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Human Brain Mapping 00:00–00 (2015)
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Socioemotional Processing of Morally-Laden
Behavior and Their Consequences on Others in
Forensic Psychopaths
Jean Decety,1,2* Chenyi Chen,1 Carla L. Harenski,3 and Kent A. Kiehl3,4,5,6
1
Department of Psychology, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, 5848 S. University
Avenue, Chicago, Illinois
2
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Chicago, Chicago,
Illinois, 5848 S. University Avenue, Chicago, Illinois
3
The Nonprofit Mind Research Network, An affiliate of Lovelace Biomedical and
Environmental Research Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico
4
Department of Psychology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico
5
Department of Neuroscience, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico
6
Department of Law, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico
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Abstract: A large body of evidence supports the view that psychopathy is associated with anomalous
emotional processing, reduced guilt and empathy, which are important risk factors for criminal behaviors. However, the precise nature and specificity of this atypical emotional processing is not well
understood, including its relation to moral judgment. To further our understanding of the pattern of
neural response to perceiving and evaluating morally-laden behavior, this study included 155 criminal
male offenders with various level of psychopathy, as assessed with the Psychopathy Check ListRevised. Participants were scanned while viewing short clips depicting interactions between two individuals resulting in either interpersonal harm or interpersonal assistance. After viewing each clip, they
were asked to identify the emotions of the protagonists. Inmates with high levels of psychopathy were
more accurate than controls in successfully identifying the emotion of the recipient of both helpful and
harmful actions. Significant hemodynamic differences were detected in the posterior superior temporal
sulcus, amygdala, insula, ventral striatum, and prefrontal cortex when individuals with high psychopathy viewed negative versus positive scenarios moral scenarios and when they evaluated the emotional
responses of the protagonists. These findings suggest that socioemotional processing abnormalities in
psychopathy may be somewhat more complicated than merely a general or specific emotional deficit.
Rather, situation-specific evaluations of the mental states of others, in conjunction with sensitivity to
the nature of the other (victim vs. perpetrator), modulate attention to emotion-related cues. Such atypical processing likely impacts moral decision-making and behavior in psychopaths. Hum Brain Mapp
C 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
V
00:000–000, 2015.
Additional Supporting Information may be found in the online
version of this article.
Conflict of interest: Drs. Decety, Chen, Harenski and Kiehl have
no conflicts of interest to disclose.
Contract grant sponsor: NIMH R01; Contract grant number:
MH087525; Contract grant sponsor: NIMH R01; Contract grant
number: MH070539
*Correspondence to: Jean Decety; Department of Psychology and
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience,
C 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
V
University of Chicago, 5848 S. University Avenue, Chicago,
Illinois 60637. E-mail: decety@uchicago.edu
Received for publication 9 January 2015; Revised 19 January 2015;
Accepted 20 January 2015.
DOI: 10.1002/hbm.22752
Published online 00 Month 2015 in Wiley Online Library
(wileyonlinelibrary.com).
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Decety et al.
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Key words: emotion; empathy; moral evaluation; psychopathy; decision-making; temporoparietal junction; insula; ventromedial prefrontal cortex; ventral striatum
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mental states, there some evidence suggesting that psychopathy is inversely associated with empathic accuracy,
which is the inference of another person’s emotional state
[Brook and Kosson, 2013; Brook et al., 2013]. One study
found that inmates with elevated psychopathic traits were
deficient in inferring affective states (emotions) but not
cognitive states (beliefs) in a theory of mind task [ShamayTsoory et al., 2010]. These cognitive aspects of emotional
understanding are closely related to processes involved in
theory of mind, the capacity to infer the explicit content of
others’ mental states such as intentions and beliefs.
Neuroimaging and lesion studies converge to indicate that
the posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS) cortex at the
junction with the temporal parietal cortex (TPJ) and medial
prefrontal cortex are essential to the perception of intentionality and mental states of others, as well as cognitive
empathy [Decety and Lamm, 2007; Gallagher and Frith,
2003; Lamm et al., 2007; Moll et al., 2007; Saxe et al., 2004;
Silani et al., 2013; Yoder and Decety, 2014a]. Atypical
information processing in this network in people with psychopathy when viewing others’ morally-laden actions may
have downstream consequences that can impact their
moral judgment and interpersonal behaviors.
Overall, while research clearly indicates atypical emotion processing in psychopathy, the nature of these deficits
and how they relate to moral cognition are still a matter of
discussion. In addition, neuroimaging studies of moral
judgment in psychopathy have shown that psychopaths
often make the same moral evaluations as nonpsychopaths, but use different brain circuits to do so [Aharoni et
al., 2012]. But atypical neural response is found in several
regions involved in moral decision-making, particularly
the amygdala, pSTS/TPJ and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) [Harenski et al., 2010]. Thus, while psychopaths show abnormal brain activation during moral
judgment, it is not understood why, or in which contexts.
