Finished reading Anatomy of Violence.
Basically the author describes different factors (biological, genetic, social) which shape human behaviour and specifically can lead to violence. He also describes how these factors, especially "selfish genes" make people unconsciously follow different survival strategies. Additionally he breaks down different parts of the brain malfunctioning of which can lead to violence in humans.
Here are some interesting quotes.
About importance of balanced neurotransmitters:
About importance of proper functioning of prefrontal cortex:
About hippocampus:
About amygdala:
Very interesting study comparing executive functioning of normal people, unsuccessful and successful psychopaths:
Very interesting description of System 1 or at least of its part:
It is so called Somatic marker hypothesis formulated by Antonio Damasio:
About superior verbal skills of psychopaths:
An example of flexing of the brain by mental efforts:
About importance of Omega-3:
About interaction of social and biological factors:
About negative effects of stress and Transmarginal Inhibition:
Effects of environment on gene expression:
Finally he presents his "Functional neuroanatomical model of violence highlighting cognitive, affective, and motor processes" (see figure 8.6 in attachments):
Very interesting example of using biofeedback or "mirror" to enhance brain functioning:
About importance of meditation:
Basically the author describes different factors (biological, genetic, social) which shape human behaviour and specifically can lead to violence. He also describes how these factors, especially "selfish genes" make people unconsciously follow different survival strategies. Additionally he breaks down different parts of the brain malfunctioning of which can lead to violence in humans.
Here are some interesting quotes.
The central thesis in his landmark book was that “successful” genes are ruthlessly selfish in their struggle for survival, giving rise to selfish individual behavior. In this context, human and animal bodies are little more than containers, or “survival machines,” for armies of ruthless renegade genes. These machines plot a merciless campaign of success in the world, where success is defined solely in terms of survival and achieving greater representation in the next gene pool.
About importance of balanced neurotransmitters:
Change the level of these neurotransmitters, and you change cognition, emotion, and behavior. Genes that influence neurotransmitter functioning can therefore result in aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. Take dopamine, for example. Dopamine helps produce drive and motivation. It is critically involved in reward-seeking behavior. Aggressive behavior can be rewarding, and in animals dopamine receptors help code for this rewarding property of aggression. When dopamine is experimentally increased in animals it fuels aggression, while blocking dopamine decreases aggression.
Why would low serotonin result in violence? Serotonin is a mood stabilizer, which has an inhibitory function in the brain. It is thought to be one of the biological brakes on impulsive, thoughtless behavior. It innervates— or lubricates— a part of the brain called the frontal cortex, which... is critically important in regulating aggression. The less serotonin you have, the more rash you may be.
About importance of proper functioning of prefrontal cortex:
1. At an emotional level, reduced prefrontal functioning results in a loss of control over the evolutionarily more primitive parts of the brain, such as the limbic system, that generate raw emotions like anger and rage. 4 The more sophisticated prefrontal cortex keeps a lid on these limbic emotions. Take that lid off, and the emotions will boil over.
2. At a behavioral level, we know from research on neurological patients that damage to the prefrontal cortex results in risk-taking, irresponsibility, and rule-breaking. It’s not far to go from these behavioral changes to violent behavior.
3. At a personality level, frontal damage has been shown to result in a whole host of personality changes. These include impulsivity, loss of self-control, and inability to modify and inhibit behavior appropriately. 6 Can you imagine these types of personality traits in violent offenders?
4. At a social level, prefrontal damage results in immaturity, lack of tact, and poor social judgment. From here we can imagine how a lack of social skills can result in socially inappropriate behavior and poorer ability to formulate nonaggressive solutions to fractious social encounters.
5. At a cognitive level, poor frontal functioning results in a loss of intellectual flexibility and poorer problem-solving skills. These intellectual impairments can later result in school failure, unemployment, and economic deprivation, all factors that predispose someone to a criminal and violent way of life.
