Jeffery Dahmer, Ted Bundy, and Charles Manson are three very well known serial killers. Society has deemed these individuals crazy psychopaths for their violent crimes and behaviors. However, is there an underlying reason, or mechanism, that has influenced their behavior? More specifically, is there a region, or regions, of the brain that play a role in the planning and execution of violent crimes such as these? Researchers hypothesize that dysfunction in the frontal lobe region, specifically the orbitofrontal cortex and amygdala, may be the answer behind psychopathy. Our frontal lobe plays a key role in a multitude of functions that allow humans to distinguish themselves from primitive, animalistic beings. Executive functioning is
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Blair (2003) states that the OFC has projections to and from the amygdala and thus the two are innervated during select tasks and functions. A hallmark symptom of psychopathy is emotional regulation dysfunction and shallowness (Blair, 2001). During an fMRI study, individuals with diagnosed psychopathy illustrated reduced activation in the amygdala and OFC in response to emotional words (Blair, 2007). Thus, researchers have found a significant relationship between psychopathy and amygdala and OFC dysfunction (Blair, 2007). Additionally, the amygdala has been found to be responsible for setting up moral constructs, created by society, while the OFC weighs the outcome of decisions based on conditioned responses to moral stimuli (Blair, 2007). Neuroimaging has found that individuals with lesions on the OFC have difficulty making moral decisions, despite the constructs maintained by the amygdala (Blair, 2007). In relation to criminal behavior, this factor is important to consider. The argument could be made that while these psychopathic criminals have full knowledge that they committed a crime, they do not possess the cognitive ability to appropriately gauge the moral and emotional gravity of the …show more content…
They presented participants with a moral dilemma about saving the life of one person versus saving the life of five people during a train accident. The researchers found that the control group choose to save the life, or lives, of whichever group had a higher emotional salience compared to the other (Koeings et al. 2007). For example, if the emotional salience of the one person’s life outweighed the salience of the five lives, healthy controls would save the one person and vice versa. However, Koeings et al. (2007) found that individuals with psychopathy and OFC dysfunction would almost always save the group of five, despite the varying emotional salience. The researchers concluded that individuals with psychopathy and OFC dysfunction have impaired moral reasoning. This may be one possible explanation for psychopath's inability to determine the difference between right and wrong (Blair, 2007). Therefore, these individuals may be at a higher risk of engaging in harmful behavior towards others because they are less capable of determining which consequence of their actions holds the greatest weight. Additionally, it is important to take an individual’s cognitive functioning into account because they may show no other deficits, except for the OFC dysfunction, and still be unable to pick the least harmful consequence
Blair (2003) states that the OFC has projections to and from the amygdala and thus the two are innervated during select tasks and functions. A hallmark symptom of psychopathy is emotional regulation dysfunction and shallowness (Blair, 2001). During an fMRI study, individuals with diagnosed psychopathy illustrated reduced activation in the amygdala and OFC in response to emotional words (Blair, 2007). Thus, researchers have found a significant relationship between psychopathy and amygdala and OFC dysfunction (Blair, 2007). Additionally, the amygdala has been found to be responsible for setting up moral constructs, created by society, while the OFC weighs the outcome of decisions based on conditioned responses to moral stimuli (Blair, 2007). Neuroimaging has found that individuals with lesions on the OFC have difficulty making moral decisions, despite the constructs maintained by the amygdala (Blair, 2007). In relation to criminal behavior, this factor is important to consider. The argument could be made that while these psychopathic criminals have full knowledge that they committed a crime, they do not possess the cognitive ability to appropriately gauge the moral and emotional gravity of the …show more content…
They presented participants with a moral dilemma about saving the life of one person versus saving the life of five people during a train accident. The researchers found that the control group choose to save the life, or lives, of whichever group had a higher emotional salience compared to the other (Koeings et al. 2007). For example, if the emotional salience of the one person’s life outweighed the salience of the five lives, healthy controls would save the one person and vice versa. However, Koeings et al. (2007) found that individuals with psychopathy and OFC dysfunction would almost always save the group of five, despite the varying emotional salience. The researchers concluded that individuals with psychopathy and OFC dysfunction have impaired moral reasoning. This may be one possible explanation for psychopath's inability to determine the difference between right and wrong (Blair, 2007). Therefore, these individuals may be at a higher risk of engaging in harmful behavior towards others because they are less capable of determining which consequence of their actions holds the greatest weight. Additionally, it is important to take an individual’s cognitive functioning into account because they may show no other deficits, except for the OFC dysfunction, and still be unable to pick the least harmful consequence