In particular, there is little neurobiological work regarding
where such abnormalities originate, especially when the
emotions of others are perceived in social contexts. Finally,
while many theories consider that psychopaths’ cognitive
deficits are secondary to their abnormal emotion processing systems, a number of studies have documented
situation-specific abnormalities in attention, which could
account for psychopaths’ socioemotional deficiencies
[Newman and Lorenz, 2003; Newman et al., 2011]. Thus,
explicitly requiring psychopaths to focus their attention on
the emotional consequences of others’ actions may modulate the neural processing of affective cues that are critical
in for moral decision-making. The study of basic socioemotional processes underlying implicit moral evaluations
INTRODUCTION
Most social interactions hinge on the degree to which
individuals understand one another’s emotional and cognitive states and process general socioemotional information.
The study of psychopathy, a construct characterized by
symptoms of emotional detachment, a propensity of disinhibited impulsive conduct, combined with a general callousness and lack of insight for the impact such actions
have on others [Cleckley, 1941], can generate valuable information for our understanding of how affective and cognitive computations are integrated when perceiving morallyladen behaviors. Over the past 50 years, the field of psychopathy research has been dominated by clinical descriptions and theories that emphasize emotional deficits as core
features of this disorder [Kiehl, 2014]. A growing body of
evidence supports the view that psychopathy is associated
with anomalous emotional processing, and deficits in empathy, which are important risk factors for criminal and violent behaviors [Anderson and Kiehl, 2011; Blair, 2007;
Decety and Michalska, 2012; Rogstad and Rogers, 2008;
Seara-Cardoso and Viding, 2014]. The level of specificity of
this atypical emotional and empathetic processing is not
well understood, and both behavioral and neuroscience
studies have reported mixed results [Book et al., 2007; Glass
and Newman, 2006; Hastings et al., 2008; Lishner et al.,
2012; Pham and Philippot, 2010, Seara-Cardoso et al., 2012].
However, most neuroimaging studies do report abnormal
neural processing in the perception and recognition of elicited emotions of others in psychopathy [Dawel et al., 2012;
Decety, Skelly, Yoyer and Kiehl, 2014; Marsh, 2013].
There is also solid evidence for the role of emotion in
moral judgment [Haidt and Graham, 2007]. Importantly,
moral insensitivity in psychopathy is often attributed to callousness and lack of empathy [e.g., Blair, 1997; Decety and
Cowell, 2014a; Cheng et al., 2012; Harenski and Kiehl, 2011;
Maibom, 2009]. Empathy, the natural ability to perceive
and be sensitive to the emotional states of others coupled
with a motivation to care for their well-being is a multifaceted construct that is comprised of affective, motivational,
and cognitive components [Batson, 2012; Decety and
Jackson, 2004; Decety, 2015]. While there is general agreement that both the emotional and motivational components
of empathy are affected in psychopathy [Decety and Skelly,
2014; Decety et al., 2013a; Seara-Cardoso and Viding, 2014],
there is extensive debate regarding whether or not cognitive
empathy is impaired and how this impairment impacts
moral cognition and behavior.
Despite the general consensus that psychopaths have an
intact ability to make inferences about another person’s
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Socioemotional Processing of Morally-Laden Behavior
Participants were included if they met the following criteria: age > 18 or < 55 years, fluent in English, reading level
higher than 4th grade, IQ score higher than 80, no history
of seizures, no prior head injury with loss of consciousness > 30 min, current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of
Mental Disorders (4th ed.; American Psychiatric
Association, 1994), Axis I diagnosis, no lifetime history of
a psychotic disorder or psychotic disorder in a first degree
relative, and no current alcohol or drug use.
of others’ behaviors and the identification of the affective
consequences of their actions is quite critical, as it is generally believed that the psychopath may be quite skilled in
understanding another person’s perspective and may be
uniquely adept in their ability to manipulate others [Book
et al., 2007], with significant implications for legal proceedings, justice, and the law [Maibom, 2008].
In this study, instead of using complex moral dilemmas
that pit consequentialism versus deontology (which are
unlikely to happen to most people) or static pictures that
evoke moral feelings (which are very simple), we used
more ecologically valid dynamic visual scenarios depicting
either intentional interpersonal harm or interpersonal
assistance. Brain response was measured when participants viewed these scenarios and subsequently evaluated
the emotional states of the protagonists. The general emotional deficit theory predicts that psychopathy should be
associated with deficits in affective processing during
implicit moral evaluation of outcomes of the actions, as
well as during the inference of the emotional state of the
protagonists. Conversely, the specific emotional deficit
theory predicts selective impairment in processing negative affect such as sadness and distress, and in the present
study for inferring the emotional states of victims of harm.
Task Design
A set of 48 dynamic visual stimuli depicting ecologically
valid dyadic social interactions that resulted in either harm
or assistance (e.g., pulling hair or helping up off of the
floor) was used. Importantly, the faces of protagonists were
not visible; thus, there was no emotional reaction of either
protagonist visible to participants. Three still frames were
extracted from each clip and presented in succession to create apparent motion (1,000, 200, and 1,000 ms, respectively).
The stimuli had been previously assessed and validated
with 91 subjects (43 males and 48 females; age 25 6 10.5
years) who rated with seven-point Likert scales the outcome
of the actions, their valence, and motives of the acting
agent, and have also been used in functional MRI (fMRI)
and high-density EEG/ERPs studies with healthy participants [Yoder and Decety, 2014a].
