COGNITIVE IMBALANCE AND ANTISOCIAL PERSONALITY-CHARACTERISTICS

A cognitive imbalance, in which intellectual functioning is elevated i n the performance area in comparison to verbal IQ, has been posited as an antecedent condition in relation to antisocial behaviors. The curr ent investigation was based on the notion of a developmental arrest in which verbal, analytical. controlling brain processes (analogous to v erbal IQ) fail to develop commensurately with the more impulsive actio ns mediated by the motor areas of the cerebral cortex (analogous to pe rformance IQ). The simple verbal IQ performance IQ discrepancy index u sed in prior studies was reformulated as a causal theoretical model co nsisting of shared and unique performance IQ variance. The participant s were 325 adults including 141 prison inmates. They were administered the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-R) and the Psycho pathic Deviate (Pd) and Mania (Ma) scales of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2). These were the manifest (measured) variables in the model tested by means of structural equation modeling procedures. Several statistical indices suggested an excellent model- data congruence. (C) 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.