Deficient response modulation and emotion processing in low-anxious Caucasian psychopathic offenders: results from a lexical decision task.
The clinical and research literatures on psychopathy have identified an emotion paradox: Psychopaths display normal appraisal but impaired use of emotion cues. Using R. D. Hare's (1991) Psychopathy Checklist-Revised and the G. S. Welsh Anxiety Scale (1956), the authors identified low-anxious psychopaths and controls and examined predictions concerning their performance on a lexical-decision task. Results supported all the predictions: (a) low-anxious psychopaths appraised emotion cues as well as controls; (b) their lexical decisions were relatively unaffected by emotion cues; (c) their lexical decisions were relatively unaffected by affectively neutral word-frequency cues; and (d) their performance deficits were specific to conditions involving right-handed responses. The authors propose that deficient response modulation may underlie both the emotional and cognitive deficits associated with low-anxious psychopaths.
Lorenz
Amanda R
AR
Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 53706, USA.
Newman
Joseph P
JP
D000328:Adult; D000987:Antisocial Personality Disorder / Q000523:psychology*; D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology*; D001364:Awareness; D003210:Concept Formation; D003463:Cues; D004644:Emotions / Q000145:classification; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010153:Paired-Associate Learning; D010555:Personality Inventory; D011329:Prisoners / Q000523:psychology*; D011578:Psycholinguistics; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D011930:Reaction Time; D011932:Reading; D012660:Semantics; D012938:Social Perception