In the scanner, participants were shown the morallyladen scenarios. Following each scenario, and separated by
a jittered ISI, a final screen was presented depicting either
the agent or the recipient of the previously shown action
and an emotional face of either the perpetrator/agent or
victim/beneficiary of the action. Participants were
instructed to identify how likely the emotional state of the
specified target (perpetrator/agent or victim/beneficiary
of the action) matched the provided face using a visual
analog scale (Fig. 1 e.g., on the experimental procedure). A
total of six evenly distributed facial expressions (sad,
happy, angry, fearful, pain, and disgust) were used in the
emotional state evaluations of the scenarios. The order of
harm/assistance scenarios and the match between scenarios and facial expressions was randomized with the same
number of same-sex/different sex pairs.
The confidence rating was determined by the absolute
value of each participant’s response on the scale (SR)
minus 3 (| SR-3 |). The SR was derived from the original
rating subjects provided (i.e., higher rating 5 larger SR,
ranging from 0 to 6). Both “very likely” and “very unlikely” were considered as confident responses. Hence, the
single-trial confidence was assessed with participants’ ratings of emotional states as “very likely” or “very unlikely”
of how the person in the clip would be feeling.
Analysis of the participants ratings during the identification of emotions showed a wide distribution from very
certain (very likely or very unlikely) to very ambiguous
(perhaps or doubtful). Hence, a trial-to-trial analysis was
applied, using the single-trial confidence for each
MATERIAL AND METHODS
Participants
One hundred fifty-five adult males between the ages of 19
and 54, incarcerated in a medium-security North American
correctional facility, volunteered for the study and provided
informed consent to the procedures described here, which
were approved by the Institutional Review Boards of the
University of New Mexico and the University of Chicago.
Participants underwent the PCL-R assessment, a reliable and
valid instrument, designed to assess psychopathic traits such
as antisocial behavior, shallowness, impulsivity, callousness,
criminal history, and lack of moral emotions, based on evidence obtained from medical and juridical records and documents, as well as extensive interviews with the forensic
patients. The PCL-R assessment was conducted by trained
and qualifies research professionals. Participants scoring 30
and above on the PCL-R were assigned to the highpsychopathy group (n 5 38; age 32.4 6 6.6; IQ 97 6 13.1),
which was the primary target of the study. To create the
medium- and low-psychopathy groups, two groups of volunteers were matched to high scorers on age, race and ethnicity, IQ (WAIS), comorbidity for DSM-IV Axis II disorders,
and past drug abuse and dependence, from pools of inmates
scoring between 21 and 29 (n 5 67; age 33.1 6 7.6; IQ
98.72 6 13.82), and those scoring below 20 on the PCL-R
(n=50; age 31.6 6 7; IQ 97.42 6 13.38), respectively. The latter
group was used as the control group. There was no difference between groups in terms of IQ [F (2,152) 5 0.69, P 5 0.5]
and age [F (2,152) 5 0.24, P 5 0.79]. Participants were paid at
a rate consistent with the facility hourly labor wage.
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Decety et al.
participant as a parametric modulator of the conditiondependent BOLD responses to response making at the
single-subject level. Contrast images from these first-level
models were then introduced into a one-sample t test at the
second level to test for group effects. Each viewing trial
lasted 2.2 s and consisted of one scenario, and interstimuli
intervals were jittered between 4.6 and 14.1 s. Each emotional identification trial was time-locked to a cropped
frame following each clip to target either the agent/perpetrator or recipient/victim. These durations were jittered
between 3.8 and 9.1 s. The interstimulus interval between
the viewing phase of the trial and the emotional expression
judgment phase of the trial jittered between 0.79 and 6.01 s.
Finally, participants’ subjective responses were modeled
using each trial’s reaction time as well as the single-trial
confidence. Timing parameters were generated using a
genetic optimization algorithm [Wager and Nichols, 2003].
Eye-tracking was monitored in the scanner to ensure
that participants were paying attention to the stimuli.
Prescan practice and postscan debriefings were also conducted to ensure that participants followed the instructions and understood the task.
MRI Acquisition: Scanning was conducted on a 1.5 Tesla
Siemens Magnetom Avanto mobile unit equipped with
advanced SQ gradients and a 12 element head coil.
Functional images were collected using an EPI gradientecho pulse sequence with TR/TE 5 2,000/39 ms, flip
angle 5 90 , field of view 5 240 3 240 mm, matrix 5 64 3
64 cm, in-plane resolution 5 3.4 3 3.4 mm, slice
thickness 5 5 mm, and 30 slices, full-brain coverage. Task
presentation was implemented using the commercial software package E-Prime 1.0 (Psychology Software Tools,
Pittsburgh PA).
High-resolution T1-weighted structural MRI scans were
acquired using a multiecho MPRAGE pulse sequence (repetition time 5 2,530 ms, echo times 5 1.64, 3.50, 5.36, and 7.22 ms,
inversion
time 5 1,100
ms,
flip
angle 5 7 ,
slice
thickness 5 1.3 mm, matrix size 5 256 3 256) yielding 128 sagittal slices with an in-plane resolution of 1.0 mm 3 1.0 mm.
Figure 1.
