The contribution of brain imaging to the understanding of psychopathy

Abstract

Psychopathy is a personality type characterized by both callous emotional dysfunction and deviant behavior that affects society in the form of actions that harm others. Historically, researchers have been concerned with seeking data and arguments to support a neurobiological foundation of psychopathy. In the past few years, increasing research has begun to reveal brain alterations putatively underlying the enigmatic psychopathic personality. In this review, we describe the brain anatomical and functional features that characterize psychopathy from a synthesis of available neuroimaging research and discuss how such brain anomalies may account for psychopathic behavior. The results are consistent in showing anatomical alterations involving primarily a ventral system connecting the anterior temporal lobe to anterior and ventral frontal areas, and a dorsal system connecting the medial frontal lobe to the posterior cingulate cortex/precuneus complex and, in turn, to medial structures of the temporal lobe. Functional imaging data indicate that relevant emotional flow breakdown may occur in both these brain systems and suggest specific mechanisms via which emotion is anomalously integrated into cognition in psychopathic individuals during moral challenge. Directions for future research are delineated emphasizing, for instance, the relevance of further establishing the contribution of early life stress to a learned blockage of emotional self-exposure, and the potential role of androgenic hormones in the development of cortical anomalies.

A Systematic Literature Review of Neuroimaging of Psychopathic Traits

“…Temporal horn enlargement has been implicated in some psychiatric diagnoses including Alzheimer disease (144) and schizophrenia (145). Moreover, global GMV of psychopathic individuals does not appear to significantly differ from that of general population (19).…”

“…Psychopathy is believed to have a neurobiological origin (18), and, in the past years, various neuroimaging studies have tried to resolve the perplexing etiology behind psychopathy (2,4,19). The structure, connectivity, and white matter tracts of brains of individuals displaying psychopathic traits have been visualized with numerous methods including conventional MRI, functional MRI, diffusion tensor MRI (DTI) voxel-based morphometry (VBM), (19), single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), positron emission tomography (PET), and electroencephalogram (EEG) (20).…”

A Critical Period for Prefrontal Network Configurations Underlying Psychiatric Disorders and Addiction

“…It is also important to note that an increasing amount of evidence is highlighting the relevance of critical periods for the establishment of functional connectivity between the mPFC and its afferent regions, and how such connectivity is disrupted in different psychiatric disorders such as addiction or depression (Crews et al, 2007;Contreras-Rodríguez et al, 2016;Pujol et al, 2019).…”

Superethics Instead of Superintelligence: Know Thyself, and Apply Science Accordingly

“…Interestingly enough, there is progress in the cognitive neuroscience of ethics, where evolutionary theory, ethology, psychology and various other disciplines combine with neuroscience in mapping and understanding the mechanisms underlying our ethical thought and behavior (Greene 2015;Racine et al 2017). Currently, there is fast growing research into pathological behavior, such as psychopathy, and antisocial personality disorder (McKinley et al 2018;Pujol et al 2019;Sonne and Gash 2018). Equally relevant from a societal perspective is to understand the mechanisms behind overcompliance with or prolonged acceptance of immoral practices that Arendt has characterized as the banality of evil (Arendt 1963).…”