NEW STUDIES ON THE PSYCHOPATHS BRAIN

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Episode Transcript

(00:02):
Welcome to the Psychopath Podcast, apodcast that discusses everything about psychopathy. Here's
your host, doctor Carlos Well.Today we're gonna get little bit more scientific

(00:41):
as we look at the neurobiological correlatesof psychopathy, which is a personality disorder,
as we mentioned, characterized by callousand impulsive anti social behavior, and
there's different dimensions of it. Ofcourse. The study that I'm looking at
used functional MRI to identify consistent findingsacross twenty five studies of task related brain
activity RESTS. Showed that psychopathy wasassociated with increased activity in midline cortical regions

(01:03):
overlapping with the default mode network.And we'll talk a little bit about the
default mode network why does it applyto psychopaths? As well as the medial
temporal lobe, which includes the amiga. Psychopathy was also related to decreased activity
in a region of the dorsal anterialsingular cortex overlapping with the salience network.

(01:23):
How important these things are. Thefindings actually challenged previous theories regarding the neumal
basis of psychopathy, which suggested thatthe amygdala is hypoactive in individual's psychopathy.
The study found though that the amigdalais actually hyperactive in individual psychopathy. The
study also found the psychopathy is relatedto a dysfunction within the default mode network

(01:46):
and salience network the singular cortex.The default mode network is a large scale
network that increases activity doing self referentialprocessing thinking about ourselves, and decreases activity
during external focuses so listening to thepodcast. The salience network is particularly important
for detecting salient important external stimuli asresponsible for switching between the two anti correlated

(02:08):
networks, the default mode network andfrontal frontal parietal network. The study suggests
that psychopathy is related to dysfunction withinthese networks across a variety of tasks.
The findings from a study on psychopathylet's see with another one here characterized well,
we'll look at it right now,so midline cortical regions in the default

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mode network. This includes areas likethe Dorso medial prefunnal cortex posterior singular precuteness.
The default mode is typically active whena person is not focused on the
outside world and the brain is kindof a wreckful wakeful srest and such as
daydreaming, recalling memories, or thinkingabout the future or others thoughts. Increased
activity in these areas might relate tothe self centered and egotistical thinking often observed

(02:53):
in psychopathy. Now, the amigdalais crucial for processing emotions actually fear and
pleasure change, and its activities areoften associated with reduced empathy, fear response,
and emotional processing. So how wouldthis impact somebody? Empathy obviously may
have difficulty of understanding and responding toothers. Antisocial behaviors can include aggression to

(03:15):
sceitfulness in a disregard for the safetyof oneself or others. Individuals may exhibit
over confidence and charm, emotional deficitssuch as lack of guilt or remorse,
and of course, shallowy emotions.The study has important implications for the diagnosis
and treatment of psychopathy, as wellas with the criminal justice system. The
ideaing of neural correlates of psychopathy couldinform the development of biomarkers for vulnerability and

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early detection. Further, given therelatively high prevalence of psychopathy among criminal offenders
and its predictive utility for violent reoffending, there's growing interest in this. The
study suggests basically, bottom line,the psychopolies related to a dysfunction within the
default mode network and salience network acrossa variety of tasks to pinpoint into such

(04:00):
specific spots only we always find outwhen they do that there's more of a
dynamic interplay. So I'm sure it'sother brain structures as well, and of
course in functional connectivity that are goingto be involved here, But nonetheless it
was an interesting study