{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,29]],"date-time":"2026-07-29T05:02:25Z","timestamp":1785301345153,"version":"3.55.0"},"reference-count":30,"publisher":"Frontiers Media SA","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,29]],"date-time":"2026-07-29T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1785283200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["frontiersin.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Front. Psychol."],"abstract":"<jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Introduction<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Juvenile delinquency is associated with multiple individual-level psychological domains, but youth psychopathic traits, moral disengagement, and cognitive empathy have been less directly examined within a single theory-informed structural model among justice-involved adolescents. This study tested a cross-sectional structural model linking youth psychopathic traits, moral disengagement, cognitive empathy, and delinquent behavior among adolescents residing in social observation centers in Saudi Arabia.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Methods<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>The sample included 171 adolescents recruited from nine social observation centers across Saudi Arabia. Youth psychopathic traits were assessed using the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory-Short Version, moral disengagement using the eight-item Propensity to Morally Disengage Scale, cognitive empathy using the cognitive empathy subscale of the Basic Empathy Scale, and delinquent behavior using a short self-report delinquency index. Data were analyzed using partial least-squares structural equation modeling with 5,000 bootstrap resamples.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Results<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>\n                      Youth psychopathic traits were positively associated with moral disengagement (\u03b2 = 0.302,\n                      <jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>\n                      &amp;lt; 0.001) and delinquent behavior (\u03b2 = 0.217,\n                      <jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>\n                      &amp;lt; 0.001). Moral disengagement was positively associated with delinquent behavior (\u03b2 = 0.153,\n                      <jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>\n                      = 0.006) and represented a small statistically detectable indirect component of the concurrent association between youth psychopathic traits and delinquent behavior (\u03b2 = 0.046,\n                      <jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>\n                      = 0.030). Cognitive empathy was negatively associated with delinquent behavior (\u03b2 = \u22120.344,\n                      <jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>\n                      &amp;lt; 0.001). The interaction between youth psychopathic traits and cognitive empathy was significant (\u03b2 = \u20130.175,\n                      <jats:italic>p<\/jats:italic>\n                      = 0.007), indicating that the positive association between youth psychopathic traits and delinquent behavior was weaker at higher levels of cognitive empathy. The model explained 36.4% of the variance in delinquent behavior.\n                    <\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Discussion<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>The findings are consistent with a social-cognitive moral-regulation framing in which delinquent behavior is associated with dispositional psychopathy-related traits, moral-cognitive justification, and social-cognitive understanding. Because the data were cross-sectional, the indirect path through moral disengagement was interpreted as a statistically estimated concurrent indirect association rather than evidence of temporal mediation or a causal mechanism. The interaction involving cognitive empathy was likewise interpreted as a conditional concurrent association rather than evidence of a causal buffering effect.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.3389\/fpsyg.2026.1895885","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,29]],"date-time":"2026-07-29T04:33:43Z","timestamp":1785299623000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Youth psychopathic traits and delinquent behavior among adolescents in Saudi social observation centers: the indirect role of moral disengagement and the moderating role of cognitive empathy"],"prefix":"10.3389","volume":"17","author":[{"given":"Bandar Salah","family":"Almailabi","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Education, College of Arabic Language and Humanities, Islamic University of Madinah","place":["Madinah, Saudi Arabia"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1965","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,29]]},"reference":[{"key":"B1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"1134","DOI":"10.1111\/j.1469-7610.2011.02412.x","article-title":"The relationship between juvenile psychopathic traits, delinquency and (violent) recidivism: A meta-analysis.","volume":"52","author":"Asscher","year":"2011","journal-title":"J. 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