title: Dimensional assessment of psychopathy and its relationship with physiological responses to empathic images in juvenile offenders.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Many psychophysiological studies investigate whether psychopaths present low levels of electrodermal activity (EDA). However, despite evidence that varying degrees of psychopathy are normally distributed in the population, there is a paucity of EDA studies evaluating dimensionally. Moreover, although lack of empathy is a cornerstone of psychopathy, there has been a lack of studies using pictures of empathic emotional content to assess psychophysiological responses.
  
  
  METHODS
  We studied a population of young male delinquents (n = 30) from a detention center, using the Psychopathy Checklist Revised (PCL-R) to determine if higher levels of psychopathy were related to lesser degrees of EDA in response to emotion-eliciting pictures of empathic content.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There were significant correlations (p < 0.05) between latency and peak of EDA responses to unpleasant pictures and factor 1 scores, as well as between lability of EDA responses and factor 2 scores.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These results extend previous findings indicating direct relationship between EDA and psychopathy, and suggest that separate investigations of the two PCL-R factors have the potential to unravel more complex relationships between EDA and psychopathy. Also, by demonstrating such associations using emotion-provoking stimuli with empathic content, our results provide a link between levels of psychopathy and biological indices of empathic detachment.
authors.affiliation: Institute and Department of Psychiatry, University of São Paulo , São Paulo , Brazil ; Center for Interdisciplinary Research on Applied Neurosciences: NAPNA , São Paulo , Brazil.
authors.forename: Daniel Martins
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: de Barros
authors.forename: Alvaro Machado
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Dias
authors.forename: Antonio de Padua
authors.initials: Ade P
authors.lastname: Serafim
authors.forename: Gustavo Bonini
authors.initials: GB
authors.lastname: Castellana
authors.forename: Maria Fernanda Faria
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Achá
authors.forename: Geraldo F
authors.initials: GF
authors.lastname: Busatto
keywords: IAPS; electrophysiology; psychopathy; youngsters