Do psychopathic traits impair autobiographical memory for emotional life experiences?

Effects of psychopathic traits on preferential recall and recognition of emotionally evocative photos

Psychopathic traits are associated with impaired emotional processing. The present study examines the potential association between psychopathic traits and memory for emotional stimuli. Although a significant body of research suggests that memory is heightened for emotional stimuli, it is unclear how psychopathic traits may disrupt this process. Eighty-two male jail inmates completed an emotional memory task as well as portions of a standardised memory assessment. Psychopathic traits were not associated with the ability to freely recall images of positive, negative or neutral valence that participants had seen more than 15 min prior; psychopathic traits were also not associated with the ability to recognise these previously viewed images when shown them again. Exploratory analyses indicated trends toward reduced accuracy in recognising both positive and negative, but not neutral, emotional stimuli in individuals with higher levels of interpersonal and affective traits of psychopathy. As expected, psychopathy was unrelated to non-emotion-related memory functioning in auditory and visual domains as measured by the Wechsler Memory Scales 4th Edition. Overall, these results do not support the hypothesis that psychopathic traits significantly interfere with memory for emotional stimuli.

Altered functional connectivity of the amygdala across variants of callous-unemotional traits: A resting-state fMRI study in children and adolescents

Over the past years, research has shown that primary (high callousness and low anxiety) and secondary (high callousness and anxiety) variants of CU traits may be associated with opposite amygdala activity (hypo- and hyper-reactivity, respectively). However, their differences in amygdala functional connectivity remains largely unexplored. We conducted a Latent Profile Analysis on a large sample of adolescents (n = 1416) to identify homogeneous subgroups with different levels of callousness and anxiety. We then performed a seed-to-voxel connectivity analysis on resting-state fMRI data to compare subgroups on connectivity patterns of the amygdala. We examined the results in relation to conduct problems to identify potential neural risk factors. The Latent Profile Analysis revealed four subgroups, including the primary and secondary variants, anxious, and typically developing adolescents. The seed-to-voxel analyses showed that the primary variant was mainly characterized by increased connectivity between the left amygdala and left thalamus. The secondary variant exhibited deficient connectivity between the amygdala and the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, temporo-parietal junction, premotor, and postcentral gyrus. Both variants showed increased connectivity between the left amygdala and the right thalamus but exhibited opposite functional connectivity between the left amygdala and the parahippocampal gyrus. Dimensional analyses indicated that conduct problems may play a mediating role between callousness and amygdala-dmPFC functional connectivity across youths with already high levels of callousness. Our study highlights that both variants differ in the functional connectivity of the amygdala. Our results support the importance of disentangling the heterogeneity of adolescents at risk for conduct problems in neuroimaging.

Psychopathic personality traits are linked to reduced false memories for negative events

Individuals scoring high on psychopathic personality traits process emotional material to a different extent than individuals with few psychopathic traits. Evidence exists that these individuals have impaired emotional memory. The question arises whether this emotional memory impairment has ramifications for the production of emotional false memories. In the present study, we investigated the production of false and true memories for emotional events in a community sample (N = 120) of individuals varying in psychopathic traits (evaluated with the Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Revised [PPI-R] questionnaire). The fearless dominance (FD) component of psychopathy interacted with the emotional impact of to-be-remembered events in the production of false memories, showing fewer negative false memories with increasing levels of FD. At the subjective level, negative false memories were not perceived as vivid memory experiences in high FD individuals. Concerning true memories, higher scores in cold-heartedness were related to fewer true memories for neutral and negative (but not positive) events. These results show that individuals with high psychopathy traits - in particular, FD - do not have a general emotional memory impairment but they process negative material in a different way than individuals with low psychopathic traits and thus are less susceptible to producing false memories for negative events.

Efecto De La Personalidad Sobre El Recobro De Actos Violentos En Testigos

En el campo de investigación en psicología del testimonio se ha estudiado el efecto de múltiples factores psicológicos sobre la cantidad de detalles, la reproducción de conversaciones y las falsas memorias en el recobro de eventos autobiográficos. El objetivo de esta investigación es identificar el efecto de la personalidad sobre el recobro de testigos presenciales de actos con violencia verbal y no verbal. Participaron 40 estudiantes de psicología divididos en cuatro grupos en términos de sus puntuaciones altas en los estilos de personalidad histriónica (Grupo 1), esquizoide (Grupo 2), obsesiva-compulsiva (Grupo 3), y un grupo control con puntuaciones promedio en dichos estilos (Grupo 4). Mediante una situación experimental se presentó a los participantes un video con contenido de violencia verbal o física; posteriormente se realizó una tarea de recobro libre y se evaluó la cantidad de detalles, la reproducción de conversaciones y las falsas memorias. Los resultados mostraron que los participantes del Grupo 1 evidenciaron recobros pobres en detalles, con deficiente precisión en la reproducción de conversaciones y ausencia de falsas memorias, mientras que los participantes de los grupos 2 y 3 recobraron la información con mayor cantidad de detalles y mayor precisión en la reproducción de conversaciones, aunque el Grupo 3 obtuvo la mayor cantidad de falsas memorias. Estos hallazgos son discutidos en términos de la relación entre la forma en que se recobra la información en los procesos de Memoria Autobiográfica en escenarios jurídicos, y que hay otros constructos asociados como la personalidad y la emoción que pueden influir en el testimonio. Palabras Clave: Psicología del testimonio, recobro, personalidad, memoria autobiográfica, testimonio, contenido violento.

The Characteristics and Benefits of Disclosing Personal Experiences in Prison: A Study of the Writing Paradigm

The aim of this study is to investigate the characteristics and benefits of writing about personal experiences in prison. A variation of the classic writing paradigm was proposed to a sample of 93 male inmates in southern Italian prisons. Participants were left to write on any personal experience related to their condition and time in prison in 4 daily sessions. Measures of subjective well-being were collected across the sessions. Transcripts were analyzed through sentiment analysis. Cognitive and executive functioning indices (i.e., general cognitive abilities, working memory capacity, inhibition, and shifting) are included as covariates in our analyses on the evolution of well-being measures. Results showed that participants’ well-being improved across the sessions, independent of the emotional valence of the disclosed experience. This effect was partly modulated by the participant’s measure of working memory capacity. After an initial simplification, narrative productions appeared to increase their length and complexity. Our results support the idea that emotional disclosure in our sample of inmates contributes to social integration. Results encourage the adoption of writing procedures, as they are inexpensive and effective in supporting prisoners’ adjustment to prison life. Supplemental materials are available at https://www.press.uillinois.edu/journals/ajp/media/a_study_on_the_writing_paradigm/index.htm

Characterisation of self-defining memories in criminals with antisocial personality disorder

Early aversive events are key factors in the development of antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) and are known to impact the ability to produce specific autobiographical memories and to modify self-construction. The present study assessed identity construction in forensic inpatients suffering from ASPD by comparing the characteristics (specificity, integration, valence, topic and period) of self-defining memories (SDM) of persons with ASPD hospitalised in a forensic hospital to those of control participants. Offenders with ASPD had difficulty in retrieving purely specific single events and tended to recall memories comprising multiple events. In addition, they produced significantly less meaning-making from their past experiences (low integration). These characteristics of SDM could be due to a defensive process used by offenders with ASPD in which they do not integrate aversive experiences, thereby creating a vicious circle where maladjustment of their personality is maintained.