Accuracy rates from the 20% of trials in which the facial expressions of the protagonists were congruent with the outcome of the
behavior shown in the clip, such as an angry face for a perpetrator
of a harmful action, or a pained face for a victim of a harmful
action. Both the perpetrator and victim are provided in the figure
to illustrate all potential task mappings. However, only one face
appeared in each trial during the scanning session. Participants
with high psychopathy scores, compared to participants with low
psychopathy scores (79 6 5% vs. 72 6 4%) identified the emotional states of a victim/recipient more accurately, but were less
accurate (65 6 6% vs. 73 6 5%) in identifying the emotional states
of a perpetrator (P < 0.05). [Color figure can be viewed in the
online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]
regressors (viewing harm; viewing help; identifying the
emotional reaction to harm for perpetrator; identifying the
emotional reaction to harm for victim; identifying the emotional reaction to help for recipient; identifying the emotional reaction to help for agent; confidence during
response making) representing the event onsets and their
time and dispersion derivatives. Single-trial confidence
was parametrically modeled (ranging from 0.0007 to
1.6432; mean 5 0.4419; SD =0.3127) for the “confidence
during response making” regressor.
Movement parameters from the realignment output were
included as regressors of no interest. All participants were
entered into a second-level pooled analysis, and full brain
activations were thresholded voxelwise at P < 0.005 and with
an extent threshold k > 20 based on Gaussian random fields
set to control the whole-brain false discovery rate (FDR) rate
at P < 0.05. For analysis of group differences, participants
with PCL-R total score at or above 30 were included in the
Image Processing and Analysis
Functional images were processed with SPM8 (Wellcome
Department of Imaging Neuroscience, London, UK) in
Matlab (Mathworks, Sherborn, MA). For each participant,
functional data were realigned to the first image acquisition
of the series and resampled to a voxel size of 2 3 232 mm3.
Structural T1 images were coregistered to the mean functional image and segmented using the ‘New Segment’ routine. A group-level structural template and individual flow
fields were created using DARTEL, and the flow fields were
in turn used to spatially normalize functional images to
standard MNI space. Data were smoothed with an 8 mm
full-width at half maximum isotropic Gaussian kernel.
Statistics were calculated at the first level using the general linear model. The design matrix included seven
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Socioemotional Processing of Morally-Laden Behavior
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increase in the network of regions involved in moral
valence evaluation (k > 10, P < 0.05, FDR corrected). Regions
with greater activity when viewing scenarios depicting
interpersonal assistance vs. interpersonal harm included the
middle and inferior temporal gyri, vlPFC, dlPFC, vmPFC,
dmPFC, insula, and hippocampus (Supporting Information
Table I). The reverse contrast showed increased signal during scenarios depicting interpersonal harm in the midcingulate cortex, precuneus, right pSTS/TPJ. When participants
made a decision about inferring the emotional states of the
protagonists, a similar pattern of response was observed,
with the addition of the supplementary motor area (SMA),
thalamus, inferior frontal gyrus and fusiform gyrus, in the
interpersonal harm vs. interpersonal assistance condition
(Supporting Information Table II). Parametric modulation
of single-trial difficulty showed that when a decision was
more difficult to make, greater activation was found in the
right fusiform gyrus.
psychopathy group, while participants scoring at 20 or below
comprised the incarcerated control group.
Finally, mean activity within a 6 mm-radius sphere
(FWE-corrected, P < 0.05) was extracted from predefined
regions of interest (ROIs) using the MarsBar toolbox.
Coordinates for the ROIs (pSTS/TPJ: x 5 66, y 5 234, z 5 8;
dmPFC: x 5 25, y 5 54, z 5 34; vmPFC: x 5 4, y 5 58, z 5 28;
dlPFC: x 5 54, y 5 20, z 5 16; right anterior insula: x 5 36,
y 5 22, z 5 28; right amygdala: x 5 22, y 5 22, z 5 216)
were taken from a recent meta-analysis of fMRI studies of
morality [Bzdok et al., 2012] as well as a previous fMRI
study of affective perspective taking in 121 male incarcerated participants (dlPFC: x 5 48, y 5 30, z 5 0) [Decety et al.,
2013a]. An additional ROI for the ventral striatum (x 5 210,
y 5 10, z 5 22) was taken from a recent meta-analysis of
fMRI studies [Diekhof et al., 2012] to examine the atypical
processing in antisocial personality disorders.
RESULTS
Behavioral Evaluations in the Scanner
Regions of Interest Analyses
Results from an analysis of variance (ANOVA) with moral
valence of the scenarios (harmful vs. helpful) and agency
(agent vs. recipient) as within-subject variables and group
(high psychopathy group vs. low psychopathy group) as the
between-subject variable, revealed a main effect of moral
valence [F (1, 86) 5 136.5, P < 0.001] qualified by an interaction between moral valence and agency [F (1, 86) 5 19.65,
P < 0.001] on behavioral ratings in the scanner. The emotional states of the protagonists were easier for participants
to identify in scenarios depicting harmful actions
(Mean 6 S.E.: 2.76 6 0.026), compared to scenarios depicting
helpful actions (2.4 6 0.031). Post hoc comparisons showed
that participants were more confident in evaluating the emotional states of a victim after viewing interpersonal harm
than the emotional state of a beneficiary in interpersonal
helping. No significant effects of PCL-R scores were found in
confidence ratings. Accuracy rate was assessed for 20% of
the trials where the facial expressions of the agent and of the
recipient matched in terms of expected outcomes of the
behavior (i.e., an angry perpetrator, victim expressing pain).
