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The Adventures of Fundi Intervention Based on the Cognitive and Emotional Processing in Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder Patients

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Psychopaths know right from wrong but don't care.

Maaike Cima¹, Franca Tonnaer, Marc D Hauser

¹Department of Developmental, Clinical and Crosscultural Psychology, Tilburg University, P.O. Box 90153, 5000 LE Tilburg, The Netherlands. M.J.Cima@uvt.nl

Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience

|January 8, 2010

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Psychopaths understand moral wrongs but exhibit abnormal behavioral regulation. This study suggests emotional deficits, not a lack of moral knowledge, explain their inappropriate actions.

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Area of Science:

Neuroscience
Moral Psychology
Psychiatry

Background:

Psychopathy is characterized by emotional processing deficits and morally inappropriate behavior.
Previous research suggests emotional deficits impair moral judgment, leading to the conclusion that psychopaths lack moral understanding.

Purpose of the Study:

To test if psychopaths have a normal understanding of right and wrong, but abnormal regulation of behavior.
To challenge the hypothesis that emotional processes are essential for moral judgment.

Main Methods:

Presented moral dilemmas to adult psychopaths, healthy controls, and non-psychopathic delinquents.
Compared judgments on personal versus impersonal harms, considering utilitarian gains.

Main Results:

All groups judged personal harms as less permissible than impersonal harms.
Psychopaths' judgment patterns mirrored those of control groups, indicating intact moral understanding.
Emotional processes are not causally necessary for moral dilemma judgments.

Conclusions:

Psychopaths possess a normal understanding of moral distinctions.
Abnormal behavioral regulation, not a deficit in moral knowledge, underlies psychopathic actions.
Emotional deficits do not preclude the cognitive understanding of right and wrong.