Effects of Psychopathy on Moral Reasoning: A Behavioural and EEG Study Glen Carrigan MBPsS

Overview Philosophy Classic moral problems Past research Specific Neuro-imaging research Damage and trait psychopathy Current studies

Philosophy Kant (1724-1804) Deontology Mill (1806-1873) Utilitarianism Aquinas (1274) DDE Who is everyone else?

Detailed but vague enough for insight Classic Problems Dilemmas – Vignettes - Trolley Problem (Foot, 1967) - Violinist (Souder, 2003) - Violent images / Video (Decety & Cacioppo, 2013) - Virtual Reality / Neuroimaging Plausibility Avoid eccentricity Detailed but vague enough for insight Appropriate format

Behavioural Research Written Moral Dilemmas - Ratio - Victim - Difference

EEG Research Intention perception 60ms posterior superior temporal sulcus The perception of intentional harm was associated with better (90% vs. 71%) and faster reaction times than accidental harm (P 0.05). Also found in: Grafton 2009; Ortigue et al. 2009 Replicated in fMRI (Decety & Cacioppo, 2013)

fMRI Research Greene et al (2001; 2003; 2004) Brain with Region Associated moral task Other associated tasks Social Pathology from damage Likely function Medial frontal gyrus (BA/9/10) Personal, impersonal and simple moral judgments. Emotional planning, emotional autobio recall, happy/sad recognition. Poor practical judgment, reactive aggression, diminished empathy & social knowledge. Integration of emotion into decision making and planning. Posterior cingulate precuneus, retrospenial cortex (BA 31/7) Disgusted, sad faces, negative event recognition, sad autobio recall (men) emotional planning. Impaired recognition for faces, Capgras delusion. Integration of emotion, imagery, coherent social narratives. Superior temporal sulcus, inferior parietal lobe (BA 39) Personal, simple moral judgments. Biological emotion, emotional film viewing s recall. Impaired judgment from eye gaze, Capgras delusion. Supporting representations of social significance Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (BA 9/ 10/ 46); Parietal lobe (BA 7/ 40) Impersonal moral judgments. Working memory and other cognitive tasks. Less emotional bias requiring cognitive control. Modulating emtional and cognitive responses to moral problems Greene et al (2001; 2003; 2004)

Damage & trait psychopathy Phineas Gage (Prehn & Heekeren, 2009; Gleichgerecht et al 2011; Moretto et al 2010) Damage to VMPC increases utilitarianism especially in 1 v 5 (Koenigs et al, 2007). Reduced compassion, shame, guilt and empathy. Healthy participants. > trait psychoticism correlates with need for cognition < empathic concern (Weich, 2012) Healthy participants. > trait psychoticism associates with diminished early recognition of emotional salience. Reduced emotional modulation of late positive potential (LPP, 400–600 ms) & EAP.

Study 1 - Behavioural Online Psychopathy, healthy population Psychoticism Branch 1 Dilemmas Filler Branch 2 Online Psychopathy, healthy population Visual, video, written Instrumental (intentional) Incidental (accidental) Answers and reaction time

Study 2 - EEG Layout High / Low participants Written or images, Instrumental / incidental Answers, ERPs and reaction times Issues - Online vs laboratory to collect reaction times across studies - Visual processing for Written vs Image based problems - Stimuli and ERP analysis anomalies

Summary Caution High trait psychoticism in healthy participants, like diagnosed psychopathy and damage, may produce diminished empathic concern (emotional recognition and cognitive conflict) in response to moral instrumental and incidental dilemmas. This may strengthen the association between high psychoticism traits and utilitarianism whilst further elucidating those implicated cognitive process as evidenced by particular ERP components.

Questions?

References Aquinas, T. (1952). The summa theologica (fathers of the english dominican province, trans.). In W. Benton (Series Ed.), Great Books Series: Vol. 19. Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc. (Original work published 1274). Carolan, L. P., Jaspers-Fayer, F., Asmaro, T. D., Douglas, S. K., & Liotti, M. (2013). Electrophsiology of blunted emotional bias in psychopathic personality. Psychophysiology, 1-6. Damasio, A. R. (2007). Damage to the prefrontal cortex increases utilitarian moral judgments. Nature, 446, 908–911. Decety, J., & Cacioppo. (2012) The speed of morality: a high-density electrical neuroimaging study. Journal of Neurophysiology, 108, pp, 3068-3072 Foot. (1967). The problem of abortion and the doctrine of double effect. Oxford Review, 5, 5–15. Gleichgerrcht E, Torralva T, Roca M, Pose M, Manes F. (2011). The role of social cognition in moral judgment in frontotemporal dementia. Social Neuroscience, 6, 113–122.

Greene, J. D. , Nystrom, L. E. , Engell, A. D. , Darley, J. M Greene, J. D., Nystrom, L. E., Engell, A. D., Darley, J. M., & Cohen, J. D. (2004). The Neural Bases of Cognitive Conflict and Control in Moral Judgment, 44, 389–400. Kant, I. (1959). Foundation of the Metaphysics of Morals. Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis, IN Koenigs, M., Young, L., Adolphs, R., Tranel, D., Cushman, F., Hauser, M., & Mill, J.S. (1998). Utilitarianism, R. Crisp, ed. New York: Oxford University Press. Moretto, G., La`davas, E., Mattioli, F. &, di Pellegrino, G. (2010). A psychophysiological investigation of moral judgment after ventromedial prefrontal damage. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 22, 1888–1899. Souder, L. (2003). What are we to think about thought experiments? Argumentation, 17(2), 203-217. Wiech, Kahane, Shackel, Farias, Savulescu & Tracey. (2012). Cold or calculating? Reduced activity in the subgenual cingulated cortex reflects decreased emotional aversion to harming in counterintuitive utilitarian judgment. Cognition, 126, 3, 364-372.