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Executive functions on psychopathic offenders: consequences for responsibility and autonomy

Philosophers, legal scholars, and cognitive scientists have contributed to the debate on the appropriate social response to the psychopathic offenders. Two main lines of investigations appear to characterise the discussion. Many have focussed on the question whether these individuals are legally (Kiehl & ; Sinnott- Armstrong, 2013) or morally (Malatesti and McMillan, 2010) responsible for their crimes. Some have investigated the ethically justifiable forms of intervention or treatment (e.g., Glannon, 2014 ; Maibom). We argue that the current neuropsychological data on psychopathy and their principal theoretical interpretations do not authorise any firm conclusion about the criminal responsibility of the psychopathic offender. Several standard legal accounts of criminal responsibility, as some philosophical accounts of moral responsibility, require that the agent should have certain executive capacities that are expressed in folk- psychological terms. Executive functions seem to be appropriate neuropsychological correlates or preconditions for these folk-psychological capacities (Hirstein & ; Sifferd, 2010) . Leading accounts, such as the affect-based (Blair, 2006 ; Kiehl, 2006) , the attention based (Hiatt & ; Newman, 2006 ; Larson, et al., 2013 ; Newman, et al., 2010) , and data on error processing in psychopaths (Brazil, et al., 2009 ; Brazil, et al., 2011 ; Brazil I. A., 2013 ; von Borries, et al., 2010) , indicate peculiar executive functions. But we contend that this peculiarity offers no sufficient grounds for exculpation. To reach this conclusion, we analyse philosophically the notions of incapacity that are contemplated in legal requirements for insanity defences and how they relate with the performances of psychopaths in the relevant experimental paradigms. We maintain, however, that the peculiarities of the executive functions in psychopaths might undermine their autonomy. Standardly, a person is autonomous when she has “a capacity to judge, decide, and act on the basis of her own attitudes and reasoning” (Blöser, Schöpf, & ; Willa, 2010, p. 240) . Autonomous action, importantly, involves appropriate responsiveness to evidence and processing of action-relevant information (Blöser, Schöpf, & ; Willa, 2010 ; Weimer, 2013) . The reviewed studies seem to indicate responsiveness and processing of action-relevant information deficits in psychopaths. Thus, these deficits might be regarded as autonomy undermining. We argue, thus, that, at least prima facie, ethical justification for subjecting criminal psychopaths to enhancement therapies. In this respect, there are some indication that behavioural and neurofeedback interventions might be the ethically viable means to overcoming these autonomy-undermining deficits (Baskin-Sommers, Curtin, & ; Newman, 2015 ; Konicar, et al., 2015) . References Baskin-Sommers, A. R., Curtin, J. J., & ; Newman, J. P. (2015). Altering the Cognitive- affective Dysfunctions of Psychopathic and Externalizing Offender Subtypes with Cognitive Remediation. Clinical Psychological Science, 3, 45–57. Blair, R. J. (2006). Subcortical Brain Systems in Psychopathy: The Amygdala. In C. J. Patrick (Ed.), Handbook of Psychopathy (pp. 296-312). New York: The Guilford Press. Blöser, C., Schöpf, A., & ; Willa, M. (2010). Autonomy, experience, and reflection: On a neglected aspect of personal autonomy. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 13, 239- 253. Brazil, I. A. (2013). Psychopathy-related Traits and the Use of Reward and Social Information: A Computational Approach. Frontiers in Psychology, 4, 1-11. Brazil, I. A., de Bruijn, E. R., Bulten, B. H., von Borries, A. K., van Lankveld, J. J., Buitelaar, J. K., & ; al., e. (2009). Early and Late Components of Error Monitoring in Violent Offenders with Psychopathy. Biological Psychiatry, 65, 137-143. Brazil, I. A., Mars, R. B., Bulten, B. H., Buitelaar, J. K., Verkes, R. 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Psychopathy ; executive function ; autonomy

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