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Psychopathy is associated with shifts in the organization of neural networks in a large incarcerated male sample.

ABSTRACT: Psychopathy is a personality disorder defined by antisocial behavior paired with callousness, low empathy, and low interpersonal emotions. Psychopathic individuals reliably display complex atypicalities in emotion and attention processing that are evident when examining task performance, activation within specific neural regions, and connections between regions. Recent advances in neuroimaging methods, namely graph analysis, attempt to unpack this type of processing complexity by evaluating the overall organization of neural networks. Graph analysis has been used to better understand neural functioning in several clinical disorders but has not yet been used in the study of psychopathy. The present study applies a minimum spanning tree graph analysis to resting-state fMRI data collected from male inmates assessed for psychopathy with the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (n?=?847). Minimum spanning tree analysis provides several metrics of neural organization optimality (i.e., the effectiveness, efficiency, and robustness of neural network organization). Results show that inmates higher in psychopathy exhibit a more efficiently organized dorsal attention network (? = =0.101, pcorrected = =0.018). Additionally, subcortical structures (e.g., amygdala, caudate, and hippocampus) act as less of a central hub in the global flow of information in inmates higher in psychopathy (? = =-0.104, pcorrected = =0.048). There were no significant effects of psychopathy on neural network organization in the default or salience networks. Together, these shifts in neural organization suggest that the brains of inmates higher in psychopathy are organized in a fundamentally different way than other individuals.

SUBMITTER: Tillem S

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6861623 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Psychopathy is associated with shifts in the organization of neural networks in a large incarcerated male sample.

Tillem Scott S Harenski Keith K Harenski Carla C Decety Jean J Kosson David D Kiehl Kent A KA Baskin-Sommers Arielle A

NeuroImage. Clinical 20191109

Psychopathy is a personality disorder defined by antisocial behavior paired with callousness, low empathy, and low interpersonal emotions. Psychopathic individuals reliably display complex atypicalities in emotion and attention processing that are evident when examining task performance, activation within specific neural regions, and connections between regions. Recent advances in neuroimaging methods, namely graph analysis, attempt to unpack this type of processing complexity by evaluating the ...[more]

PMID: 31795050

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Project description:A marked lack of empathy is a hallmark characteristic of individuals with psychopathy. However, neural processes associated with empathic processing have not yet been directly examined in psychopathy, especially in response to the perception of other people in pain and distress.To identify potential differences in patterns of neural activity in incarcerated individuals with psychopathy and incarcerated persons serving as controls during the perception of empathy-eliciting stimuli depicting other people experiencing pain.In a case-control study, brain activation patterns elicited by dynamic stimuli depicting individuals being harmed and facial expressions of pain were compared between incarcerated individuals with psychopathy and incarcerated controls.Participants were scanned on the grounds of a correctional facility using the Mind Research Network's mobile 1.5-T magnetic resonance imaging system.Eighty incarcerated men were classified according to scores on the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) as high (27 men; PCL-R, ?30), intermediate (28 men; PCL-R, 21-29), or low (25 men; PCL-R, ?20) levels of psychopathy.Neurohemodynamic response to empathy-eliciting dynamic scenarios revealed by functional magnetic resonance imaging.Participants in the psychopathy group exhibited significantly less activation in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, lateral orbitofrontal cortex, and periaqueductal gray relative to controls but showed greater activation in the insula, which was positively correlated with scores on both PCL-R factors 1 and 2.In response to pain and distress cues expressed by others, individuals with psychopathy exhibit deficits in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and orbitofrontal cortex regardless of stimulus type and display selective impairment in processing facial cues of distress in regions associated with cognitive mentalizing. A better understanding of the neural responses to empathy-eliciting stimuli in psychopathy is necessary to inform intervention programs.

Dataset Information

Psychopathy is associated with shifts in the organization of neural networks in a large incarcerated male sample.

Publications

Psychopathy is associated with shifts in the organization of neural networks in a large incarcerated male sample.

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