Recalled parental bonding, current attachment, and the triarchic conceptualisation of psychopathy

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2013.03.012Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Suboptimal parenting has been implicated in the development of psychopathy.

  • Mediation analysis explored whether attachment functioning mediated this link.

  • Both attachment anxiety and avoidance mediated certain parenting-psychopathy links.

  • Only paternal overprotection maintained a direct effect on levels of disinhibition.

  • Such links may prove exploitable for the purpose of prevention/intervention schemes.

Abstract

The current investigation examined whether attachment functioning might mediate the effects of parenting on traits associated with psychopathy. Participants completed the Parental Bonding Instrument, the Experiences in Close Relationships Scale, and the Triarchic Psychopathy Measure within a cross-sectional design. Whilst several recalled parenting variables demonstrated significant correlations with the psychopathy subscales, mediation analyses confirmed that the majority of these effects were mediated by current attachment anxiety and avoidance. Only paternal overprotection maintained a significant direct effect on levels of disinhibition. These findings provide support for the argument that attachment dysfunction may represent a potential mechanism through which parenting practices contribute to the emergence of psychopathy-related traits. Inferences regarding causality and mechanisms of effect are naturally constrained by the cross-sectional design of the current investigation, but the preliminary findings presented warrant further examination within prospective designs.

Introduction

Psychopathy represents a pathological form of personality characterised by impulsivity, antisocial tendencies, and a range of interpersonal/emotional deficits (Hare, 2003). It has strong associations with criminality and recidivism, (Harris, Rice, & Cormier, 1991), and those with high levels of psychopathy are likely to engage in both reactive and premeditated aggression, and to demonstrate little remorse for their actions (Hare, 2003). In addition, current treatments typically result in only small to moderate gains, with several aspects of the psychopathic disposition posing serious challenges to therapeutic progress (Salekin, Worley, & Grimes, 2010). As such, a great deal of empirical interest has been devoted to determining the causes and correlates of this distorted personality style, including the potential role of parenting experienced during childhood.

The quality of parent–child relationships has been shown to exert a lasting impact on social, emotional, and behavioural development, leading several eminent researchers to implicate such factors in the development of psychopathy (Hare, 1970, McCord and McCord, 1964). Indeed, several retrospective studies have found that adolescents or adults who score highly on measures of psychopathy recall early family environments characterised by parental rejection, neglect or separation, inconsistent or severe punishment, and/or inadequate supervision (e.g., Campbell et al., 2004, Gao et al., 2010, Kimbrel et al., 2007, Marshall and Cooke, 1999). Such observations have led to the suggestion that suboptimal parenting may play an aetiological role in the development of psychopathy.

Longitudinal studies have evidenced some provisional support for this argument, demonstrating prospective links between parenting practices and psychopathy-related traits. For example, chronically-elevated levels of callousness have been longitudinally related to harsh parenting in children aged 2–4 (Waller et al., 2012), as well as poor parent–child communication among male adolescents with symptoms of Oppositional Defiant Disorder/Conduct Disorder (Pardini & Loeber, 2008). In addition, McDonald, Dodson, Rosenfield, and Jouriles (2011) found that a parenting intervention successfully reduced levels of psychopathy-related traits among children aged 4–9, and that these effects were mediated by a reduction in levels of harsh and inconsistent parenting by mothers.

Whilst such findings are encouraging, some inconsistencies still remain. For example, whilst there is some evidence that parenting relates to certain affective features of psychopathy (e.g., callousness; Waller et al., 2012), other evidence suggests parenting practices are selectively related to the more behavioural features of psychopathy (i.e. impulsivity/antisociality; Kimbrel et al., 2007, Wooton et al., 1997). In addition, longitudinal studies demonstrate the potential for reciprocal child-parent influences. For example, early levels of child conduct problems and hyperactivity have been found to elicit harsh parental discipline practices (Larsson, Viding, & Plomin, 2008), suggesting that the relationship between parenting and psychopathy may be more complex than initially conceived.

In order to better understand the relationship between parenting and psychopathy, researchers have begun to consider potential mechanisms of effect. One suggestion is that these links are mediated by the development and influence of maladaptive internal working models (IWMs) of attachment (e.g., Bowlby, 1944, Patrick et al., 2009, Saltaris, 2002). According to attachment theory, in response to early interpersonal experiences, children develop a series of IWMs concerning the value of the self and significant others within relationships (Bowlby, 1969). These IWMs are essentially mental representations that are used to guide and interpret behaviour across a wide variety of interpersonal contexts. The functioning of these IWMs can be reliably assessed across the lifespan, and have demonstrated links with a wide variety of intra- and inter-personal behaviours (for a review, see Mikulincer & Shaver, 2007).

As early as 1944, Bowlby argued that experiences of parental rejection or separation might disrupt attachment system functioning and give rise to a particular form of “affectionless” offending, seemingly akin to contemporary descriptions of psychopathy. Others have elaborated upon such claims, suggesting that sub-optimal parent–child interaction generates maladaptive IWMs that disrupt moral socialisation, and give rise to several characteristic features of psychopathy, such as negative dispositions towards others, and a lack of empathy, compliance, or self-control (e.g., Lykken, 1995, Patrick et al., 2009, Saltaris, 2002). In other words, parenting is assumed to relate to psychopathy through its impact on attachment IWMs.