About hippocampus:
The hippocampus is also part of the neural network that forms the basis for the processing of socially relevant information, and it is involved in recognizing and appraising objects. Disruption to such a system could in part relate to the socially inappropriate behavior shown by some violent individuals, as well as the misrecognition and misappraisal of ambiguous stimuli in social situations that can result in violent encounters.
Yet there’s more to the hippocampus than memory and ability. It is a key component in the limbic circuit that regulates emotional behavior, 39 and it has been implicated in aggressive, antisocial behavior in both animals and humans.
About amygdala:
...individuals with high psychopathy scores showed reduced activity in the amygdala during emotional, personal moral decision-making. While the amygdala, the neural seat of emotion, shows a bright glow in normal people when faced with emotion-provoking moral dilemmas, this emotional candle is barely flickering in highly psychopathic individuals.
Very interesting study comparing executive functioning of normal people, unsuccessful and successful psychopaths:
See figure 4.3 in attachments.We also tested our psychopaths and controls on a measure called “executive functioning.” It involves all the cognitive functions that you would like in a successful business executive— planning, attention, cognitive flexibility, and, importantly, the ability to change plans when given feedback that one course of action was inappropriate. How did our three groups do? The controls performed significantly better than unsuccessful psychopaths— that’s something you might expect. But take a look at how the successful psychopaths performed. They not only outperformed the failed psychopaths— they also performed significantly better than the normal controls.
Very interesting description of System 1 or at least of its part:
A good mind makes good decisions, and to do so it has to rely on “somatic markers” produced by the body. These somatic markers are unpleasant autonomic bodily states produced when one is contemplating a risky action or a difficult decision— the pounding heart and the perspiration. These somatic markers have flagged negative outcomes in the individual’s past, and are stored in the somatosensory cortex. This input is then transmitted to the prefrontal cortex, where further evaluation and decision-making takes place. If the current situation has been previously linked to a negative outcome, the somatic marker for that past event will sound an alarm bell to the decision-making areas of the brain— no action will be taken. This process may act at either a conscious or a subconscious level and can be thought of as helping to reduce the range of options in decision-making. It is similar to classical conditioning and the anticipatory fear that deters us from conducting an antisocial act previously associated with punishment.
We had always assumed that in order to make good decisions, we need to be removed from our emotions— to be cool, calm, and collected. The revolution Damasio made in cognitive and affective neuroscience was to argue that instead, emotions importantly guide good decision-making. Without emotions and somatic markers, we will not make good decisions.
It is so called Somatic marker hypothesis formulated by Antonio Damasio:
The somatic marker hypothesis provides a systems-level neuroanatomical and cognitive framework for decision making and the influence on it by emotion. The key idea of this hypothesis is that decision making is a process that is influenced by marker signals that arise in bioregulatory processes, including those that express themselves in emotions and feelings. This influence can occur at multiple levels of operation, some of which occur consciously and some of which occur non-consciously. Here we review studies that confirm various predictions from the hypothesis. The orbitofrontal cortex represents one critical structure in a neural system subserving decision making. Decision making is not mediated by the orbitofrontal cortex alone, but arises from large-scale systems that include other cortical and subcortical components. Such structures include the amygdala, the somatosensory/insular cortices and the peripheral nervous system.
Turning to the successful psychopaths, we see that they show intact autonomic stress reactivity and anticipatory fear. They have a mind-body connectedness that allows for somatic markers to help form good decision-making. That translates into superior executive functioning. And I would argue that that is why successful psychopaths are successful.
We have seen from MRI studies that antisocial individuals in the community have structural brain impairments. We have also seen from the clinic that patients with head injuries causing prefrontal structural damage develop antisocial behavior and a loss of somatic markers, resulting in poor decision-making and maladaptive social behavior.
About superior verbal skills of psychopaths:
In many of us, the left hemisphere is largely responsible for language processing— language is strongly lateralized to the left hemisphere. But in psychopaths it’s more of a mix of both left and right hemispheres. This might be why they seem to be so adept in their verbal skills. They have two hemispheres— not one— that they can utilize for language processing. This in turn could be due to a larger, better communicating corpus callosum.
