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ScienceWeek
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY: ON ORDINARY PEOPLE AS TORTURERS
The following points are made by S.T. Fiske et al (Science 2004 306:1482):
1) Initial reactions to the events at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq were shock and disgust. How could Americans be doing this to anyone, even to Iraqi prisoners of war? Some observers immediately blamed "the few bad apples" presumably responsible for the abuse. However, many social psychologists knew that it was not that simple. Society holds individuals responsible for their actions, as the military court-martial recognizes, but social psychology suggests we should also hold responsible peers and superiors who control the social context.
2) Social psychological evidence emphasizes the power of social context; in other words, the power of the interpersonal situation. Social psychology has accumulated a century of knowledge about how people influence each other for good or ill [1]. Meta-analysis, the quantitative summary of findings across a variety of studies, reveals the size and consistency of such empirical results. Recent meta-analyses document reliable experimental evidence of social context effects across 25,000 studies of 8 million participants [2]. Abu Ghraib resulted in part from ordinary social processes, not just extraordinary individual evil. Meta-analyses suggests that the right (or wrong) social context can make almost anyone aggress, oppress, conform, and obey.
3) Virtually anyone can be aggressive if sufficiently provoked, stressed, disgruntled, or hot [3-5]. The situation of the 800th Military Police Brigade guarding Abu Ghraib prisoners fit all the social conditions known to cause aggression. The soldiers were certainly provoked and stressed: at war, in constant danger, taunted and harassed by some of the very citizens they were sent to save, and their comrades were dying daily and unpredictably. Their morale suffered, they were untrained for the job, their command climate was lax, their return home was a year overdue, their identity as disciplined soldiers was gone, and their own amenities were scant. Heat and discomfort also doubtless contributed.
4) The fact that the prisoners were part of a group encountered as enemies would only exaggerate the tendency to feel spontaneous prejudice against outgroups. In this context, oppression and discrimination are synonymous. One of the most basic principles of social psychology is that people prefer their own group and attribute bad behavior to outgroups. Prejudice especially festers if people see the outgroup as threatening cherished values. This would have certainly applied to the guards viewing their prisoners at Abu Ghraib, but it also applies in more "normal" situations. A recent sample of US citizens on average viewed Muslims and Arabs as not sharing their interests and stereotyped them as not especially sincere, honest, friendly, or warm.
5) Even more potent predictors of discrimination are the emotional prejudices ("hot" affective feelings such as disgust or contempt) that operate in parallel with cognitive processes. Such emotional reactions appear rapidly, even in neuroimaging of brain activations to outgroups. But even they can be affected by social context. Categorization of people as interchangeable members of an outgroup promotes an amygdala response characteristic of vigilance and alarm and an insula response characteristic of disgust or arousal, depending on social context; these effects dissipate when the same people are encountered as unique individuals.
References (abridged):
1. S. T. Fiske, Social Beings (Wiley, New York, 2004)
2. F. D. Richard, C. F. Bond, J. J. Stokes-Zoota, Rev. Gen. Psychol. 7, 331 (2003)
3. B. A. Bettencourt, N. Miller, Psychol. Bull. 119, 422 (1996)
4. M. Carlson, N. Miller, Sociol. Soc. Res. 72, 155 (1988)
5. M. Carlson, A. Marcus-Newhall, N. Miller, Pers. Soc. Psychol. Bull. 15, 377 (1989)
Science http://www.sciencemag.org
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Related Material:
MEDICAL BIOLOGY: ON SURVIVING TORTURE
The following points are made by Richard F. Mollica (New Engl. J. Med. 2004 351:5):
1) The shocking, unfiltered images from the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq have focused the world's attention on the plight of torture survivors. Physicians in the US are confronted as never before with the need to identify and treat the physical and psychological sequelae of extreme violence and torture. Yet this is not a new role for medical practitioners. More than 45 countries are currently suffering from the destruction caused by mass violence.(1) The 20th century has been called the "refugee century", with tens of millions of people violently displaced from their homes. Millions of these people have resettled in the US, and refugees, asylum seekers, and illegal immigrants now commonly enter our health care institutions.(2)
2) Despite routine exposure to the suffering of victims of human brutality, health care professionals tend to shy away from confronting this reality. The author states that he and his colleagues have cared for more than 10,000 torture survivors, and in their experience, whether in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cambodia, East Timor, or the US, clinicians avoid addressing torture-related symptoms of illness because they are afraid of opening a Pandora's box: they believe they will not have the tools or the time to help torture survivors once they have elicited their history.
