What We Do
The interest in understanding the origins of criminal behaviour goes far back in time, to the controversial theories of Franz Josef Gall and Cesare Lombroso. Since then, some improvements and discoveries were achieved, and nowadays the body of research in forensic psychiatry has grown substantially, specially thanks to the contributions of neuroscience. In fact, despite the radical view that both Gall and Lombroso had, they got the right intuition, confirmed by recent research: the predisposition to offend (or to act in a certain way) can be associated with genetic, hormonal and neurobiological factors.
For this reason neuroscience has become the tool to investigate the source of such offending behaviour, trying to understand its motives and causes.The broader scope of Forensic Neuroscience is then to investigate the brain functioning of offenders or, more generally, the neural basis and the mechanisms that lead to break norms (social or moral) and to behave differently from the majority of people.
Therefore, our research line in Forensic Neuroscience and Psychiatry aims to shed new light on the biological and genetic underpinnings of human behaviour. To reach our goal, we combine behavioural, genetic, physiological, computational and imaging tools, investigating the roots of aggression, pro-sociality and personality disorders.
ONGOING PROJECTS
The Genetic Basis of Pro- and Anti-social Behaviour
Functional Frontal Fragility and Social Behaviour
Machine Learning Techniques and Malingering (Univerità di Padova)
Personality Disorders , Psychopathy and Social Cognition
Neurocomputational Mechanisms of Psychiatric traits
Decision Making in Forensic Settings
Large Language Models and Verbal Lie Detection
Who We Are
What We Publish
A Multidisciplinary Approach to Insanity Assessment as a Way to Reduce Cognitive Biases
Scarpazza. G., Zampieri. I., Miolla. A., Melis. G., Pietrini, P., Sartori. G.Forensic Science International, 2021. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.forsciint.2020.110652
Neurobiological Correlates of Antisocial Human Behavior
Zampieri. I., Pellegrini, S., Pietrini, P.Neuroscience and Law (book chapter), 2020. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-38840-9_21
The Role of Neuroscience in the Evaluation of Mental Insanity: on the Controversies in Italy
Scarpazza, C., Pellegrini, S., Pietrini, P., Sartori, G. Neuroethics, 2017. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12152-017-9349-0
Neural Correlates of Imaginal Aggressive Behavior assessed by Positron Emission Tomography in Healty Subjects
Pietrini, P., Guazzelli, M., Basso, G., Jaffe, K., Graffman, J.Am J Psychiatry, 2000. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.157.11.1772Our Collaborations
Dipartimento di Psicologia Generale - Prof. Giuseppe Sartori and Cristina Scarpazza - Università degli Studi di Padova, Italy
Dipartimento di Medicina Clinica e Sperimentale - Prof.ssa Silvia Pellegrini and collaborators - Università di Pisa, Italy
AXES Research Unit - Behavioral Economic group - Prof. Ennio Bilancini and collaborators - IMT Scuola Alti Studi Lucca, Italy
MoMiLab Research Unit - SPACE group - Prof. Giulio Bernardi and collaborators - IMT Scuola Alti Studi Lucca, Italy
Recent Talks and Presentations
Riccardo Loconte- “Large Language Models per la rilevazione della menzogna”. V Convegno Nazionale di Psicologia Giuridica, Milano, 12-14/05/2023
Riccardo Loconte, “Are humans bad evaluators or poor decision-makers? A human vs machine experiment”, AIP – Sezione Clinico Dinamica, University of Florence, 18-20/09/2023
Riccardo Loconte, “Fine-tuning Large Language Models for verbal lie detection”, AIP – Sezione Sperimentale, IMT School of Advanced Studies Lucca, 18-20/09/2023
Matteo Pirisi, Simona Casale, Clara Gangemi, “The Nature and Methods of Psychiatric Evaluation in Italian Criminal Trials”. 9th Conference of the Italian Society for Neuroethics (SINe), IMT School of Advanced Studies Lucca, 10-12/05/2023
Simona Casale, “Combining Forensic Psychology and AI to Standardize Forensic Evaluations”, AIP – Sezione Sperimentale, IMT School of Advanced Studies Lucca, 20/09/2023