Abnormal Psychology:
The Biological Paradigm
(Psy346)
Dr. Brett Beston
Recognition Problem:
Science versus Non-Science
Cause and Effect
Objectivity
Falsifiable?
How do you know what’s true?
Who / what are your sources?
Challenge #1
Defining Mental Disorders
•
Psychiatrists diagnose and
categorize mental illness using
the DSM-V
•
400 disorders!
•
There have been a lot of shifting
as to ‘what’ is classified as a
disorder.
included in DSM-V
The shifting sands of the
DSM
American Psychiatric Association
(APA) declassified homosexuality
as a mental disorder in 1973.
The question stands… Why was it
classified as a disorder in the first
place?
New-Directions in Defining
Disorders
In DSM-IV, each of the mental disorders is
conceptualized as a clinically significant
behavioral or psychological syndrome or pattern
that occurs in an individual and that is associated
with:
Challenge #2
The Research-Treament Disconnect
Doctor of Psychology (PsyD) don’t have required
training in research design.
American Psychological Association (APA)
concluded that understanding research methodology
is unrelated to being a good practitioner.
Therapists are free to choose their own treatment
approach.
Recently Introduced Therapies:
Should they be used?
Eye Movement Desensitization Reprogramming (EMDR)
(anxiety)
Recently Introduced Therapies:
Should they be used?
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation
(TMS) (depression)
Recently Introduced Therapies:
Should they be used?
St. John’s wort
(depression)
Exploring the Biological
Paradigm of Mental Health
Exploring the windows of
Mental health
Neurobiology
Genetics
Development
Evolution
Window on Neurobiology
Window on Neurobiology
Window on Neurobiology
Window on Neurobiology
Window on Genetics
Window on Evolution
Evolution is a process of
change in the proportion of
heritable traits within a
population spread over
many generations
What ‘lies’ ahead
Enron Corporation was an American
energy, commodities, and services
company
Fortune named Enron "America's Most
Innovative Company" for six consecutive
years.
Enron suffered the largest Chapter 11
bankruptcy in history
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enron
http://people.duke.edu/~dandan/webfiles/PapersDisHonesty/The%20Dishonesty%20of.pdf
The untold cost of lying
$16 billion
$24 billion
$300 billion
$600 billion
The Dishonesty of Honest
People
Task: Find two numbers that combine to add to 10.
How many of these tasks can you completed in 4 min?
The Dishonesty of Honest
People
Does increasing reward
affect cheating?
So why do a lot of people
cheat a little?
The Dishonesty of Honest
People
“I understand that this short survey
falls under the MIT honour code…”
Does ‘risk’ affect cheating?
Does the risk of ‘getting caught’ affect dishonest behaviour?
50 Multiple choice questions including…
•How deep is a fathom?
•What does 3! equal?
•How many degrees in a triangle?
•15 minutes to answer questions
•$0.10 for every correct answer
•Students asked to transfer answers over to
scantron
•three conditions
Does ‘risk’ affect cheating?
Does the risk of ‘getting caught’ affect dishonest behaviour?
control condition solved 32.6 questions,
no-recycle, recycle, and recycle* conditions
solved 36.2, 35.9, and 36.1 questions
The average reported performance in the
three cheating conditions was significantly
higher than in the control condition
Evidence shows that no one dramatically cheats, so they
are only cheating a small amount
Does cheating affect our
self-perception?
ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLE
published: 28 August 2012
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00305
Nepotistic patterns of violent psychopathy: evidence
for adaptation?
Daniel Brian Krupp 1,2,3 *, Lindsay A. Sewall 3,4 , Martin L. Lalumière 3 , Craig Sheriff 5 and Grant T. Harris 6
Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada
Department of Psychology, Neuroscience and Behaviour, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada
3
Department of Psychology, University of Lethbridge, Lethbridge, AB, Canada
4
Department of Psychology, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, SK, Canada
5
Tulloch Mapping Solutions, Ottawa, ON, Canada
6
Mental Health Centre, Penetanguishene, ON, Canada
1
2
Edited by:
Paul J. Watson, University of New
Mexico, USA
Reviewed by:
Paul J. Watson, University of New
Mexico, USA
Elizabeth G. Pillsworth, California
State University Fullerton, USA
Andrea Glenn, Institute of Mental
Health, Singapore, USA
*Correspondence:
Daniel Brian Krupp, Department of
Mathematics and Statistics, Queen’s
University, Jeffery Hall, Kingston, ON,
Canada K7L 3N6.