3) Unfortunately, survivors and clinicians may conspire to create a relationship founded on the avoidance of all discussion of trauma. In one instance, a middle-aged Cambodian woman had had an excellent relationship with her American doctor for nine years, but he had no idea that she had been tortured. He had had only partial success in controlling her type 2 diabetes. After attending a training session on treating the effects of terrorism after the events of September 11, 2001, the doctor asked the patient for the first time whether she had undergone extreme violence or torture. She revealed that two of her children had died of starvation in Cambodia, her husband had been taken away violently and disappeared, and she had been sexually violated under the Khmer Rouge. More recently, in the US, her remaining daughter had been nearly fatally stabbed by a gang that burglarized her home. Since September 11, the patient had taken to barricading herself in her house, leaving only to see her doctor. When the doctor became aware of the patient's traumatic history, he used a screening tool to explore the effects of her traumas, diagnosing major depression. Over time, he was able to treat the depression with medication and counseling, eventually bringing the diabetes under control as well.
4) The author concludes: Torture and its human and social effects are now in the global public eye. Medical professionals must relinquish their fears and take the lead in healing the wounds inflicted by the most extreme acts of human aggression. Commitment to a process that begins with a simple but courageous act -- asking the right question -- bespeaks the belief that medicine is a potent antidote to the practices of torturers.(3-5)
References:
1. Krug EG, Dahlberg LL, Mercy JA, Zwi AB, Lozano R, eds. World report on violence and health. Geneva: World Health Organization, 2002.
2. Bramsen I, van der Ploeg HM. Use of medical and mental health care by World War II survivors in the Netherlands. J Trauma Stress 1999;12:243-261
3. Goldfeld AE, Mollica RF, Pesavento BH, Faraone SV. The physical and psychological sequelae of torture: symptomatology and diagnosis. JAMA 1988;259:2725-2729. [Erratum, JAMA 1988;260:478
4. Mollica RF. Waging a new kind of war: invisible wounds. Sci Am 2000;282:54-57
5. Cassano P, Fava M. Depression and public health: an overview. J Psychosom Res 2002;53:849-857
New Engl. J. Med. http://www.nejm.org
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NEUROBIOLOGY: ON THE BRAIN AND VIOLENCE
Notes by ScienceWeek:
Although human violence has been a major focus of research in psychiatry, psychology, and the social sciences, neurobiological studies of human violence have been relatively uncommon. Neurobiology, however, is a major component in our understanding of human behavior: genetics, environment, brain structure and brain function are all involved in both ordinary behavior and in violent behavior.
The following points are made by C.M. Filley et al (The Scientist 2001 2 Apr):
1) The authors point out that in adults, the role of brain damage in violence remains unclear. A brain lesion by itself is rarely sufficient to cause violent behavior, and most individuals with brain damage do not commit criminal acts. But we cannot assume that the brains of violent individuals are invariably normal. The neurologic status of the brains of violent persons has not been adequately assessed by detailed neurological examination, neuropsychological testing, *magnetic resonance imaging, or *functional neuroimaging. Studies of murderers have suggested a high prevalence of neurologic dysfunction, and some individuals with traumatic brain injury, epilepsy, dementia, and sleep disorders have been observed to exhibit excessive violence. Violence is more likely among those with severe mental illness, particularly psychosis, and violence is exacerbated by the use of alcohol and other psychoactive substances.
2) The authors point out that detailed analysis of the neurobehavioral aspects of violence is complex:
a) The cause of violence is multifactorial, and a direct correlation between brain dysfunction and a violent act is rarely possible.
b) Identification of brain lesions is imperfect given the limitations of diagnostic classifications, the limitations of the neurologic examination, the limitations of neuroimaging technologies, the limitations of neuropsychological assessment, and the limitations of neurochemical analysis.
c) Some subject samples, such as prisoners or those with severe neurologic or psychiatric disease, are necessarily based on violent persons who are apprehended or hospitalized. Conclusions are therefore based only on those whose records are analyzed, and the potential for violence in the general population remains unknown.
3) There is the possibility of a neurogenetic contribution to violent behavior. Although no single gene for human violence has been discovered, data from molecular genetics indicate that multiple genes may interact to predispose individuals to violent behavior. Observations in mouse *knockout models have suggested that targeted disruption of single genes can induce aggressiveness in males and diminish nurturing in females. Aggression in animals and humans is also likely related to genes regulating central nervous system *serotonin metabolism.
4) In general, males are much more likely to commit violent acts than are females, but genetic factors may not explain this discrepancy. Socioeconomic and cultural influences play a major role. Unemployment, lower educational level, alcohol abuse, and access to firearms all contribute to violent crime among males. The *XYY chromosomal disorder serves to highlight difficulties in establishing an influence of gender on violence.
