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Psych 371
Annotated Bibliography
Vitacco, M., Neumann, C., & Caldwell, M. (2010). Predicting antisocial behavior in high-risk
male adolescents: Contributions of psychopathy and instrumental violence. Criminal Justice and
Behavior,37(8), 833-846. doi:10.1177/0093854810371358.
This study tested three hypotheses concerning high-risk male adolescents and the amount
to which their scores on a number of validated measures on psychopathy could predict their
future criminal conduct. It used the Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version (PCL:YV) as the
primary measure and followed the participants over a five-year span to check for criminal
offenses. The PCL:YV is the most empirically validated instrument of adolescent psychopathy
that looks at the prediction between psychopathy and antisocial conduct. The researchers sought
to study how the PCL:YV would predict criminal charges across the follow-up time period of
five years. Also, they expected that if they added the subject’s counts of instrumental violence, it
would increase the predictive power of the PCL:YV. The last hypothesis they studied was
looking at African Americans within the participants and seeing if the psychopathic traits
displayed in the PCL:YV would be predictive of criminal recidivism.
The participants for this study were 120 ethnically diverse males who were currently
incarcerated at a maximum-security setting that was a hybrid of correctional and mental health
facilities. Almost half of males in the study were arrested after hospitalizing or killing their
victim, which displays the high aggression and violent nature of the group of participants. The
participants were an average age of 15 years and had a diverse ethnic breakdown (56 African
Americans, 48 European Americans, 10 Asian Americans, and 6 Hispanic Americans). The
recruitment of participants was based on the residency in the facility, as well as the minimum
sentence of three years incarceration. After the participant left the facility, follow-up data was
collected for five years, which included criminal charges, convictions, and any court action. The
researchers combined the PCL:YV and aggression scores to obtain a consensus score for each
participant. The researchers found that the PCL:YV was predictive of future criminal offenses.
Also, that instrumental violence negatively predicted future criminal offending. And, that
psychopathy was predictive of relapse in criminal activity in African American males.
In this study, the researchers mentioned that African American participants were being
released from incarceration into more urban and therefore more risky environments, whereas the
European American participants were going back to more rural settings that involved lower
crime rate and less chance of getting recharged. While this may be an inevitable division of the
population, the factor of race in the third hypothesis, which predicted a lower association of
psychopathy and criminal recidivism for African American males, is not externally valid from
this study. The population presented is not equal in the environments the subjects enter into after
leaving the incarceration facility and therefore it is not valid to say there is a difference in race in
terms of psychopathy and a relapse of criminal activity.
The researchers were studying instrumental violence, defined as planned with a lack of
affect, as it related to psychopathy. One of the initial tasks for each participant was for a
researcher to code acts of aggression based on arrest records, there was also a similar task in the
follow-up portion of the data collection. There is a reliability issue based on how each act of
aggression was coded and how the researchers accounted for violence not reported on a criminal
record. Because this study did not involve first person interviews or follow-up, the only access
the researchers have for follow-up data is police records, an incomplete record. The article states
that instrumental violence is less likely to be caught and therefore the aggression record for each
participant could be flawed and skew the data to show less than what actually occurred. This
problem could be solved with yearly follow-up interviews looking retrospectively at violence.
Psych 371
Annotated Bibliography
Walters, G., & Knight, R. (2010). Antisocial personality disorder with and without antecedent
childhood conduct disorder: Does it make a difference?. Journal of Personality Disorders, 24(2),
258-271. doi:10.1521/pedi.2010.24.2.258.
This study tested the contribution of retrospective testing for childhood conduct disorder
to diagnose adult antisocial personality disorder in federal prison inmates. The researchers
sought to study a two-part hypothesis in which they looked at participants that fell into three
diagnostic groups: one for both childhood conduct disorder and antisocial personality disorder
(APD subjects), the AAB adult antisocial behavior participants that included inmates that met the
antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) criteria, but not the conduct disorder diagnoses, and lastly
the NA, or non-antisocial, inmates without ASPD. The hypothesis predicted that on measures of
criminal history, antisocial attitudes, and misconduct within the prison, the APD group would
score significantly higher than the AAB group (the participants without a history of conduct
disorder), who would in turn score higher than the NA group.
