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Aberrations in emotional processing of violence-dependent stimuli are the core features of sadism

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Abstract

Psychopathy and sadism are personality traits that share emotional deficits and propensity towards violence. However, sadism should be based on additional affective aberrations: pleasant emotional responses to hurting others or witnessing others in pain. In Study 1 (N = 116) emotional responses to violent and peaceful images and their associations with the subclinical trait sadism are analyzed. The results showed that elevated positive emotions when observing violent stimuli and negative emotions as a reaction to peaceful stimuli predicted sadism, even when variance of psychopathy was controlled in the analysis. In Study 2 (N = 156) implicit associations between violence-dependent stimuli (measured by IAT task) and terms describing positive and negative emotions are analyzed. Again, lower negative associations to violent stimuli predicted sadism, together with psychopathic trait of callous affect. The obtained results provide additional clarification of emotional processes in subclinical sadism.

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Notes

  1. The theory is revised afterwards (Gray and McNaughton 2000), however, this revision is not relevant to the topic of the present manuscript.

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Acknowledgements

Funding was provided by Serbian Ministry of Education, Science and Technical Development (Grant No. 47011). Author would like to express his gratitude to Goran Knežević and Ljiljana Lazarević who participated in the constructing of the IAT test. Author also wishes to thank the staff of penitentiary facilities and the convicts who participated in the research.

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  1. Institute of Criminological and Sociological Research, Gračanička 18, 11000, Belgrade, Serbia

    Janko Međedović

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Correspondence to Janko Međedović.

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Međedović, J. Aberrations in emotional processing of violence-dependent stimuli are the core features of sadism. Motiv Emot 41, 273–283 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-016-9596-0

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