Sociopaths and Neuroimaging

Sociopaths and Neuroimaging(Aggression)

Antisocial personality disorder is a psychiatric condition characterized by chronic behavior that manipulates, exploits, or violates the rights of others. This behavior is often criminal. This disorder is chronic behavioral and develops relationship patterns that intefere with a person's life over many years. To receive a diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder, a person must have first had behavior that qualifies for a diagnosis of conduct disorder during childhood. The cause of antisocial personality disorder is unknown, but genetic factors and child abuse are believed to contribute to the development of this condition. Although there is no set cause of this disorder, the syndrome may have organic pathology: a significant number of sociopaths exhibit unusual EEG patterns. Also, far more men than women are affected, and unsurprisingly, the condition is common in prison populations. Individuals with antisocial personality disorder are often angry and arrogant but may be capable of superficial wit and charm. They may be adept at flattery and at manipulating the emotions of others. This is why I chose to focus on the aggression behind a sociopath.

R J R Blair's July 2001 study of neurocogntive models of aggression in antisocial personality disorders, he considers there to be to different forms of aggression, reactive and instrumental. In order to distinguish the difference between these two forms such models as the somatic marker model, social response reversal model and the violence inhibition mechanism model were formed. Through these models, it was found that the two different aggressions were linked to two different disorders. The reactive showed to be with "acquired sociopathy" after orbit frontal cortex lesions and psychopathy after, and instrumental with the persons inability to socialize due to an impairment in the capacity to form associations between emotional unconditioned stimuli and conditioned stimuli. For example, it is believed that when raised in an environment where poverty exists, those with this disorder may engage in antisocial behavior, but will not experience aversion to the distress of their victims. This study is important in that it has proved that we need different forms of neurocognitive models to explain the emergence of the two different forms of aggression.