An example of flexing of the brain by mental efforts:
Practicing lying in childhood might particularly enhance prefrontal white matter. But even in adults, extensive practice has been found to correlate with brain structure. London taxi drivers have to undergo three years of extensive training to learn their way around 25,000 convoluted city streets. MRI studies have shown that these taxi drivers have a greater volume of the hippocampus compared with matched controls, and also compared with London bus drivers, who do not undergo such extensive training. Just as working in the gym can build up your muscles, mental effort can flex your brain.
About importance of Omega-3:
Omega-3 has two important components— DHA (docosahexaenoic acid) and EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid). What does DHA do? It is known to play a key role in neuronal structure and function. Making up 6 percent of the dry cerebral cortex, it influences the functioning of the blood-brain barrier that regulates what gets into your brain from your bloodstream. It enhances synaptic functioning, facilitating communication between brain cells. It makes up 30 percent of the membrane of your brain cell and regulates the activity of membrane enzymes. It protects the neuron from cell death. It increases the size of the cell. DHA also stimulates neurite outgrowth. There is more intricate dendritic branching in the neurons of animals fed a diet rich in omega-3 compared with those fed a normal diet. Dendrites of the cell receive signals from other brain cells, so this dendritic branching translates to more connectedness between cells. The axon that transmits the electrical signal to other cells is longer and has a better sheath to conduct the electrical impulse. DHA regulates serotonin and dopamine neurotransmitters... We also know that DHA is involved in regulating gene expression, so in theory it can help turn on genes that protect against violence— or turn off genes that increase the probability of violence.
...Omega-3 enhances both brain structure and function.
...Joe Hibbeln, a leading figure in the field, explained to me that the half-life of omega-3 in the body could be about two years— it stays in the body ready for re-uptake and it can make a lasting change in the brain.
About interaction of social and biological factors:
Social factors interact with biological factors to increase a propensity for violence. They also moderate the relationship between biology and violence.
[...] In the first-ever functional MRI study of any antisocial group, I found that violent offenders who suffered severe child abuse showed the greatest reduction in right temporal cortical functioning. 30 Another study found that if you have high testosterone levels and a deviant peer group you may become conduct disordered — yet if you have that same high testosterone and circulate in a non-deviant peer group you are instead led to become a leader.
So far we’ve seen that when a biological risk factor interacts with a social risk factor, the outcome is an exponential increase in violence. But “moderation” is another way that social and biological factors can influence each other. A social process can “moderate”— or change— the relationship between biology and violence. That is exactly what the conditioning experiment had demonstrated— that home background moderates the relationship between fear conditioning and antisocial behavior.
About negative effects of stress and Transmarginal Inhibition:
We see here that it’s not just direct social experiences like physical child abuse that can change a child’s cognitive functioning. Even in the dark shadow of social experience, something indirect in society can affect your brain. An insidious effect of social experience can profoundly change neurocognitive functioning.
We know that excessive release of cortisol in response to stress is neurotoxic to pyramidal cells in the hippocampus— a brain region critical for learning and memory. It kills them off. It seems reasonable to hypothesize that children who hear about a homicide around the corner get scared out of their wits. Is this going to happen to their family? Can they walk to the store safely? Are they going to be next? That fear and stress can translate into temporarily impairing brain functioning and cognitive performance.
Adults who lived close to the World Trade Center buildings on September 11, 2001— and thus were exposed to very significant environmental stress— showed a reduction in hippocampal gray-matter volumes when brain-scanned three years later. From environment to brain— and, at least in some— to ultimate destructive violence.
Effects of environment on gene expression:
I know this is controversial, but it is also critically important to recognize that the social environment is far more important than many have ever imagined, and complicated in ways we’re still trying to understand. Jonathan Kellerman as a clinical psychologist and scientist in Los Angeles was decades ahead of his time when he published a paper in 1977 documenting how environmental manipulations can reduce oppositional and destructive behavior in a seven-year-old boy with XYY syndrome. The environment can overcome genetics.
