ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPHIC EVALUATION OF PSYCHOPATHIC PERSONALITY

Abstract

In a previous report¹ it was indicated that adults who exhibited certain personality deviations presented abnormalities in the electroencephalogram. Of 44 patients with a condition diagnosed as "psychopathic personality," 23, or 52 per cent, had electroencephalograms which did not meet our criteria of normal. Several other investigations have been made independently, and all have revealed a similar relation. Hill and Watterson² reported that 48 per cent of 151 patients with a disorder diagnosed as "psychopathic personality" had abnormal electroencephalograms. Silverman,³ in a study of the more extreme and dangerous criminal psychopathic personalities, found that 80 per cent of 75 patients exhibited abnormal or borderline abnormal tracings. In view of the essential agreement of these three reports, the problem of the meaning of this relation arises. One of the inherent difficulties in a study of this kind is the inability to define meaningfully the concept "psychopathic personality." Maughs,