“…psychopathy is best conceptualized as a neurodevelopmental disorder.”

Dr. Kent Kiehl is on this team which means a few things: it’s gonna be about fMRI, it’s gonna be about an incarcerated population or psychopaths and I should have contacted him a long time ago about how to be awesome. This study looks at the relationship of brain volumes in the paralimbic & limbic areas and psychopathic traits in male adolescents to see if they are the same as previously observed in incarcerated adult males. They found that:

Consistent with hypotheses and the adult literature, psychopathic traits (..cough cough) were associated with decreased regional gray matter volumes in diffuse paralimbic regions, including orbitofrontal cortex, bilateral temporal poles, and posterior cingulate cortex. 

Blues check: The above composite from their study, shows gray matter volumes significantly associated with Total Psychopathy Checklist–Youth Version scores, increases are in yellow-oranges and decreases are in blue. This is a fascinating link to make regarding a disorder that is usually considered a personality disorder.