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Reduced Electrodermal Activity in Psychopathy-Prone Adolescents

Reduced Electrodermal Activity in Psychopathy-Prone Adolescents This study tests the hypothesis that psychopathy-prone adolescents show reduced anticipatory skin conductance responding. Electrodermal activity was recorded while participants anticipated and responded to a 105dB signaled or unsignaled white-noise burst. Using an extreme groups design, the authors used Child Psychopathy Scale (D. R. Lynam, 1997) scores from a community sample of 335 male adolescents (age 16) to form control (n = 65) and psychopathy-prone (n = 65) groups. Significantly more psychopathy-prone participants were nonresponders in the signaled anticipatory (p =.014), signaled responsivity (p =.037), and unsignaled responsivity (p =.003) conditions compared with controls. Anticipatory hyporesponsivity of psychopathy-prone adolescents similar to the electrodermal hyporesponsivity found in psychopathic adults suggests that this autonomic impairment is present by adolescence and may predispose individuals to adult psychopathy. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal of Abnormal Psychology American Psychological Association

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References (89)

Publisher
American Psychological Association
Copyright
Copyright © 2005 American Psychological Association
ISSN
0021-843X
eISSN
1939-1846
DOI
10.1037/0021-843X.114.2.187
pmid
15869350
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

This study tests the hypothesis that psychopathy-prone adolescents show reduced anticipatory skin conductance responding. Electrodermal activity was recorded while participants anticipated and responded to a 105dB signaled or unsignaled white-noise burst. Using an extreme groups design, the authors used Child Psychopathy Scale (D. R. Lynam, 1997) scores from a community sample of 335 male adolescents (age 16) to form control (n = 65) and psychopathy-prone (n = 65) groups. Significantly more psychopathy-prone participants were nonresponders in the signaled anticipatory (p =.014), signaled responsivity (p =.037), and unsignaled responsivity (p =.003) conditions compared with controls. Anticipatory hyporesponsivity of psychopathy-prone adolescents similar to the electrodermal hyporesponsivity found in psychopathic adults suggests that this autonomic impairment is present by adolescence and may predispose individuals to adult psychopathy.

Journal

Journal of Abnormal PsychologyAmerican Psychological Association

Published: May 1, 2005

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