Results from a 2 (moral valence) 3 2 (agency) 3 2 (group)
Repeated Measures ANOVA revealed a significant interaction between group and agency [F (1, 86) 5 2.93, one-tailed
P < 0.05] on accuracy scores. Post hoc comparisons showed
that high psychopathy participants compared to low psychopathy participants (79 6 5% vs. 72 6 4%) identified the
emotional states of a recipient more accurately but were less
accurate (65 6 6% vs. 73 6 5%) in identifying the emotional
states of an agent (Fig. 1).
Results from the ROI analyses are presented in Tables I and
II. When participants with low scores on the PCL-R were
compared with individuals scoring high on the PCL-R during
the viewing phase of the harmful vs. helpful scenarios, greater
response was detected in right pSTS/TPJ, dmPFC, and bilaterally in dlPFC, temporal pole and anterior cingulate cortex
(ACC). The opposite pattern was found (high psychopathy > low psychopathy) when participants inferred the emotional states of the protagonists elicited by harmful actions
compared to helpful actions (Fig. 2). When participants identified the emotional states of others (either agent and recipient),
high psychopathy was associated with bilateral increased
activity in the pSTS/TPJ, dmPFC, dlPFC, vlPFC, hippocampus, amygdala, and ACC (Fig. 2). Importantly, during the
identification of the emotional state of an agent/perpetrator,
individuals with low scores on the PCL-R compared with
individuals with high scores on the PCL-R, showed greater
signal change in the anterior insula, vmPFC, dlPFC, and right
pSTS/TPJ, consistent with previous studies on perceiving
intentional harm (Decety and Porges, 2011; Decety, et al.,
2012; Yoder and Decety, 2014a). Conversely, participants with
high scores on the PCL-R (>30) show decreased signal in all
regions (see Fig. 3, bottom).
When inferring the emotional states of a victim of harm,
those with high scores on psychopathy showed increased
signal in bilateral TPJ, amygdala, dlPFC, dmPFC, ACC and
vlPFC. Participants with low levels of psychopathy exhibited an attenuation of response in these regions (Fig. 3, top).
Neurohemodynamic Response to the Scenarios
Correlation Analysis Between PCL-R Scores and
Signal Change in ROIs
The entire sample of 155 participants (regardless of their
psychopathy level) showed significant neurohemodynamic
To examine psychopathy from a dimensional perspective rather that a categorical one, PCL-R scores
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Decety et al.
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TABLE I. Groupwise results and PCL-R correlations from harmful > helpful contrasts when participants viewed
morally-laden scenarios and identified the emotional states of the protagonists
MNI coordinates
Region of interest
x
y
DIRECT COMPARISON BETWEEN VIEWING AND
Viewing > identifying
L
Lingual gyrus
212
L
Posterior cingulate cortex
26
L
Middle temporal gyurs
258
L
Precentral gyrus
260
—
ventromedial prefrontal cortex
22
—
ventromedial prefrontal cortex
14
R
Supramarginal gyrus
52
Identifying > viewing
L
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
252
L
anterior insula
236
L
dorsomedial prefrontal cortex
212
L
Superior temporal gyrus
254
L
pSTS
250
L
Inferior parietal lobule
242
—
anterior cingulate cortex
0
R
pSTS
52
R
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
46
R
Superior temporal gyrus
44
R
dorsomedial prefrontal cortex
2
R
Precentral gyrus
26
R
Lingual gyrus
14
VIEWING MORALLY-LADEN BEHAVIORS
Controls > Psychopaths
L
Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
248
L
Temporal pole
252
L
Dorsomedial prefrontal cortex
28
L
Anterior cingulate cortex
212
R
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
48
R
pSTS/TPJ
60
R
precentral gyrus
R
temporal pole
Psychopaths > Controls
L
postcentral gyrus
224
IDENTIFYING EMOTIONAL STATES
Controls > psychopaths
L
postcentral gyrus
224
Psychopaths > controls
L
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
256
—
dorsomedial prefrontal cortex
24
R
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
46
R
pSTS/TPJ
60
R
precentral gyrus
PCL-R Factor 1
z
Peak T
x
y
z
Peak T
IDENTIFYING MORALLY-LADEN BEHAVIORS
274
246
262
10
58
42
224
22
32
10
32
210
212
30
4.83
3.67
3.52
3.43
2.09*
2.84
3.28
36
18
32
218
236
230
2
242
12
224
24
232
284
26
24
48
24
16
32
28
6
26
6
44
70
26
3.59
3.44
3.98
4.73
3.6
3.18
3.37
2.57*
3.97
4.47
3.66
3.18
2.96
38
2
54
28
30
230
0
26
34
18
0
8
3.2
3.44
2.19*
3.99
3.21*
2.61*
n.s.
n.s.
242
48
4.13
240
50
4.35
224
240
48
32
50
26
234
10
32
0
8
2.63*
3.07*
2.74*
2.25*
n.s.
