Prefrontal Structural and Functional Brain Imaging findings in Antisocial, Violent, and Psychopathic Individuals: A Meta-Analysis

By Yaling Yang, A. Raine. Psychiatry Research, 2009

807 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Brain imaging studies suggest that antisocial and violent behavior is associated with structural and functional deficits in the prefrontal cortex, but there is heterogeneity in findings and it is unclear whether findings apply to psychopaths, non-violent offenders, community-based samples, and studies employing psychiatric controls. A meta-analysis was conducted on 43 structural and functional imaging studies and results show significantly reduced prefrontal structure and function in antisocial individuals. Effect sizes were significant for both structural and functional studies. With minor exceptions, no statistically significant moderating effects of sample characteristics and methodological variables were observed. Findings were localized to the right orbitofrontal cortex, right anterior cingulate cortex, and left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Findings confirm the replicability of prefrontal structural and functional impairments in antisocial populations and highlight the involvement of orbitofrontal, dorsolateral frontal, and anterior cingulate cortex in antisocial behavior.

Subfields: Clinical Psychology, Psychiatry and Mental health

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/83b1530111108cb765e861e9d8a75ce7ba53fd97

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In Clinical Psychology

In Psychiatry and Mental health

Citations in the corpus

Systematic reviews of explanatory risk factors for violence, offending, and delinquency (2017, background): “Yang and Raine (2009) Meta-analysis of functional brain imaging studies and findings concerning prefrontal structural abnormalities in antisocial, violent, and psychopathic individuals.”
The brain basis of emotion: A meta-analytic review (2012, background): “Psychopathy and antisocial disorder are marked by increased aggression and correspond to structural (e.g., Raine et al. 2000) and functional (e.g., Glenn et al. 2009; Harenski et al. 2009) changes to the mOFC (Yang & Raine 2009).”