Neurobiological Correlates of Antisocial Behaviour and Forensic Implications for Criminal Responsibility in Nigeria

Advances in neuroscientific understanding of the neurobiological underpinnings of antisocial and violent behaviour have increasingly challenged traditional legal concepts of criminal responsibility, raising profound jurisprudential questions with direct forensic implications. This doctoral study investigates the neurobiological correlates of antisocial behaviour and their forensic implications for criminal responsibility determinations in Nigerian courts. A multi-method design integrating neuroimaging, forensic psychological assessment, and legal analysis was employed, conducting neuroimaging assessments with structural and functional MRI on sixty convicted violent offenders from Kirikiri and Keffi Maximum Security Prisons, administering validated antisocial behaviour assessment instruments, reviewing eighty criminal responsibility determinations in federal high courts across four geopolitical zones, and conducting doctrinal legal analysis of Nigerian criminal responsibility doctrine against neuroscientific findings. The study identifies statistically significant reductions in prefrontal cortical volume and reduced amygdala reactivity to social stimuli among offenders convicted of premeditated violent offences, consistent with international neurobiological literature. Legal analysis reveals that Nigerian criminal law's binary responsibility framework does not accommodate graduated or neuroscientifically informed assessments of culpability, creating jurisprudential gaps. The study makes original contributions to Nigerian forensic neuroscience and legal scholarship, proposing a Neuroscience-Informed Criminal Responsibility Evaluation Protocol for use by forensic psychiatrists in federal court proceedings. Recommendations include judicial education programmes on neuroscientific evidence and legislative review of the Criminal Code's insanity defence provisions. Keywords: forensic neuroscience, antisocial behaviour, criminal responsibility, Nigeria, neuroimaging.