256
22
50
56
56
34
50
24
230
26
10
32
16
10
18
252
252
28
212
48
56
58
58
38
4
38
28
24
230
28
6
4
24
40
18
2
10
16
0
22.75*
24.35
23.76
23.76
23.74
24.29
24.11
23.5
n.s.
23.46
3.01*
3.45
3.16
3.86
3.81
Negative and positive peak T-values represent negative and positive correlations, respectively. All clusters are significant at FDRcorrected P < 0.05 [thresholded at P < 0.005, cut-off, t 5 2.608 (uncorrected) with a spatial extent threshold of k > 20], except those
marked with a star, which are taken from a priori predefined ROIs and significant at uncorrected P < 0.05. The FDR correction is used
for exploratory purposes only as some have argued that it underestimates Type I error.
phase, but was directly related to signal change in
right pSTS/TPJ (b 5 0.28, P < 0.001) and dmPFC
(b 5 0.25, P 5 0.001) during the identification phase of
the protagonists (Fig. 2).
were computed as a continuous variable and related
to signal change. PCL-R Factor 1 inversely predicted
response in right pSTS/TPJ (b 5 20.35, P < 0.001) and
dmPFC (b 5 20.27, P 5 0.001) during the viewing
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TABLE II. Groupwise results and PCL-R correlations on harmful > helpful contrast when participants identified the
emotional states of the recipient/victim and the agent/perpetrator involved in the morally laden scenarios
MNI coordinates
Region of interest
x
y
PCL-R total scores
z
DIRECT COMPARISON BETWEEN AGENT AND RECIPIENT SENARIOS
Recipient > agent
L
anterior insula
236
14
214
—
ventromedial prefrontal cortex
14
38
22
R
anterior cingulate cortex
12
36
22
R
anterior insula
46
22
22
Agent > recipient
L
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
252
40
0
L
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
244
32
30
L
Fusiform gyrus
242
254
220
L
Angular gyrus
242
266
38
L
TPJ
256
250
36
—
Mid cingulate cortex
8
234
36
R
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
50
18
36
R
pSTS
48
246
14
R
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
42
20
34
R
Occipital cortex
46
268
28
R
TPJ
58
232
34
R
Fusiform gyrus
48
256
218
R
Angular gyrus
46
262
26
IDENTIFYING EMOTIONAL STATE OF AN AGENT/PERPETRATOR
Controls > psychopaths
L
anterior insula
234
12
28
—
ventromedial prefrontal cortex
26
58
24
R
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
50
22
34
R
pSTS/TPJ
46
246
12
Psychopaths > controls
L
amygdala
226
0
226
L
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
252
38
0
L
dorsomedial prefrontal cortex
24
48
32
R
hippocampus
30
238
22
R
temporal pole
30
6
218
R
anterior cingulate cortex
12
34
14
R
SMA
16
28
54
IDENTIFYING EMOTIONAL STATE OF A RECIPIENT/VICTIM
Controls > psychopaths
L
postcentral gyrus
224
240
50
Psychopaths > controls
L
pSTS/TPJ
242
246
18
L
dorsomedial prefrontal cortex
22
50
32
L
anterior cingulate cortex
210
28
20
R
hippocampus
30
238
22
R
amygdala
30
2
220
R
ventrolateral prefrontal cortex
40
38
26
R
pSTS/TPJ
58
230
8
R
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
54
20
16
Peak T
x
y
z
Peak T
2.4*
1.91*
2.62*
3.28
236
14
52
46
14
38
24
246
210
22
32
12
22.46*
22.84*
22.67*
23.16
3.1
2.76*
3.2
4.46
3.42
3.23
3.71
226
246
22
30
30
12
16
0
38
50
238
6
34
28
226
0
32
22
220
12
54
3.12
2.34*
3.46
3.48
3.92
2.78
3.94
3.39
224
240
50
2.99
2.81*
3.09
4.67
2.33*
2.61
2.30*
2.46*
260
22
28
32
30
42
58
52
230
48
26
240
2
40
230
22
18
34
20
24
220
28
8
20
2.15*
2.46*
2.89
3.11
2.24*
3.36
4.95
5.14
4.06
4.92
3.19*
2.06*
3.82
5.74
3.08
4.59
5.52
23.19
2.93
3.7
3.26
3.76
3.01
3.05
3.3
2.24*
Negative and positive peak T-values represent negative and positive correlations, respectively. All clusters are significant at FDRcorrected P < 0.05 [thresholded at P < 0.005, cut-off, t 5 2.608 (uncorrected) with a spatial extent threshold], except those marked with a
star, which are taken from predefined ROIs and significant at uncorrected P < 0.05.
PCL-R total score negatively
namic response in dlPFC during
perpetrator doing the harmful
(b 5 20.21, P 5 0.009). Activity in
positively associated with PCL-R total score (b 5 0.258,
P 5 0.001) when participants identified the emotions of the
victim in harmful vs. helpful scenarios. Finally, a positive
association was found between the response in the ventral
predicted the hemodymoral evaluation of the
versus helpful actions
the right pSTS/TPJ was
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Decety et al.
ber of striking differences were detected in neural
response patterns between high and low psychopaths. At
the whole group level, viewing harmful vs. helpful actions
and evaluating the emotional states of the protagonists of
those actions was associated with increased activity in the
insula, ACC, SMA, dorsomedial and dorsolateral PFC,
temporal pole, inferior frontal gyrus, and pSTS/TPJ, and
was stronger in the right hemisphere. This pattern of
response is consistent with previous neuroimaging studies
using similar stimuli with nonforensic populations [Decety
et al., 2012; Yoder and Decety, 2014a].