The recruiting for the study took place in a federal prison from January 2008 to May
2008 and included all but 32 inmates, who were excluded for varying reasons, who were
admitted during that time. The participants were 327 male inmates, who had a mean age of
36.26 years and were predominantly African-American. The most common offense was a drug
crime (42.5% of the participants) and 96% of the participants had one or more prior convictions,
with 63.3% having at least one violent crime prior conviction. The participants were given three
assessments upon entry into the facility. The first was the Antisocial Personality Disorder semistructured interview modeled from the DSM-IV criteria for ASPD. The second assessment was
the Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles, and 80-item self-report assessing
thinking styles. The last assessment was the Antisocial Features scale of the Personality
Assessment Inventory. After the scales were given, researchers looked into past convictions and
violations and incidents and disciplinary infractions within the prison were recorded. The
researchers found that adults with APD had greater levels of criminal history, antisocial/ criminal
attitudes, and misconduct within the prison than the AAB group and the AAB group was harder
to distinguish from the NA group in various measures.
One critical point that the authors failed to mention was the lack of another control group
to help enrich the data. Although they have an APSD and conduct disorder group, an AAB
group with no conduct disorder, and a NA group with no APSD, there is a need for a group with
just conduct disorder and no ASPD. This group would serve as a comparison point to look at the
importance of a diagnosis of conduct disorder before a diagnosis of ASPD.
Another critical point worthy of noting is that the researchers chose to exclude transfers
from the study. Although this made sense in terms of maintaining a specific population, the
study would have had more external validity if they had expanded their recruitment and followup to outside offenders. Without testing other populations and therefore an increased external
validity, there are limits to how much researchers can generalize the results.
The last critique is that the method of assessing the inmates upon arrival included three
self-report assessments. Having three closely related assessments can lead to participants’
knowledge and possible changing of their answers. This would affect the strength of the
measures and alter how the diagnoses are read.
Psych 371
Annotated Bibliography
Jonson-Reid, M., Presnall, N., Drake, B., Fox, L., Bierut, L., Reich, W., et al. (2010). Effects of
child maltreatment and inherited liability on antisocial development: An official records study.
Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 49(4), 321-332.
doi:10.1097/00004583-201004000-00007.
This study examined the effects of abuse on the development of conduct problems at a
young age by employing official reports of maltreatment of children. The researchers sought to
distance the mode of research away from previous studies that used family- and self-report
methods that were low in reliability. The researchers aimed to answer three questions
concerning the link between maltreatment and conduct problem development. The first question
asked if children with official records of maltreatment versus the general population are at a
higher risk for conduct problems, controlling for genetic inheritance. The second question dealt
with the replication of official report maltreatment observed in an epidemiologic sample to a
clinically established contrast sample. The last question the researchers sought to examine was
looking at if records of inherited risk that could be gotten in public health settings would be
significantly predictive of an antisocial outcome.
The sample was created by merging two data sets the Missouri Twin Registry,
MOTWIN, (4,432 subjects) and the COGA, Collaborative Study on the Genetics of Alcoholism,
(428 subjects). The researchers used data from the Missouri department of Social Services to
cross-reference the subjects to derive data on demographics, familial liability to antisocial
development, and presence/ absence of the development of an antisocial outcome in children.
They used the data to compare presence of antisocial outcome to the variables and seek answers
to the questions asked. The researchers found that across levels of genetic predisposition,
maltreatment in childhood increased the prevalence of child antisocial outcome at about 10% to
25%. But they did not find significant support for the interactive effects of genetic inheritance
risk and maltreatment on antisocial development.
One important limitation to mention is that although the method of official reports was
chosen to decrease the low reliability of self/ familial reports, official report data can be
misleading. The actual process of reporting maltreatment of children is not carried through for
every case of abuse, and can show a lowered pattern of abuse for some subjects. This is also
important to note because a study needs to be conducted that compares a group of self-reported
or family reported maltreatment against a group with only official records to see what method is
better to examine the influence of maltreatment on the development of an antisocial outcome.
