Social cognition in aggressive offenders: Impaired empathy, but intact theory of mind

Abstract

Aggressive, violent behaviour is a major burden and challenge for society. It has been linked to deficits in social understanding, but the evidence is inconsistent and the specifics of such deficits are unclear. Here, we investigated affective (empathy) and cognitive (Theory of Mind) routes to understanding other people in aggressive individuals. Twenty-nine men with a history of legally relevant aggressive behaviour (i.e. serious assault) and 32 control participants were tested using a social video task (EmpaToM) that differentiates empathy and Theory of Mind and completed questionnaires on aggression and alexithymia. Aggressive participants showed reduced empathic responses to emotional videos of others’ suffering, which correlated with aggression severity. Theory of Mind performance, in contrast, was intact. A mediation analysis revealed that reduced empathy in aggressive men was mediated by alexithymia. These findings stress the importance of distinguishing between socio-affective and socio-cognitive deficits for understanding aggressive behaviour and thereby contribute to the development of more efficient treatments.

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

“…In the general adult population, the reported prevalence of alexithymia is around 10% (Parker, Taylor, & Bagby, ; Salminen, Saarijärvi, Äärelä, Toikka, & Kauhanen, ). Studies identified in our search indicate that aggression and alexithymia appear to be positively correlated (Konrath, Novin, & Li, ; Winter, Spengler, Bermpohl, Singer, & Kanske, ). In various criminal populations, the prevalence of alexithymia was found to be significantly higher, for example, 43% of prisoners serving lengthy sentences (Maisondieu, Tarrieu, Razafimamonjy, & Arnault, ) and 33% among female offenders (Louth, Hare, & Linden, ).…”

The social mind: disentangling affective and cognitive routes to understanding others

“…Indeed, impairments in ToM have been consistently described for patients with autism spectrum disorder (Frith 2001) or in ageing (Reiter et al 2017), while empathy seems to be preserved, when controlling for alexithymic deficits (Bird et al 2010). Psychopathic individuals and aggressive criminal offenders, in contrast, show empathy deficits (Meffert et al 2013) without concurrent changes in ToM (Winter et al 2017). …”

Aplicación de un programa de aprendizaje socioemocional y moral para mejorar la convivencia en educación secundaria

“…Aunque los resultados de la literatura no son del todo consistentes, la empatía afectiva parece estar relacionada con el comportamiento agresivo en la adolescencia (Lovett & Sheffield, 2007). Las dificultades con la empatía afectiva pueden explicarse por razones como falta de respuesta al castigo o al malestar de los otros (Hughes, 2011), por dificultades en la comprensión de determinadas emociones como la rabia o la tristeza (Bookhout et al, 2018) o por dificultades de comprensión y expresión de las propias emociones (Winter, Spengler, Bermpohl, Singer, & Kanske, 2017). Así pues, la futura investigación debería explorar con mayor profundidad el papel de la empatía afectiva en el comportamiento agresivo, así como los mecanismos a través de los cuales se puede mejorar.…”