Alpha Response Reveals Attention Abnormalities in Psychopathy

Psychopathy is a personality disorder associated with callous, impulsive, and antisocial behaviors. Decades of research indicate that individuals higher on psychopathy exhibit abnormal allocation of attention during goal pursuit. However, the manner in which attention is allocated to goal-relevant information and the downstream neurocognitive consequences of this attention abnormality remain unclear. The present study addresses this gap by examining the relationship between psychopathy and the allocation of attention during an electroencephalogram (EEG)-based continuous performance task in a sample of 61 adolescents and young adults. Results indicate that individuals higher on psychopathy overallocate attention to visual cues during the task (i.e., enhanced parieto-occipital alpha suppression), and this overallocation of attention reduces the neural resources required for motor control (i.e., blunted central alpha activity during NoGo trials). Psychopathy appears related to a unique pattern of attention allocation that prioritizes neural resources for goal-relevant information, resulting in alterations in the neural response for downstream cognitive functions.