Another important limitation is the use of only two racial groups in the data set. The data
set used consisted of mainly Caucasian and African-American subjects, so the results are only
generalizable to those groups. Obviously the researchers are limited to what data is presented to
them, but it is a limitation to the external validity of the study and caution must be used to not
extend the reach of the results.
The last critical point to mention is the control for external environments of the subjects.
Although physical maltreatment was the variable of interest, the researchers missed a large
subset of children that are emotionally abused or are in households with toxic environments.
Emotional abuse goes largely unreported, if reported at all, but can represent continued affects on
the children. This would be an interesting research design to look at the effects of emotional
trauma or distress on the development of conduct problems.
Psych 371
Annotated Bibliography
Forsman, M., Lichtenstein, P., Andershed, H., & Larsson, H. (2010). A longitudinal twin study
of the direction of effects between psychopathic personality and antisocial behaviour. Journal of
Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 51(1), 39-47. doi:10.1111/j.1469-7610.2009.02141.x.
There is no clear research looking into the connection between antisocial behavior and
psychopathic personality and the direction of effects or root causes of the association. The aim
of this study was to examine the direction of effects between psychopathic personality and
antisocial behavior, as well as looking at the genetic and environmental effects on the
association. Predicted that psychopathic personality traits early on would predict antisocial
behavior later on in adult years. The researchers did not expect the inverse relationship to be
observed though, with antisocial traits leading into psychopathic traits. The last hypothesis
predicted that genetic factors would be more indicative of an association between psychopathic
and antisocial behavior than environmental factors.
The subjects were from the participant pool of the Twin Study of Childhood Adolescent
Development (TCHAD), a longitudinal twin study in Sweden, where 1,386 twins were used in
four measures. The participants were given the Youth Psychopathic traits Inventory (YPI) once
in the beginning of the study and again during the follow-up period. The researchers assessed
levels of antisocial behavior through self- and parent-reports, the Youth Self Report and the
Child Behavior Checklist, respectively, and then combined the two scores to create a composite
score to compare against the YPI score. The conclusions the researchers drew from the results
was that psychopathic personality in mid-adolescence can be predictive of early adulthood
antisocial behavior, but not in the opposite direction (antisocial to psychopathic). The second
hypothesis was confirmed that genetic factors were predominant in the association between
psychopathic personality and antisocial behavior.
The first critical point worth mentioning deals with the population sample used. The
inclusion of female subjects in the population set is confounding, as females are a minority in the
ASPD spectrum and show more cases of Borderline personality. The researchers need to drop
the female subject data from the study to create a purer study of ASPD and psychopathic
personality. Another alternative would be for the authors to make note of this large gendered
difference and use the data to enrich the results and create a more dynamic study of ASPD and
related disorders.
The next critical point deals with the reliability of the method of data collection. Selfand family-reports are often the easiest, most efficient, and cheapest way of collecting, but an
official records search into criminal behavior and incident reports would have provided another
dimension of depth to the results. By comparing the composite antisocial score, the
psychopathic personality score, and the number of prior criminal acts, the researchers could
create a more robust connection between psychopathic personality, antisocial behavior, and
genetics. Also, it would create a more reliable data set, that adds to potentially flawed
participant reports.
The last critical point comments on the external validity of the study and the limits it has
to other groups. The extension to other racial groups, socioeconomic backgrounds, etc is limited
due to the homogeneity of Sweden’s population. Although the study included a large number of
participants, and the results were significant in numbers, the authors must be cautious with the
results.
Psych 371
Annotated Bibliography
Brooner, R., Herbst, J., Schmidt, C., & Bigelow, G. (1993). Antisocial personality disorder
among drug abusers: Relations to other personality diagnoses and the five-factor model of
personality. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 181(5), 313-319. doi:10.1097/00005053199305000-00007.