Consistent with this argument, several studies have reported associations between psychopathy-related traits and two particular forms of attachment dysfunction; dismissive attachment (a distinct lack of attachment relationships) and disorganised attachment (lacking a coherent strategy for dealing with attachment-related distress; e.g., Bakermans-Kranenburg and van Ijzendoorn, 2009, Pasalich, 2011). Yet, some studies have failed to find attachment-related differences between individuals designated as high versus low in clinician-rated psychopathy (e.g., Frodi, Dernevik, Sepa, Philipson, & Bragesjo, 2001), whilst others report only modest attachment-psychopathy links among nonclinical samples (Brennan & Shaver, 1998). Such inconclusive findings may be due to such studies relying upon a categorical approach to attachment (where individual differences in IWM functioning are expressed in terms of discrete “attachment styles”), which has been criticised for discounting important within-category variation (Fraley & Shaver, 2000).

Studies utilising the conceptually preferred dimensional approach to attachment demonstrate that adolescents scoring highly on clinician-rated psychopathy demonstrate poor parental attachment (Flight and Forth, 2007, Kosson et al., 2002). With regards to attachment functioning within adults, Brennan, Clark, and Shaver (1998) proposed the now widely adopted two-dimensional model of attachment anxiety and avoidance. Attachment anxiety represents a person’s sensitivity to rejection, and degree of preoccupation with attachment figure availability. Attachment avoidance represents the degree to which individuals avoid versus approach attachment figures during times of distress, and their willingness to engage reciprocally in the functions of attachment relationships. Within a nonclinical sample, Mack, Hackney, and Pyle (2011) demonstrated that both attachment anxiety and avoidance demonstrated independent relationships with the behavioural symptoms of psychopathy, and that an interaction between high levels of both attachment anxiety and avoidance predicted affective symptoms of psychopathy. Such findings suggest that, when adult attachment is measured in a conceptually accurate manner, theoretically consistent links can be drawn between attachment functioning and psychopathy. Such evidence supports the idea that attachment IWMs could function as the mechanism behind parenting-psychopathy links.

The current investigation sought to directly test such a prediction, using a cross-sectional design within a predominately student sample. Whilst it is acknowledged that use of a nonclinical sample may limit the applicability of findings to previous theorising among clinical samples (e.g., Bowlby, 1944), it is considered a useful first step in evaluating such links for two reasons. Firstly, the use of nonclinical participants affords recruitment of a much larger sample than typically achieved within clinical populations, enhancing the power of analyses to detect the presence of more complicated mediation effects. Secondly, modern conceptualisations of psychopathy acknowledge the dimensional nature of personality, such that all individuals can be placed somewhere upon a continuum of traits associated with a particular disorder (Hare & Neumann, 2005). Nonetheless, it should be noted that the effects reported currently may not necessarily generalise to clinical populations.

Within the current investigation, psychopathy was operationalised using the triarchic meta-conceptualisation proposed by Patrick et al. (2009). Within this conceptualisation, psychopathy is decomposed into three distinct facets. Disinhibition captures the behavioural deficits associated with psychopathy, such as a tendency towards impulsivity, focus on immediate gratification, and impaired regulation of affect/behaviour. Meanness represents the affective/interpersonal deficits, including lack of empathy and emotional bonds to others, and a propensity towards exploitation/cruelty. Finally, boldness captures the more functional, social efficacious aspects of psychopathy, such as self-assurance, and high tolerance for stress, danger or unfamiliarity. Whilst these facets may sometimes inter-relate empirically, Patrick et al. (2009) stress the importance of considering them as “distinctive phenotypic identities” (p. 925), which should be assessed and interpreted separately.

Unlike previous factorial solutions, within this conceptualisation no one component focuses exclusively on the overtly antisocial traits associated with more criminal manifestations of psychopathy (e.g., delinquency, predatory violence). As such, it offers a potentially more appropriate way to examine psychopathic traits within nonclinical populations (Patrick et al., 2009). Recent findings demonstrate provisional support for the three-factor structure of this triarchic conceptualisation, along with evidence of convergent and concurrent validity by virtue of its associations with established psychopathy measures, and other psychopathy-relevant traits (such as Machiavellianism, narcissism, and low empathy; Sellbom & Phillips, 2013).

Several hypotheses were tested. First, it was predicted that recollections of suboptimal parenting practices (indexed by lower care and higher overprotection) would be positively related to disinhibition, yet negatively related to boldness (as this represents the more socially efficacious elements of psychopathy). Given that previous investigations have reported an inconsistent relationship between parenting and affective deficits associated with psychopathy, no firm predictions were made for the meanness subscale. Second, it was predicted that current levels of attachment anxiety and avoidance would mediate the relationships between each index of recalled parenting and each subscale of psychopathy. Such findings would be consistent with the proposition that attachment IWMs act as the mechanism of effect between suboptimal parenting and traits associated with psychopathy.