In individuals with high psychopathy, when viewing
harmful vs. helpful scenarios, the first segment of the task,
the neural response was significantly reduced in the right
pSTS/TPJ, dmPFC, dlPFC, temporal pole, and ACC (Fig.
2). These regions are involved in extracting the intentions
and mental states of others, which is required for moral
judgment [Decety and Lamm, 2007; Pelphrey et al., 2004;
Saxe et al., 2004; Yoder and Decety, 2014a]. Additionally,
an inverse association between the neural responses to
harmful versus helpful actions in this network during
viewing the scenarios was found with PCL-R Factor 1
which clusters the interpersonal/affective aspects of psychopathy. This finding supports the theory that psychopaths suffer from a general deficit in both emotional and
cognitive processing, but not necessarily in the case of positively valenced actions, as previously reported by Brook
and Kosson [2013]. However, during the emotional evaluation segment of the task (identifying the emotional states
of the individuals interacting), there was a significant
increase of activity in right pSTS/TPJ, dmPFC, dlPFC, temporal pole, and anterior midcingulate cortex for individuals scoring high on psychopathy compared with those
scoring low. In addition, when high psychopaths evaluated the emotional consequences of harmful actions for a
victim, there was an augmentation of the hemodynamic
activity bilaterally in the pSTS/TPJ, hippocampus, amygdala, and ACC. This shift in the pattern of response fits
well with the attentional theory of psychopathy [Newman
and Lorenz, 2003]. Such a pattern, which could be viewed
as compensatory neural activity in brain regions extracting
intentionality and emotional saliency, may explain why
psychopaths were not impaired in behavioral ratings of
the scenarios’ agents and could distinguish the moral
valence of the actions.
Moreover, and most interestingly, differential neural
response detected in individuals scoring high in psychopathy depended on whether the target of emotional identification was a victim or a perpetrator of a harmful action
(Fig. 3). When focusing on a perpetrator vs. a victim
engaging in harmful actions, significantly decreased activity was detected in areas related to empathic concern and
perspective taking, including the anterior insula, vmPFC,
dlPFC, and right pSTS/TPJ. Conversely, inferring the emotional state of a victim of harmful actions was associated
with increased signal change in a large portion of the
same network. This distinction in neurohemodynamic
striatum (210, 10, 22) and scores on PCL-R Factor 1
(b 5 0.254, P 5 0.002) when participants evaluated the emotional states of perpetrators engaging in harmful actions
(Fig. 4).
DISCUSSION
Psychopaths are characterized by a general lack of
empathy and shallow affect, traits associated with callous
disregard for the wellbeing of others, guiltlessness, and little appreciation of moral wrongdoing. However, the precise nature of their emotional, moral and empathetic
deficits remains unclear [Carre et al., 2013; Sato et al.,
2011; Seara-Cardoso and Viding, 2014]. While most behavioral and neuroimaging studies report that psychopaths
are impaired in their capacity to experience empathic concern [Decety et al., 2013a], resonate with the affective
states of others [Decety et al., 2014; Marsh, 2013], or process stimuli depicting moral violations in a typical way
[Harenski et al., 2010], some work also suggests that they
may have difficulties in correctly identifying the emotional
states of others [Brook and Kosson, 2013]. Such impairments can have downstream effects in decision-making
and moral behavior.
In this study, we examined basic socioemotional processing of morally-laden behavior depicting interpersonal
harm or interpersonal assistance in criminal offenders
with high levels of psychopathy (PCL-R 30) and low levels of psychopathy (PCL-R 20), by measuring the neurohemodynamic response elicited by viewing and
subsequently interpreting the emotional consequences of
such actions on others.
Importantly, online behavioral ratings indicate that all
participants were engaged in both segments of the task
while being scanned and paid attention to the outcomes of
the scenarios. In addition, and like healthy subjects viewing a similar stimuli [Decety, et al., 2012; Yoder and
Decety, 2014a], harmful actions were more discernable
than helpful actions. This has been interpreted along the
line of the negativity bias in social emotional processing,
which plays a critical role in moral judgment [Decety and
Cacioppo, 2012; Peeters and Czapinski, 1990; Schupp et al.,
2004; Yoder and Decety, 2014b]. Interestingly, at the cognitive level, psychopaths had no massive deficit in either
intention or emotion understanding. In fact, individuals
scoring high on the PCL-R had a higher accuracy rate in
identifying the emotions of the victim of a harmful action
or the recipient of a helpful interaction. These results support a previous study with inmates which reported that
psychopathy was not associated with any deficit in rating
individuals on assertiveness after viewing short interpersonal interactions, and that psychopathic traits were significantly positively correlated with accuracy in ratings of
facial expressions of emotions [Book et al., 2007].