Drug abuse is often co morbid with antisocial personality disorder (APD) or other Axis II
personality disorders and the personality traits can worsen the outcome of the drug abuse
treatment. This study investigated drug abuse and the relationships with APD and other
personality disorders as compared to other non-Axis II groups. The researchers examined three
hypotheses. The first one predicted that the APD group with dual diagnoses with one other Axis
II disorder would score significantly higher than the pure APD group and the non-Axis II control
group on the neuroticism domain and other facets. The second hypothesis expected that the nonAPD Axis II group would score higher on the neuroticism scale than the non-Axis II group. The
last one hypothesized that the non-Axis II group would have significantly higher agreeableness
than the mixed and pure APD groups.
Between April 1989 and April 1991, an outpatient drug treatment program admitted 228
opioid drug abusers between the ages of 21 and 58 years. The participants of the study were 203
of these patients. Upon intake to the treatment program, the assessments that made up the data
set were administered to eligible patients. Using the DSM-III-R, each participant was
interviewed to possibly diagnose personality and other psychiatric disorders. The second
assessment was the NEO-personality inventory (NEO-PI), a self-report measure that looks at the
five-factor model of personality (neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience,
agreeableness, and conscientiousness). The first and second hypotheses were confirmed, while
the results for the third was less definitive. The APD group with a dual diagnosis scored higher
on the neuroticism domain of the NEO-PI, and the non-APD Axis II group scored higher than
the non-Axis II group. But the agreeableness scores were less conclusive and only the mixed
APD group scored lower than the non-Axis II group and not the pure APD group.
Although the study design was clear and simple, taking only a “snapshot” of a patient’s
mental health history is not as descriptive as a longitudinal historical sample that could enrich the
study’s intent to look at the success of treatment in drug abusers. The outcome of treatment
timeline would be informative for designing more effective treatment programs for drug abusers
with Axis II disorders.
The external validity is threatened in this study due to the use of only opioid drug
abusers. Although opioid drugs are the most common abused drug group, the same personality
traits may not be seen across all drug abuse patients. It would be valuable to further this study to
include other drug abuse groups and maybe alcohol abuse patients as well, to get the broadest
spectrum for substance abuse and its relation to Axis II disorders.
Another critique of this study, specifically the sample population used, was that the
different groups (APD pure, mixed APD, non-APD Axis II and non-Axis II) were imbalanced in
numbers and not large enough for statistical strength in some measures. This lack of statistical
strength could lead to the rejection of hypotheses. If differing groups of drug abusers were
added, this could add to the four groups and create strength.
Psych 371
Annotated Bibliography
Barnow, S., Ulrich, I., Grabe, H., Freyberger, H., & Spitzer, C. (2007). The influence of parental
drinking behaviour and antisocial personality disorder on adolescent behavioural problems:
Results of the Greifswalder family study. Alcohol and Alcoholism, 42(6), 623-628.
doi:10.1093/alcalc/agm051.
Past studies on children of alcoholics (COAs) have been contradictory in the extent to
which parental influence effects development of behavioral problems than levels seen in nonCOAs. This study investigated if COAs exhibited more behavioral problems than non-COAs,
also the influence of parental antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) in this spectrum. The
researchers hypothesized that when there is a family history (FH) of ASPD, COAs would show
increased behavioral problems and disruptive behavior than non-COAs.
The final set of consented participants included 315 family groups with 381 total
adolescents (some families had multiple children, a possible confound). This population sample
was taken from the population-based sample Study of Health in Pomerania, Germany, which
included a sub-sample study, the ‘Greifswalder Family Study’, an addiction and personality
study. The families were recruited from the smaller study if they had an adolescent between the
ages of 11 and 18 years. Using the Structured Interview for the Genetics of Alcoholism
(SSAGA), seventy-six adolescents were identified as living in a household with a FH of
alcoholism, out of the total 259 families. Most adolescents had a father with an alcohol use
disorder (AUD), while six had a mother with an AUD, and two with both parents with an AUD.
With the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-III-R Axis II, ASPD status was determined for
the parents, with a positive status for FH for the children noted as FHapsd+. The last measure
was the Youth Self-Report (YSR) filled out by the children, and the Child Behavior Checklist
(CBCL) administered to the mothers as a family-report. The hypothesis that the COAs (over
non-COAs) would show a higher incidence of behavioral issues when FHapsd+ was confirmed.
