Development and preliminary validation of a self-report measure of psychopathic personality traits in noncriminal populations.

Research on psychopathology has been hindered by persisting difficulties and controversies regarding its assessment. The primary goals of this set of studies were to (a) develop, and initiate the construct validation of, a self-report measure that assesses the major personality traits of psychopathy in noncriminal populations and (b) clarify the nature of these traits via an exploratory approach to test construction. This measure, the Psychopathic Personality Inventory (PPI), was developed by writing items to assess a large number of personality domains relevant to psychopathy and performing successive item-level factor analyses and revisions on three undergraduate samples. The PPI total score and its eight subscales were found to possess satisfactory internal consistency and test-retest reliability. In four studies with undergraduates, the PPI and its subscales exhibited a promising pattern of convergent and discriminant validity with self-report, psychiatric interview, observer rating, and family history data. In addition, the PPI total score demonstrated incremental validity relative to several commonly used self-report psychopathy-related measures. Future construct validation studies, unresolved conceptual issues regarding the assessment of psychopathy, and potential research uses of the PPI are outlined.

The pressor response and laryngeal mask insertion. A comparison with tracheal intubation.

The pressor response associated with laryngoscopy and tracheal intubation may be harmful to certain patients. The laryngeal mask airway avoids the need for laryngoscopy and allows positive pressure ventilation of the lungs in appropriate patients. This study compared the pressor response of tracheal intubation with that of mask insertion in two groups of 24 and 23 healthy patients respectively. All patients were anaesthetised with thiopentone, nitrous oxide, enflurane and paralysed with atracurium. We have shown a similar, but attenuated pattern of response associated with mask insertion in comparison with laryngoscopy and intubation; significant differences between the groups were evident in arterial diastolic blood pressure immediately after insertion and again 2 minutes later. Use of the laryngeal mask may therefore offer some limited advantages over tracheal intubation in the anaesthetic management of patients where the avoidance of the pressor response is of particular concern.