Passive avoidance in psychopathic offenders: a replication and extension.
A passive avoidance task was administered to 97 Caucasian and 110 African American offenders to (a) replicate prior research demonstrating poor passive avoidance in psychopathic individuals (Ps) with low anxiety, (b) compare the effects of anxiety, neuroticism, and fear in identifying subgroups of Ps and controls who differ in passive avoidance, and (c) reevaluate the generalizability of this finding to African American offenders. Replicating past research with Caucasian offenders, low-anxious Ps committed significantly more passive avoidance errors than low-anxious controls. Although this difference was also found in Ps and controls with low neuroticism scores, the comparison involving low-fear offenders failed to reach significance. As in past research, comparable comparisons involving African American offenders were not statistically significant.
Newman
J P
JP
Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Madison 53706, USA. jpnewman@facstaff.wisc.edu
Schmitt
W A
WA
D000328:Adult; D001741:Black or African American / Q000523:psychology*; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000987:Antisocial Personality Disorder / Q000145:classification / Q000150:complications / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology; D001007:Anxiety / Q000150:complications* / Q000208:ethnology; D001362:Avoidance Learning; D006801:Humans; D009497:Neurotic Disorders / Q000150:complications* / Q000208:ethnology; D011329:Prisoners / Q000523:psychology*; D011678:Punishment / Q000523:psychology; D044465:White People / Q000523:psychology*; D014922:Wisconsin / Q000453:epidemiology