"Prefrontal deficits" discriminate young offenders from age-matched cohorts: juvenile delinquency as an expected feature of the normal distribution of prefrontal cerebral development.
A total of 36 male adolescent delinquents and 19 age-matched students from a male secondary school were administered several different performance-based tests. Although estimates of intelligence did not differ significantly between the groups, the incarcerated delinquents displayed more impulsivity, lower conceptual level, less conceptual flexibility, and poorer critical thinking than the reference group. The linear combination of only three variables, critical thinking, conceptual level, and numbers of errors during a conditioned spatial association task, correctly classified 89% of the 55 subjects. The results were considered consistent with the hypothesis that delayed or different development of complex functions associated with the left and (particularly) the right prefrontal cortices and their limbic inputs may be responsible for antisocial behavior. This variation will always be present due to the statistical variations in ontogeny and less than optimal parental structure within a consistent but small proportion of any generational cohort.
Laurentian University, Sudbury, Ontario, Canada P3E 2C6.
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D000293:Adolescent; D000987:Antisocial Personality Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000523:psychology; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D007604:Juvenile Delinquency / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000523:psychology*; D008032:Limbic System / Q000503:physiopathology; D008297:Male; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000503:physiopathology; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology*; D011594:Psychometrics