Is Female Psychopathy Linked with Child Abuse? An Empirical Investigation using a Person-Centered Approach

ABSTRACT

Childhood abuse is associated with increased psychopathic features among girls, but most prior research is based on data from correctional samples of female delinquents and less is known about how specific forms of childhood abuse affect specific features of psychopathy. Using a school-based community sample of 696 girls aged 9–17 years from Barbados and Grenada, the current study examined latent profiles of psychopathic personality traits and their associations with physical, emotional, and sexual abuse. Latent profile analysis (LPA) revealed four distinct psychopathy groups among girls, including a ‘low psychopathy’ group (41.9% of girls), ‘high psychopathy’ group (4.8%), ‘high interpersonal manipulation and egocentricity’ group (37.4%), and a ‘moderate psychopathy’ group (16%). There was considerable evidence of physical abuse, emotional abuse, and sexual abuse among participants. Sexual abuse was associated with a 116% increased likelihood of membership in the high psychopathy group and a 57% increased likelihood of membership in the high interpersonal manipulation and egocentricity group. These results indicate that sexual abuse is a powerful distal factor in the development of psychopathic personality functioning, especially more severe variants.

KEYWORDS:

• Child abuse
• sexual abuse
• psychopathy profiles
• female psychopathy

Disclosure of Interest

Authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Standards and Informed Consent

All procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation [Human and Health Sciences Ethical Board, University of Huddersfield, United Kingdom] and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000. Informed consent was obtained from all patients for being included in the study.

Notes

¹ Several comparative studies have examined psychopathy among girls using both samples of girls in clinical, forensic, or correctional settings and control samples of girls in the community (see, Frick, Bodin, & Barry, 2000; Leenarts et al., 2017; Oshukova et al., 2017; Pechorro, Kahn, Ray, Raine, & Gonçalves, 2017). These studies have shown that clinical samples of girls are unilaterally more severe in their psychopathology, psychopathy, and offending; however, these works did not focus on the role of childhood abuse in the girls’ backgrounds.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the European Union [EuropeAid/136243/DD/ACT/Multi – Towards a Future].

Notes on contributors

Daniel Boduszek

Daniel Boduszek, PhD is a Professor of Criminal Psychology at the University of Huddersfield. His current research interests and publications include the aspects of criminal cognitions, homicidal behavior, psychopathy, prisonization, and recidivism.

Agata Debowska

Agata Debowska, PhD is a Lecturer in Psychology at the University of Sheffield. Her current research interests and publications include violence against women and children, child sexual abuse, psychopathy, and criminal social identity.

Dominic Willmott

Dominic Willmott, PhD is a Research Fellow at the University of Huddersfield. His current research interests and publications include jury decision making, child abuse and neglect, and psychopathy.

Adele D. Jones

Adele D. Jones, PhD is a Professor of Social Work at the University of Huddersfield. Her current research interests and publications include child abuse, adoption, residential care, migration, child refugees, gender inequality, and HIV-AIDS.

Matthew DeLisi

Matthew DeLisi, PhD is a Professor of Criminology at the Iowa State University. His current research interests and publications include pathological criminality, psychopathy, self-control, offender/inmate behaviour, and the genetics of antisocial behaviour.

Gillian Kirkman

Gillian Kirkman, MA is a Subject Leader in Social Work with strategic lead for post-graduate development. Her research interests are intimate partner violence in adolescence, domestic abuse, child sexual abuse and child centred approaches to research.