5) Although no "violence center" exists in the brain, the *limbic system and the *frontal lobes are areas most implicated in violence. The limbic system is the neuroanatomic substrate for many aspects of emotion. The limbic system structure most often implicated in violent behavior is the *amygdala: placidity has been described in humans with bilateral amygdala damage, whereas violence has been observed in those with abnormal electrical activity in the amygdala. The frontal lobes are apparently the areas of the most advanced functions of the brain. In particular, the *orbitofrontal cortices are involved in the inhibition of aggression: individuals with orbitofrontal injury have been found to display antisocial traits that justify the diagnosis of "acquired sociopathy", and some of these individuals have an increased risk of violent behavior. A balance apparently exists between the potential for impulsive aggression mediated by limbic structures, and the control of this drive by the influence of the orbitofrontal regions.
6) The authors conclude: "Whereas dysfunction of a discrete brain region, isolated neurochemical system, or single gene will not likely emerge as a direct cause of violence, all may contribute."
The Scientist http://www.the-scientist.com
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Notes by ScienceWeek:
magnetic resonance imaging: Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is essentially a technique for examining morphology (as opposed to _functional_ magnetic resonance imaging, which is a technique for examining anatomical correlates of function). In general, MRI involves magnetic coils producing a static magnetic field parallel to the long axis of the patient or subject, combined with inner concentric magnetic coils producing a static magnetic field perpendicular to the long axis. A radio-frequency coil specifically designed for the head perturbs the static fields to generate a magnetic resonance image. The interaction physics in this technique is that between the magnetic fields and atomic nuclei in brain tissue. "Sliced" views can be obtained from any angle, and the resolution is quite high and on the order of millimeters for magnetic field strengths of 1.5 tesla.
functional neuroimaging: Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is based on the fact that oxyhemoglobin, the oxygen-carrying form of hemoglobin, has a different magnetic resonance signal than deoxyhemoglobin, the oxygen-depleted form of hemoglobin. Activated brain areas utilize more oxygen, which transiently decreases the levels of oxyhemoglobin and increases the levels of deoxyhemoglobin, and within seconds the brain microvasculature responds to the local change by increasing the flow of oxygen-rich blood into the active area. This local response thus leads to an increase in the oxyhemoglobin-deoxyhemoglobin ratio, which forms the basis for the fMRI signal in this technique. Because of its high spatial resolution (millimeters) and high temporal resolution (seconds) compared to other imaging techniques, fMRI is now the technology of choice for studies of the functional architecture of the human brain. Positron emission (PET) tomography is a technique for producing cross-sectional images of the body after ingestion and systemic distribution of safely metabolized positron-emitting agents. The images are essentially functional or metabolic, since the ingested agents are metabolized in various tissues. Fluoro-deoxyglucose and H(sub2)O(sup15) are common agents used for cerebral applications, and in cerebral applications of central importance to the technique is the fact that changes in the cellular activity of the brains of normal, awake humans and unanesthetized laboratory animals are invariably accompanied by changes in local blood flow and also changes in oxygen consumption.
knockout models: In general, in this context, "knockout technology" involves the generation of a mutant organism (usually a mouse) with a missing specific gene.
serotonin metabolism: A neurotransmitter substance involved in nearly everything occurring in the brain, including psychological states such as anxiety and depression, and dysfunctions producing migraine and epilepsy.
XYY chromosomal disorder: Humans ordinarily have 46 chromosomes. Of this number, 44 are not sex-related and are called "autosomal". Two chromosomes, X and Y, are sex-related. An individual with two X chromosomes is a female; an individual with one X and one Y chromosome is a male. Approximately 1 in 1000 males have an extra Y chromosome (total 47 chromosomes), and this abnormality is denoted as "47,XYY". Such individuals are often characterized by tallness, severe acne, and sometimes skeletal malformations and mental deficiency. It has been suggested that the presence of an extra Y chromosome in an individual may cause him to be more aggressive and prone to criminal behavior, but recent studies of the general population have cast doubt on the validity of this linkage.
limbic system: In general, this refers to those cortical and subcortical structures ("cortical" refers to cerebral cortex) concerned with the emotions. The most prominent anatomical components of the limbic system are the cingulate gyrus, the hippocampus, and the amygdala, all "deep brain" structures and not visible on the exterior surface of the brain.
frontal lobes: One of the four lobes of the brain. The other lobes are the parietal lobe, the temporal lobe, and the occipital lobe. Each hemisphere has these 4 lobes.
amygdala: A cellular complex in the temporal lobe that forms part of the limbic system. The major functional correlates of the amygdala are autonomic nervous system behavior, emotional behavior, and sexual behavior.
orbitofrontal cortices: The orbitofrontal cortex lies directly under the forehead skull.
ScienceWeek http://scienceweek.com
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