e-mail: daniel.krupp@queensu.ca
Psychopaths routinely disregard social norms by engaging in selfish, antisocial, often violent behavior. Commonly characterized as mentally disordered, recent evidence suggests
that psychopaths are executing a well-functioning, if unscrupulous strategy that historically
increased reproductive success at the expense of others. Natural selection ought to have
favored strategies that spared close kin from harm, however, because actions affecting
the fitness of genetic relatives contribute to an individual’s inclusive fitness. Conversely,
there is evidence that mental disorders can disrupt psychological mechanisms designed to
protect relatives. Thus, mental disorder and adaptation accounts of psychopathy generate
opposing hypotheses: psychopathy should be associated with an increase in the victimization of kin in the former account but not in the latter. Contrary to the mental disorder
hypothesis, we show here in a sample of 289 violent offenders that variation in psychopathy
predicts a decrease in the genetic relatedness of victims to offenders; that is, psychopathy
predicts an increased likelihood of harming non-relatives. Because nepotistic inhibition in
violence may be caused by dispersal or kin discrimination, we examined the effects of
psychopathy on (1) the dispersal of offenders and their kin and (2) sexual assault frequency
(as a window on kin discrimination). Although psychopathy was negatively associated with
coresidence with kin and positively associated with the commission of sexual assault, it
remained negatively associated with the genetic relatedness of victims to offenders after
http://www.readcube.com/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00305
removing cases of offenders who had coresided with kin and cases of sexual assault from
Antisocial Personality
Disorder
must be at least 15 but usually diagnosed at 18
Failure to conform to social norms
Deceitfulness
Impulsivity
Irritability of Aggressiveness
Lack of Remorse
Harmful disfunction
He wanted to test that:
(a mechanism no longer serving its evolved function... hmmm)
Think about it...
•
In a cooperative society, those who cheat can take
advantage of a system.
•
Can’t have too many cheaters though, or the
system doesn’t work!
Psychopaths in the
Population
Psychopaths are rare in the population
Represent 15% of prisoners.
Commit half of all serious crime
1-2%
What’s Unique About
Psychopaths
•
They are not like other psychological disorders..
•
Not found to be co-morbid with other disorders / mental
illness (which is other wise common).
•
In-tact ‘Theory of Mind’
•
Can detect emotions in others
•
Can predict vulnerability
•
Show behaviours that may be adaptive.
How can Psychopathy exist?
survival/ reproductive rate
•
By increasing fitness or inclusive fitness!
•
Many other clinical disorders show a high likely-hood of
harming family.
but psychopaths don’t
If psychopath is adaptive...
•
We should see evidence of discriminate
behaviour, unlike genetic kin.
Experiment
•
Review of 400 violent offender case files.
•
Identified psychopaths from case files and scored on
Psychopathy Checklist revised (PCL-R).need 30+ / 40
Krupp et al.
Nepotistic patterns of violent psychopathy
Victim-offender relatedness
FIGURE 1 | Mean PCL-R score and victim-offender relatedness. The
figure shows the mean PCL-R score for all offenders meeting inclusion
criteria for each category of victim-offender relatedness: first-degree
relatives; second-degree relatives; and non-relatives. Error bars represent
standard errors of the mean. There was a significant effect of PCL-R score
on victim-offender relatedness (Nagelkerke R 2 = 0.06, $2 = 17.97,
p < 0.001): as PCL-R scores increased, victim-offender relatedness
decreased.
FIGURE 1 | Mean PCL-R score and victim-offender relatedness. The
figure shows the mean PCL-R score for all offenders meeting inclusion
criteria for each category of victim-offender relatedness: first-degree
relatives; second-degree relatives; and non-relatives. Error bars represent
standard errors of the mean. There was a significant effect of PCL-R score
on victim-offender relatedness (Nagelkerke R 2 = 0.06, $2 = 17.97,
p < 0.001): as PCL-R scores increased, victim-offender relatedness
decreased.
Psychopath dispersal
FIGURE 2 | Dispersal of offender as a function of offender’s PCL-R score. The figure depicts the ranked distances that offenders dispersed from their places
of birth to the locations of their index offenses against their ranked PCL-R scores. The solid line represents a linear regression line of best fit for the ranked data
(r s = 0.08, p = 0.193).
Evidence that psychopathology is not a
disorder, but rather an adaptive strategy
•
less likely to harm kin
•
likely an increase in nepotism
•
Fails to support the idea that it is a disorder