why do some children develop serious
TRANSCRIPT
Why do some children develop serious and persistent anti-social behaviour?
Prof Essi Viding
Professor of Developmental Psychopathology, UCL
@EssiViding
www.drru-research.org
Ted Bundy’s description of himself:
"..the most cold-hearted son of a bitch you'll ever meet.”
Ted Bundy’s defense lawyer’s decription of him:
"Ted, was the very definition of heartless evil.”
Ted Bundy (1946-1989)
Serial killer
• Lack of remorse / guilt
• Shallow affect (genuine emotion is short-lived and egocentric)
• Superficial charm
• Grandiose sense of self-worth
• Pathological lying
• Manipulation of others
What characterises individuals with psychopathy?
• Early behavioural warning signs of children at risk for psychopathy:
– Lack of remorse and guilt
– Lack of empathy
– Shallow affect
– Manipulation of others for own gain
– Sense of being more important than others
• These traits are predictive of persistent, violent and severe antisocial behaviour/psychopathy in adolescence and adulthood
‘Callous-Unemotional’
CU traits
Frick et al., 1994; 2014
Children with conduct problems
High Callous-Unemotional Traits
▪ Engage in proactive aggression ▪ Lack guilt▪ Do not worry about hurting others▪ Often have low levels of anxiety
Low Callous-Unemotional Traits
▪ Often aggress when feel under threat▪ Feel bad about hurting others▪ Can have high levels of anxiety
Frick & Viding, 2009
Affective processing in children with conduct problems and HIGH callous-unemotional traits
▪ Lack of recognition and reactions to other people’s emotions
▪ Report feeling less fear themselves
▪ Less responsive to punishment
Affective processing in children with conduct problems and LOW callous-unemotional traits
▪ Hostile Attribution Bias
▪ Oversensitive to perceived anger (sometimes even when stimuli are neutral)
Masked Fear Task
Calm ConditionFear Condition
vs.
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Height threshold T = 2.692278 {p<0.005 (unc.)}
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Design matrix
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Viding, Sebastian, Dadds, Lockwood, Cecil, de Brito, & McCrory, AJP
The higher the level of callous-unemotional traits, the less active the amygdala is to fearful faces…
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SPMresults: .\Aff_ToM-Cog_ToM_2_groups
Height threshold T = 2.689585 {p<0.005 (unc.)}
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Design matrix
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Sebastian, McCrory, Cecil, Lockwood, De Brito, Fontaine & Viding (2012), JAMA Psychiatry
…and to scenarios showing other people in distress.
Probing the aetiology: Classical twin design
IdenticalMonozygotic
NonidenticalDizygotic
Twin method
• Genetic influence (A) =
identical twins > non- identical twins
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MZ DZ
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Twin method
• Shared environmental influences (C)=
Non-identical twins more similar than expected by genetic relatedness
• Environmental influences that make family members similar to each other 0
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Twin method
• Non-shared environmental influences (E) =
Identical twins not 100% identical
• Environmental influences that make family members different from each other
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Is there a difference in the origin conduct problems between those who have HIGH vs. LOW callous-unemotional traits?
Conduct Problems
HIGH callous-unemotional traits LOW callous-unemotional traits
Genetic
Shared E
Non-shared E
Genetic
Shared E
Non-shared E
Viding, Blair, Moffitt, & Plomin, 2005, JCPP
What genes?What environments?
‘Risk’ genes may be different for children with HIGH vs. LOW callous-unemotional traits
Conduct Problems
HIGH callous-unemotional traits LOW callous-unemotional traits
• Genotypes conferring low emotional reactivity/arousal?
• Genotypes conferring high arousal and reactive aggression ?
(Buckholtz & Meyer-Lindenberg, 2009; Viding & Jones, 2008)
Risk environments may be different for children with HIGH vs. LOW callous-unemotional traits
Conduct Problems
HIGH callous-unemotional traits LOW callous-unemotional traits
?• Harsh and inconsistent parenting• Maltreatment
• Parental warmth protective against development of CP/HCU? (Viding & McCrory, 2015; Vagos, Ribeiro da Silva, Rijo, Brazao, 2016)
• Parenting and child focused interventions can have a positive effect for children with CP/HCU (Waller, Gardner, & Hyde; 2013; Wilkins, Waller, & Viding, 2016)
Adoption study (Hyde et al., 2016):
• Biological parents with severe antisocial behaviour were more likely to have adopted away offspring with high CU traits– In line with the notion of genetic predisposition
• Warm adoptive parenting REDUCED risk for developing CU traits in children who have biological risk– In line with the notion that genes are not destiny!
• Encouraging – but adoptive families are a case of ‘what can be’, not a case of ‘what is’…
• CP/HCU may need:
– A longer treatment period
– More comprehensive support
– Treatment adjuncts suited to their neurocognitive profile
Psychological
Behavioural
En
viron
men
t
Genetic vulnerability
Environmental conditions that do not counteract the
genetic risk or make it worse?
Lack of emotional reactivity and
empathy; insensitivity to punishment
Why do some people become psychopaths?
We also know that not all children with conduct problems and HIGH callous-unemotional traits grow up to be adults with psychopathy
Specific interventions are being developed
• How does atypical emotionality develop over time?
• Can these children empathiseunder any circumstances?
• Can we help them see the world differently?
We need longitudinal studies that combine
different methodologies
Acknowledgements
TEDS, schools, families and children
Developmental Risk & Resilience Unit
Eamon McCrory, Lucy Foulkes, Philip Kelly, Rachael Lickley, Patricia Lockwood, Elizabeth O’Nions, Jean-Baptiste Pingault, Vanessa Puetz, Sophie Raeder, Ruth Roberts, Ana Seara-Cardoso
Former lab members
Catherine Sebastian, Stephane de Brito, Marine Buon, Caroline Bradley, Laura Finlayson, Charlotte Cecil, Elena Rusconi, Chloe Thompson-Booth, Alice Jones, Nathalie Fontaine, HenrikLarsson, Sara Hodsoll, Zoe Hyde, Moran Cohn, Amy Palmer, Sophie Samuel
Collaborators
Robert Plomin ,Geoff Bird, Jon Roiser, Francesca Happe, Fruhling Rijsdijk, Andrea Mechelli, Mark Dadds, Craig Neumann, Beata Tick
Funding
ESRC, MRC, British Academy, Royal Society, Waterloo Foundation