Award Date

August 2025

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Psychology

First Committee Member

Stephen Benning

Second Committee Member

Shane Kraus

Third Committee Member

Joel Snyder

Fourth Committee Member

Elizabeth Lawrence

Number of Pages

103

Abstract

Performance monitoring and error processing are crucial for learning from mistakes, adjusting responses, and adapting to the environment. Individuals with psychopathy present with failures in performance monitoring, particularly a failure to learn from experience, and error processing deficits have been reported in this population. Error processing literature has investigated its underlying mechanisms via two prongs, namely behavioral measures and electroencephalography (EEG) indicators. Behaviorally, error processing literature has focused on post-error slowing (PES) and post-error accuracy (PEA). Meanwhile, EEG research has identified two components of error-related brain potentials (ERPs) in error processing: error-related negativity (ERN) and error positivity (Pe). This study investigated error processing in psychopathy, via a letter-shock task and assessing for both behavioral (i.e., PES and PEA) and psychophysiological (i.e., ERN and Pe) measures. While we predicted error processing deficits associated with impulsive-antisocial traits, instead we found error processing improvements associated with interpersonal-affective traits, with higher PEA and enhanced ERN amplitudes. Overall, our findings add to the literature on successful psychopathy, a controversial yet commonly-cited concept, defined as the display of core psychopathic traits while still able to achieve and maintain success.

Keywords

error positivity; error processing; error-related negativity; post-error accuracy; post-error slowing; psychopathy

Disciplines

Clinical Psychology | Cognitive Psychology | Personality and Social Contexts

File Format

pdf

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

Rights

IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Download


Share

COinS