Section snippets

Participants

A convenience sample of 214 participants (153 female, 61 male) responded to an online study advert in return for course credit or cash payment. The majority of participants were undergraduate students (89%) with the remaining participants representing postgraduate students (9%) and staff (2%). Ninety-five percent of the sample described themselves as White-Caucasian, with the remaining sample describing themselves as Chinese (1.5%), Mixed-Race (1.5%), Arab (<1%), Asian (<1%) and Indian (<1%).

Sample averages

One participant failed to complete the maternal PBI and five participants did not complete the paternal PBI. These values were found to be missing completely at random (χ2(14) = 6.33, p < .05) and were deleted listwise from subsequent analyses. Table 1 contains average scores for each variable, both across the sample as a whole, and according to gender. MANOVA analyses indicated that several significant gender differences were present across the grouped parenting/attachment variables (V = 0.11, F

Discussion

Overall, the current findings demonstrated support for the prediction that attachment-related IWMs could mediate the effects of parenting on psychopathy. Whilst several parenting variables demonstrated theoretically consistent correlations with the triarchic subscales of psychopathy, mediation analyses revealed that the majority of these effects operated indirectly via the influence of current attachment anxiety or avoidance.

Current attachment anxiety was found to mediate the relationships

References (40)

  • J.I. Flight et al.

    Instrumentally violent youths – The roles of psychopathic traits, empathy, and attachment

    Criminal Justice and Behavior

    (2007)
  • R.C. Fraley et al.

    Adult romantic attachment: Theoretical developments, emerging controversies and unanswered questions

    Review of General Psychology

    (2000)
  • A. Frodi et al.

    Current attachment representations of incarcerated offenders varying in degree of psychopathy

    Attachment & Human Development

    (2001)
  • Y. Gao et al.

    Early maternal and paternal bonding, childhood physical abuse and adult psychopathic personality

    Psychological Medicine

    (2010)
  • R.D. Hare

    Psychopathy: Theory and research

    (1970)
  • R.D. Hare

    The hare psychopathy checklist-revised

    (2003)
  • R.D. Hare et al.

    Structural models of psychopathy

    Current Psychiatry Reports

    (2005)
  • G.T. Harris et al.

    Psychopathy and violent recidivism

    Law and Human Behavior

    (1991)
  • Hayes, A. F., & Preacher, K. J. (2012). Statistical mediation analysis with a multicategorical independent variable....
  • D.S. Kosson et al.

    The reliability and validity of the Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version (PCL: YV) in nonincarcerated adolescent males

    Psychological Assessment

    (2002)
  • Cited by (41)

    • Psychopathy

      2023, Encyclopedia of Mental Health, Third Edition: Volume 1-3
    • Refining the link between psychopathy, antisocial behavior, and empathy: A meta-analytical approach across different conceptual frameworks

      2022, Clinical Psychology Review
      Citation Excerpt :

      Both dimensions are associated with suboptimal parenting (Craig, Gray, & Snowden, 2013), but disinhibition-impulsive traits are associated with an anxious attachment style, while affective-meanness traits relate to an avoidant one. Thus, anxious attachment styles will explain the intense irritability and emotion regulation difficulties in disinhibition-impulsive traits, while avoidance styles in meanness-affective traits may shape relationships marked by a limited concern for others (Christian, Sellbom, & Wilkinson, 2017; Craig et al., 2013). Taking the perspective of others may be more difficult for a child with high callous-unemotional traits because he/she is not motivated to do so, and he/she does not experience the expected level of emotional arousal to others' distress (Frick & Kemp, 2020).

    • Dark Triad traits, recalled and current quality of the parent-child relationship: A non-western replication and extension

      2021, Personality and Individual Differences
      Citation Excerpt :

      Finally, we expect that the same maladaptive pattern of relationships with parents, as measured by the Quality of Relationship Inventory (QRI; Pierce, 1994), would extend into at least early adulthood, such that individuals with higher levels of Dark Triad traits report having a worse current relationship with their parents—one marked by lower perceived support and care and by greater conflict. To conduct a more comprehensive examination of the associations between Dark Triad traits, attachment styles, and recalled parenting, we also tested the conceptual mediation model suggested by Craig et al. (2013) and Jonason et al. (2014). In the developmental research reviewed above, attachment styles have been proposed as plausible factors accounting for the association between child-parent bonding and the development of Dark Triad traits.

    • Attachment and psychopathic traits in inpatient female and male adolescents

      2018, Comprehensive Psychiatry
      Citation Excerpt :

      Consistent with theoretical positions, several studies have demonstrated positive associations between psychopathic traits and attachment insecurity in adults [5,25–30]. In particular, most of the studies indicated positive relationships between impulsive/irresponsible component of psychopathy and attachment avoidance (characteristic for dismissing attachment style) and attachment anxiety (characteristic for preoccupied attachment style) [5,26–29] Psychopathic traits were shown to be related to attachment insecurity not only in adults, but also in children [31] and youths [32–36].

    View all citing articles on Scopus
    View full text