title: Evidence for a Heritable Brain Basis to Deviance-Promoting Deficits in Self-Control.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Classic criminological theories emphasize the role of impaired self-control in behavioral deviancy. Reduced amplitude of the P300 brain response is reliably observed in individuals with antisocial and substance-related problems, suggesting it may serve as a neurophysiological indicator of deficiencies in self-control that confer liability to deviancy.
  
  
  METHODS
  The current study evaluated the role of self-control capacity - operationalized by scores on a scale measure of trait disinhibition - in mediating the relationship between P300 brain response and behavioral deviancy in a sample of adult twins (N=419) assessed for symptoms of antisocial/addictive disorders and P300 brain response.
  
  
  RESULTS
  As predicted, greater disorder symptoms and higher trait disinhibition scores each predicted smaller P300 amplitude, and trait disinhibition mediated observed relations between antisocial/addictive disorders and P300 response. Further, twin modeling analyses revealed that trait disinhibition scores and disorder symptoms reflected a common genetic liability, and this genetic liability largely accounted for the observed phenotypic relationship between antisocial-addictive problems and P300 brain response.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These results provide further evidence that heritable weaknesses in self-control capacity confer liability to antisocial/addictive outcomes and that P300 brain response indexes this dispositional liability.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States.
authors.forename: James R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Yancey
authors.forename: Noah C
authors.initials: NC
authors.lastname: Venables
authors.forename: Brian M
authors.initials: BM
authors.lastname: Hicks
authors.forename: Christopher J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Patrick
keywords: Antisocial Behavior; Disinhibition; Externalizing; Genetics; P300; Self-Control