Emotional memory and psychopathic traits in conduct disordered adolescents

The limited number of studies reporting emotional memory impairments in adults with psychopathic traits has not yet been replicated in conduct disordered adolescents with callous unemotional (CU) traits. This study aimed to test the developmental hypothesis that emotional memory will also be impaired in conduct disordered adolescents with CU traits on similar memory tasks. Eighty-four conduct disordered male adolescents assessed using the Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version (PCL: YV) were tested on a well-validated emotional memory task. Task performance was assessed in relation to scores on the PCL: YV with particular reference to the affective domains which reflect CU traits. As expected, in the sample as a whole, memory for emotional events was better than memory for neutral events. High psychopathy scorers had attenuated cued recall for the more emotional components of the task. Psychopathy scores, particularly the affective facet scores (reflecting CU traits) showed a negative relationship to recall accuracy for emotional events. The findings essentially replicate those from our adult studies suggesting that the emotional memory processing deficits seen in psychopathy are reasonably stable across the lifespan.