We often conceive of genes as fixed and static, but they are much more changeable than commonly believed. True, the underlying structure of the DNA— the nucleotide sequence— remains relatively
fixed. But the chromatin proteins that DNA wraps itself around may be altered by the amino acids that make up these proteins. Proteins can be turned on— or turned off— by the environment. That alters how the DNA is transcribed and how the genetic material is activated. Methylation— the chemical addition of a methyl group to cytosine, which is one of the four bases of DNA— can also increase or decrease gene expression.
So the environment not only changes gene expression in the individual— it also has permanent effects that transmit to the next generation. The exciting concept here is that although 50 percent of the variation in antisocial behavior is genetic in origin, these genes are not fixed. Social influences result in modifications to DNA that have truly profound influences on future neuronal functioning.
Finally he presents his "Functional neuroanatomical model of violence highlighting cognitive, affective, and motor processes" (see figure 8.6 in attachments):
You may also wonder how violence in particular arises from these cognitive, affective, and motor forces. I view violence at a dimensional, probabilistic level. The greater the number of impaired cognitive, affective, and motor neural systems, the greater the likelihood of violence as an outcome. If, for example, you make poor decisions and you don’t feel guilt and you act impulsively, then that will exponentially increase the likelihood of violence— all other things being equal.
Very interesting example of using biofeedback or "mirror" to enhance brain functioning:
The first clinical evaluation confirmed excessive slow-wave activity in Danny’s prefrontal cortex— a classic sign of chronic under-arousal. Then came thirty sessions of biofeedback. Danny sat in front of a computer screen with an electrode cap on his head, which measured his brain activity as he played Pac-Man on the computer. Danny controlled Pac-Man, trapped in a maze, and his task was to move around, gobbling up as many pellets as he could. He could only move Pac-Man by maintaining sustained attention— by transforming his frontal slow-wave theta activity into faster-wave alpha and beta activity. If his attention lapsed, Pac-Man stopped. By maintaining his concentration, Danny was able to retrain his under-aroused, immature cortex, which had constantly craved immediate stimulation, into a more mature and aroused brain capable of focusing on a task. It was hardly a quick fix. For Danny, the biofeedback training lasted for nearly a year. But a metamorphosis took place over the course of his thirty treatment sessions. He was radically transformed, from an inattentive, F-grade teenager on a downward spiral toward prison into a mature, straight-A, career-oriented student who ended up passing his exams with distinction.
...By feeding back to him his brain activity, he was able to learn how to increase activation of the prefrontal cortex. That gave him agency and the ability to better regulate his behavior.
About importance of meditation:
It’s not just that meditation changes the brain during the time of meditation. People who have practiced meditation over a long period later show that at rest— in a non-meditation state— their brain has shifted toward increased attention and alertness as measured by gamma activity— a form of high-frequency EEG activity involved in consciousness, attention, and learning. The more hours of practice, the greater the brain change taking place. Meditation is producing long-lasting positive effects on the brain. Mindfulness practice changes not just brain function but also brain structure. One study scanned subjects before and after an eight-week mindfulness course, with controls again being put on a waiting list. The mindfulness group showed a significant increase in the density of cortical gray matter after treatment— a tangible physical change. Enhanced areas included the posterior cingulate and the temporal-parietal junction, areas involved in moral decision-making. The hippocampus was also enhanced, an area critical for learning, memory, conditioning, and aggression regulation and that is impaired by extreme stress. So even though the hippocampus reaches full maturity early in life, its structure can still be enhanced through later environmental change. Another brain-imaging study documented that extensive meditators have increased cortical thickness in the prefrontal cortex compared to controls. Mindfulness remodels the brain— physically.
Meditation enhances left frontal brain activity. That meshes with the fact that enhanced left frontal brain activation occurs when people experience positive emotions and is associated with reduced anxiety. It also increases frontal cortical thickness, and we know that this area is not just important in emotion regulation, but is also structurally and functionally impaired in offenders. Note also that meditation enhances brain areas important for moral decision-making as well as areas involved in attention, learning, and memory.
