Reduced negative affect response in female psychopaths

Abstract

Studies that investigate the differences between high and low psychopathic persons in brain activity during emotional facial expression processing are rare and commonly focus on males. The current study assessed whether previously reported behavioral differences would be reflected in differential brain activity in a sample of female offenders. The participants included 23 female forensic inpatients with high and low scores on the Psychopathy Checklist Revised (PCL-R). ERPs were recorded during presentation of emotional facial expressions (i.e., fear, angry, and happy). Results revealed no differences in N170, P3 and late positive potential components between groups, but a significant difference in N2 only for angry and fear facial expressions, with high psychopathic participants showing lower reactivity. This N2 effect was found to be related to Factor 2 but not Factor 1 of the PCL-R. In time frequency analysis, theta activity underlying N2 best reflected these differences. Findings in this female sample are consistent with a cortical deficit in processing facial expression of negative emotions in psychopathic men. In addition, differences in processing seem to appear relatively early.

Dysfunctional error-related processing in female psychopathy

“…While female psychopaths are characterized by similar affective dysfunction as male psychopaths (Sutton et al, 2002;Eisenbarth et al, 2013;Verona et al, 2013), results are less consistent across cognitive domains. For example, female psychopathy is not associated with the same response perseveration deficits characteristic of male psychopathy (Vitale and Newman, 2001a;Vitale et al, 2011).…”

Emotional processing and psychopathic traits in male college students: An event-related potential study

“…More recently, researchers have begun to utilize the excellent temporal resolution of event-related potentials (ERPs) to examine the ways in which individual differences in psychopathic traits give rise to variations in the timing of affective processing. Relatively few studies have investigated the relationship between psychopathy and the late positive potential (LPP; Anderson and Stanford, 2012;Carolan et al, 2014;Eisenbarth et al, 2013;Howard and McCullagh, 2007;Kiehl et al, 1999;Sadeh and Verona, 2012).…”

Psychopathische Persönlichkeit bei Frauen

“…In einer Serie von Untersuchungen bei forensischen Patientinnen konnte gezeigt werden, dass sich die weiblichen hoch psychopathischen Probanden in Aufgaben, die eine schnelle Emotionsdekodierung erfordern im Verhalten und entsprechenden neurobiologischen Korrelaten von männlichen hoch psychopathischen Probanden nicht unterscheiden. Sie erkennen traurige Gesichtsausdrücke weniger gut [12], reagieren auf negativ valente Gesichtsausdrücke mit einer reduzierten Aufmerksamkeitszuwendung [13] und zeigen bei gleichzeitiger reduzierter Ängstlichkeit weniger Schreckreflexverstärkung durch negative Reize als gering psychopathische Frauen [25]. D. h., dass laut der bisherigen Befundlage die Emotionsverarbeitung bei männlichen und weiblichen hoch psychopathischen Probanden in ähnlicher Weise vorliegt.…”