantly less mature than that of adolescents in the Low Conduct Disorder group. However, the majority of participants in the Low Conduct Disorder group also scored low on the Sociomoral Reflection Measure-Short Form, suggesting more immature moral judgment. The bias introduced by the mode of recruitment in most comparisons of adolescents involved with delinquency to adolescents with no delinquency problems is discussed, and an argument is made for the importance of analysing moral judgment development within a framework of general cognitive development.

Reduced Default Mode Connectivity in Adolescents With Conduct Disorder

“…The MTL subsystem is involved in binding together disparate information to facilitate scene construction 8 and the aMPFC-PCC core in attaching personal significance to internally focused thoughts 8 as well as forming the self-other distinctions linked to pro-social behavior 15 and possibly judgments of affective empathy 16 . Thus the DMN and its component subsystems represent plausible pathophysiological substrates for deficits in emotion perception 17 , empathy, 18 or moral reasoning 19 that have been observed in individuals with CD.…”

Large-scale functional brain networks of maladaptive childhood aggression identified by connectome-based predictive modeling

“…Given the overlap of neural networks supporting social cognitive and emotion regulation processes 52 , disruptions in salience, default mode, and frontoparietal networks in children with aggression suggests impairment in the ability to detect salient social cues or inhibit inappropriate social responses, leading to aggressive responding. Thus, the salience and default mode networks and their component subsystems represent plausible substrates for de cits in emotion perception 53 , empathy 54 , and moral reasoning 55 that have been observed in children with disruptive behavior disorders.…”

“…The Aggressive Behavior scale includes 16 items re ecting anger outbursts, verbal and physical aggression. HC participants were required to have no current or past history of psychiatric or neurological disorders and a CBCL Aggressive Behavior T-score below 55. Additional details regarding inclusion and exclusion criteria are provided in the Supplement.…”

Moral Reasoning in Children with Focal Brain Insults to Frontotemporal Regions

“…Composite T-scores on the three-broadband scales (internalising, externalising and total problems) are reported ( M = 50, SD = 10). Scores on the rule-breaking behaviour scale ( M = 50, SD = 10) are also reported since previous studies in non-injured children have posited that failure to abide by moral guidelines is prominent in the rule-breaking behaviours that lead to criminality, violence and delinquent behaviour (Chudzik, 2007; Raaijmakers et al, 2005).…”