Despite this seemingly absent cognitive deficit in reading the emotional states of others in social context, a num-
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Socioemotional Processing of Morally-Laden Behavior
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Figure 2.
Neural response in individuals with different levels of psychopathy (low, L; medium, M; and high, H) while they viewed morallyladen actions (left) and when they were requested to identify
the emotional states of the victims/recipients or perpetrator of
the behavior (right). Neural responses to harmful actions compared to helpful actions, modeled to the onset of the clips,
suprathreshold voxels (P < 0.05 corrected for multiple comparisons) are displayed on 4 anatomical sections. There was signifi-
cantly reduced activity in the rTPJ, dmPFC, dlPFC, temporal
pole, precentral gyrus, and ACC in individuals with high levels of
psychopathy while they viewed morally laden scenarios.
Conversely, when identifying the emotional states of the recipient/victim of an action, participants with high scores on PCL-R
Factor 1, showed greater hemodynamic response in the rTPJ
and dmPFC. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue,
which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]
response between victim and perpetrator is quite intriguing, as one would have expected just the opposite from
previous work documenting a lack of empathic concern
and perspective taking for victims in high psychopathy
[Decety et al., 2013a].
The response in the ventral striatum to the emotional
evaluation of a perpetrator engaging in harmful actions
was predicted by scores on PCL-R factor 1 (Fig. 4), and is
consistent with previous work that demonstrates that psychopaths and adolescents with conduct disorder show
enhanced activation in this region when viewing an individual hurting another [Decety et al., 2009], imagining
another individual in pain [Decety et al., 2013a], or viewing facial expressions of pain [Decety et al., 2013b]. This
has been interpreted as reflecting feelings of pleasure
toward the emotional distress of others. Neurons in the
ventral striatum have access to central representations of
reward and thereby participate in the processing of information underlying the motivational control of goaldirected behavior [Delgado, 2007; Diekhof et al., 2012].
However, some studies suggest that the human striatum is
not only involved in appetitive and reward processing,
but also in aversive processing [Fox, et al., 2013; Jensen
et al., 2003; Porges and Decety, 2013]. Yet, the relation
between Factor 1 and activation in ventral striatum is
unlikely to be driven by aversive reactivity. For instance,
psychopathy measured in a community sample is directly
associated with reports of positive valence in response to
viewing facial expressions of sadness [Ali et al., 2009].
Importantly, individuals with psychopathy often show
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Decety et al.
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Figure 3.
Contextualized socioemotional understanding in psychopathy.
Groupwise effects in bar graphs (L, low; H, high on total PCL-R
scores). During the identification of the emotional states of the
protagonists, participants with low scores on the PCL-R compared with individuals with high scores on the PCL-R, showed
greater signal change in the anterior insula (234 12 28),
vmPFC (14 38 22), dlPFC (50 22 34), and rTPJ (46 246 12).
When participants were asked to identify the emotions of the
protagonists, participants with high psychopathy showed
increased activity bilaterally in the TPJ (left: 242 246 18; right:
58 230 8), dmPFC (-2 46 32), dlPFC (52 20 20), vlPFC (40 38
26), hippocampus (30 238 22), amygdala (30 2 220), and
ACC (210 28 20). [Color figure can be viewed in the online
issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]
higher activity in regions associated with reward processing in tasks involving moral decision-making [SearaCardoso and Viding, 2014].
Overall, individuals high in psychopathy appear to be
able to distinguish between right and wrong actions, as
well as interpret the emotional consequences of these
actions on other people. This is in line with a study reporting that high-psychopathy offenders were not deficient in
discerning moral from conventional transgressions when
compared to low-psychopathy offenders [Aharoni et al.,
2012]. However, the neural underpinnings of these computations are dramatically different from normative popula-
tions [Decety et al., 2012; Yoder and Decety, 2014a], as
well as incarcerated controls.
r
CONCLUSION
Deficits in emotional functioning have been critical to
many etiological theories of psychopathy. Importantly, our
results support theories indicating that individuals with
psychopathy do seem to make the “cognitive” distinction
between morally good and bad actions, as shown by
behavioral ratings. Moreover, when they focus on the
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Socioemotional Processing of Morally-Laden Behavior
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Figure 4.
Differential activity in the ventral striatum in participants with
psychopathy while they were evaluating a perpetrator engaging
in harmful actions (compared to an agent engaging in helpful
behavior) as positively associated with PCL-R scores on
Factor 1. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue,
which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]
emotional consequences of others’ negative relative to positive actions, increased neural response is detected in
regions that are critical for affective reactivity, including
the amygdala and theory of mind such as the TPJ and
dmPFC. However, the pattern of brain activation during
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dissociable from incarcerated nonpsychopaths. The findings of this study further suggest that socioemotional processing abnormalities in psychopathy may be somewhat
more complicated than a mere general emotional deficit.
Rather, situation-specific evaluations of the mental states
of others, in conjunction with sensitivity to the nature of
the other (victim vs. perpetrator) modulate attention to
emotion-related cues. Such atypical neural processing
impacts moral judgment and decision-making.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Dr. Decety takes full responsibility for the integrity of the
data and the accuracy of the data analysis. All authors
had full access to all the data in the study.
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