Summary: A new research links neuroticism with emotionality, or personal blindness, which may reveal the emotional imbalances seen in individuals with psychopathic traits. People with severe psychotic qualities struggle to express and express their emotions, which impairs their capacity to express and control their emotions.
This understanding makes it possible to develop therapeutic strategies that will increase personal recognition, which will increase empathy and lower the risk of reoffending. Researchers believe that treating those with psychotic tendencies with alexithymia in treatment might increase their mental functioning.
Important Facts:
- Psychopathy is linked to emotionality, hindering feeling recognition and rules.
- People who exhibit psychotic traits struggle more to display emotion.
- Reducing psychotic offenders ‘ rehabilitation could be achieved by increasing emotional awareness.
Origin: Max Planck Institute
Psychotic people experience great difficulty or are unable to display empathy or control their emotions. According to a new research by Matthias Burghart, a Max Planck scholar in Freiburg, this could be because these individuals suffer from emotionality, also known as mental blindness.
The labor is , published , in the journal , PLOS ONE.
The term alexithymia is an amalgam of the Greek prefix a- ( without ) and the words lexis ( reading ) and thymos (emotion ). It refers to a person’s inability to express and express their personal feelings.
People with extraversion typically think of their emotions as purely physical experiences. For instance, psychological anxiety is thought to be just physical pain or discomfort.
Past research has linked alexithymia to , cognitive health issues , such as depression and anxiety.
” However, analysis in , clinical psychology , shows that the ability to properly identify and understand one’s own feelings is essential for the healthy functioning of other mental capabilities such as compassion and feelings rules.
” For us as researchers, this raises the question: Is neuroticism related to extraversion and, if so, was this marriage ( at least in part ) explain the many other mental deficits often observed in sociopathy? “explains Burghart, a doctorate at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law in Freiburg.
To answer this question, Burghart and colleagues from the University of Konstanz conducted a survey of two groups: a randomly selected group of people from the general population ( 315 people ), who were recruited through posters, flyers, and social media ads, and a group of 50 inpatients from a psychiatric clinic.
Patients from four different wards of the office were all in the latter group, and they all shared that they had been admitted to the criminal office after committing crimes under conditions like reduced legal duty or drug addiction.
Both parties completed the following self-report surveys, which are widely used in , mental research:
- the Triarchic Psychopathy Measure ( TriPM) to assess , psychopathic traits,
- the Saarbrücken Personality Questionnaire to assess emotion,
- the Toronto Alexithymia Scale-20 to examine emotionality,
- the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire ( ERQ ) to assess emotion regulation strategies.
The result: the” criminal trial “was found to exhibit considerably higher levels of courage, rudeness, and disinhibition compared to the general population group. These qualities are regarded as normal psychotic traits.
This finding matches earlier studies and suggests that there are more cases of psychotic symptoms in criminal clinics-treated groups than in the general populace.
What is noteworthy, however, is the recent scientific research that indicates that those with strong psychopathic traits are more prone to have trouble describing and recognizing their own emotions ( i .e., having alexithymia ), which in turn contributes to a lack of empathy and poor emotion regulation.
In contrast, this implies that psychotic personality-related therapeutic approaches may be beneficial.
” If these individuals can identify and describe their own thoughts, their empathy and capacity to control their emotions may increase,” says Burghart.
Ultimately, this healing approach may reduce the risk of rehabilitation in offenders.
About this study on extraversion and sociopathy
Author: Matthias Burghart
Source: Max Planck Institute
Contact: Matthias Burghart – Max Planck Institute
Image: The image is credited to Neuroscience News
Original Research: Start entry.
By Matthias Burghart and colleagues,” Interpretating empathy shortfalls and mood dysregulation in neuroticism: The mediating part of alexithymia.” PLOS ONE
Abstract
Understanding emotion deficits and feeling dysregulation in sociopathy: The controlling role of alexithymia
Psychopathy is a serious personality disorder marked by a wide range of personal deficits, including a lack of empathy, mood regulation, and emotionality. These emotional conditions have previously been largely studied in isolation, ignoring how they affect each other.
Thus, we examined the concurrent interrelationship between emotional impairments in psychopathy, with a particular focus on the mediating role of alexithymia.
Our findings compared the relationship between psychopathy and empathy ( community and forensic ) and between psychopathy and emotion dysregulation ( community ), using cross-sectional data from a community sample ( N , = 315 ) and a forensic sample ( N , = 50 ).
Moreover, replacing psychopathy with its three dimensions ( i. e., meanness, disinhibition, and boldness ) in the community sample revealed that boldness may function as an adaptive trait, with lower levels of alexithymia counteracting deficits in empathy and emotion dysregulation.
Overall, our findings point to the lack of empathy and emotion dysregulation that psychopathic individuals have due to their limited understanding of their own emotions.
This demonstrates the potential advantages of enhancing psychopathy treatment by increasing emotional awareness.