Disruptive behavior was measured at much higher levels for COAs with FHaspd+. The findings
identify these children with co morbid ASPD and AUD parents as a high-risk group for
developing behavioral and conduct disorder.
The first critical point is the sole use of mothers for the CBCL. Although, indicating only
one parent to fill the CBCL out can control for gendered issues, all families are not the same in
terms of the dominant parent and therefore it is not appropriate to assign one parent to fill out the
report. Also, although the study looked at the father history of ASPD, if the mother had traits of
conduct issues, her report may not be fully reliable due to deceptive habits. The correlation
between the YSR and CBCL was moderate (r=.30 and r=.36 for attentional and behavioral
problem scores, respectively). The use of the parental-report is appropriate due to the age of the
adolescents, but seems to be a confounding issue and threatens the external validity.
The researchers mentioned the issues with the sample and the desire to conduct further
research with a less positively selected population sample. The sample was taken from a smaller
population sample from a larger stratified population sample. The amount of randomization is
severely limited and creates results that cannot be generalized outside of the study. But the
results can be used to guide further research studies along the same lines.
Psych 371
Annotated Bibliography
Poythress, N., Edens, J., Skeem, J., Lilienfeld, S., Douglas, K., Frick, P., et al. (2010).
Identifying subtypes among offenders with antisocial personality disorder: A cluster-analytic
study. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 119(2), 389-400. doi:10.1037/a0018611.
Psychopathy shares many traits with antisocial personality disorder (ASPD), even in the
DSM-IV, psychopathy lists many associated features with ASPD, but doesn’t explain the extent
to which they are related or why. This study investigated the subgroups that emerged among
participants that met the DSM-IV criteria for ASPD, looking specifically at differences in
expression of psychopathy. The researchers offered eight hypotheses that dealt with primary and
secondary variants (differing traits of psychopathy) and how they differed among external
criteria, or how they are expressed. Primary psychopaths were predicted to be more extroverted
and dominant, while secondary psychopaths were predicted to be more withdrawn and inhibited.
Additionally, primary psychopaths would exhibit less substance use disorders and would show
less reactive anger. The criminal recidivism of the participants was also looked at.
The researchers recruited male offenders court-ordered to drug treatment programs or
were currently serving prison sentences (n=660 and n=753, respectively), making the sample
1,413 participants with a mean age of 30.87 years. The total number used in the results was
1,208 individuals with 691 meeting the DSM-IV criteria for ASPD. Each participant was
administered the ASPD part of the Structured Interview of the DSM-IV Axis II personality
disorders, with the participants meeting the criteria about equal across recruitment site and
ethnicity. Six other assessments were given to examine psychopathic features and official record
data was collected on disciplinary actions and criminal records. To collect the data, participants
sat down to take the PAI, the self-report measures and a final go-no-go task used for passiveavoidance assessment. The researchers concluded from the results a clear cluster pattern among
the ASPD participants, validating the differences between internal/ external and primary/
secondary characteristics of psychopathy. But the primary and secondary differences seem to be
most robust in a theoretical manner and not in socially relevant settings.
The use of specified clusters to categorize and identify participants is detrimental due to
the negative nature of labeling. ASPD appears to be an aspect of a spectrum of personality
disorders. Although this research looks at the intersection of ASPD and psychopathy, it would
be more useful to create a continuum than to categorize and possibly isolate patients who do not
fit into the criteria. A continuum allows for the inclusion and intersection of the ASPD/
psychopathic association, it would also allow the more gendered Borderline personality disorder
to be fit into the spectrum.
Out of the studies reviewed for this annotated bibliography, this was the most extensive
and successful sample population used. It was sufficiently large to create statistical strength in
all the categories and hypotheses. It also covered varied geographic regions and featured
recruitment from more than one location. The measures used were varied, although reliance on
self-report measures for ASPD participants is faulty, due to dishonest and deceptive qualities. A
future aim for methods to measure ASPD and psychopathy would be developing scales that do
not rely on long self-report measures, but more efficient and conclusive methods.