Brains On Purpose™

Values and Empathy across Social Barriers: A Neurocognitive Approach to Fairness

A conference with that title will be held later this year. From the New York Academy of Sciences Web site:

What makes suicide bombers capable of sacrificing themselves for a belief? Why do members of one race believe they are superior to another? How do subliminal messages affect the outcome of political polling? Using the tools of neuroscience and social science, researchers have learned a great deal about the brain's role in human behavior and interactions. This November, international scientific leaders and young investigators will convene for the first Barcelona Social Brain Conference, an exciting two-day event featuring talks, poster presentations, and a public lecture on the interdisciplinary field of social neuroscience. Through a neuroscientific lens, participants will examine the human qualities of empathy, sacred values, and cooperation, and focus on the ways in which what they learn can be used to understand human conflicts.

The program includes some excellent presenters, including Kevin Ochsner, Elizabeth Phelps, and Susan Fiske.

Take a closer look at what the media report: Recent studies about fairness and empathy

Reading about research in the media sometimes can be misleading. Here are two recent examples. First, several articles and blog posts have covered "The Sunny Side of Fairness," research out of UCLA by Golnaz Tabibnia, Ajay B. Satpute, and Matthew D. Lieberman.

An article about the study at physorg.com is titled "Are humans hardwired for fairness?" Professor Greg Downey of Neuroanthropology posted at Craving money, chocolate and… justice his concern about interpreting the research as saying fairness is hardwired.

I still reject the notion that this necessarily proves that we are ‘hard-wired to treat fairness as a reward [quoting Dr. Lieberman in a UCLA press release].’  I don’t think that the research shows anything about ‘hard-wiring’, but rather about the ‘wiring’ of university students. No developmental or cross-cultural data has been discussed that might go to the issue of whether this ‘wiring’ is ‘hard’ or ’soft,’ and I strongly suspect that it’s not ‘hard’ in the sense that this usually means, as we have plenty of cross-cultural evidence suggesting not every society thinks money should be divided equally, or even that money is terribly valuable.

The notion of ‘hard-wiring’ still seems to me to be one of the most problematic pieces of baggage that gets drug out in much of the brain imaging research, usually without data that would actually support it. The research is plenty interesting without the assumption of ‘hard-wiring’, . . .

I am looking forward to reading the study. Here you will find links to the study and to several articles about it.

The second example: At idealawg, I posted Better to lead with thinking rather than feeling in negotiations? Maybe if you are an MBA student in a negotiations course. I question the conclusions drawn from the research both in the media—and by the study itself.

Bottom line: Whenever possible, read the actual studies in addition to what the media reports.

Grit your teeth and bear it: Get angry for all the right reasons

Another study on the usefulness of anger! That emotion is enjoying attention and a second—and third—look. (Is March the month for mad?) From a Science Daily article "Anger Has An Upside, Study Suggests":

Psychologists Maya Tamir and Christopher Mitchell of Boston College, and James Gross of Stanford University tested whether people prefer to experience emotions that are potentially useful, even when they are unpleasant to experience.

The authors wanted to examine whether individuals are motivated to increase their level of anger when they expect to complete a confrontational task, where anger might enhance performance.

This study "Hedonic and Instrumental Motives in Anger Regulation" (pdf) seems to suggest that, yes, people will choose anger-inducing over pleasant activities when they know they are about to engage in confrontation. The angry people also performed better in the confrontational task. They did not perform better in an activity which involved serving customers. (I think some of those study participants are now working in stores near me.)

[I]t seems that individuals are not always striving to feel pleasure and may even be willing to endure some nasty emotions if necessary.  “Such findings,” write the authors “demonstrate that what people prefer to feel at any given moment may depend, in part, on what they might get out of it.”

As I said earlier this week in Anger—your inner fiend or your friend? Or both? What's the role of emotion?:

[T]here is a time and a place for every emotion—including anger.

What are your thoughts? When and where is anger appropriate?

Notes from the actual Psychological Science research article (linked to above): The authors of the study conclude that negative emotions may be adaptive in certain contexts.

Unpleasant emotions are important predictors of mental health. It is not surprising, therefore, that emotion-regulation research has emphasized the importance of decreasing unpleasant emotions. Our findings, however, suggest that experiencing some degree of negative emotions in specific contexts may be adaptive, if those emotions promote goal pursuits (Tamir & Diener, in press). [pdf]

And they add something related to conflict resolution.

Anger may be instrumental in some contexts (e.g., when fighting over limited resources) and harmful in others (e.g., when cooperating and sharing limited resources).

But they also introduce some caution about their results.

In this investigation, we created artificial contexts in which anger could be more or less instrumental. Given the uncertain ecological validity of these contexts, future research should test our hypotheses in the context of daily life . . .  .

Good mind hygiene—thought management—is the pathway to conflict resolution

In her blog Lab Notes, Newsweek's Sharon Begley posted a story about the Dalai Lama observing brain surgery.

Afterwards, he chatted with the surgeon, telling him how his scientist friends had patiently explained to him that all of our thoughts, feelings, memories, dreams and other mental activities are the products of electrical and chemical activity in the brain. But he had always wondered something, the Dalai Lama told the surgeon. If electricity and chemistry can produce thoughts and all the rest, can thoughts act back on the physical stuff of the brain to change its chemical, electrical and other physical properties?

The surgeon said no.

The brain produces and shapes mental activity, the brain surgeon said; mental activity does not alter the brain.

This incident took place about a decade ago. We now know that "mental activity" can shape and change the brain. In her post The Lotus and the Synapse, Begley gives examples of research showing that both thinking and meditation can mold your brain. Jeff's research with self-directed neuroplasticity (and here) has also shown that your thoughts change your brain.

You definitely have control over the neuron paths you create inside your skull. What brain pathways have you been forging? Have you created paths that are bearish, bitchy, surly, sullen, frenzied, fierce, arbitrary, absolutist, wimpy, weak,  stolid, stoic, considerate, compassionate? (You get the idea.) The thoughts you entertain, allow, and author are those that design your brain.

Each minute, the thoughts to which you are giving attention are sculpting your brain. Your mind hygiene, your thought management, shapes not only your brain but your life. And your conflict! The conflict between people practicing good brain hygiene will be very different from between people who have poor mind hygiene.

The life of a person with poor mind hygiene usually, well, stinks. And they often have lots of conflict that is messy. Think neuro-Pigpen.

What are your clients thinking? How good is their mind hygiene? And how about you? Aside from being a good model and attending to your place in the conflict's emotional contagion, what is your role in the mind hygiene of your clients? Let me know what you think, please.

Image credits:
jetolla at morgueFile
ammcf at photobucket

Note (added April 20, 2008, 9:17 AM Mountain): A blog post at Creating Passionate Users that includes information about emotional contagion. Scroll down to the section entitled "Emotional Contagion"

Anger—your inner fiend or your friend? Or both? What's the role of emotion?

About a year ago in Good brain, bad brain? Bring it all to the negotiation table, I wrote about the research article "Thinking straight while seeing red: The influence of anger on information processing," in which researchers looked at the effects of anger on decision-making and thinking. The effects are sometimes positive.

Today in Negotiation, I saw some related thoughts in the sidebar of an article titled "Will your emotions get the upper hand?" (pdf)

Angry individuals approach situations with confidence, a sense of control, and negative thoughts about others. In negotiation, these appraisal tendencies can trigger overconfidence, unrealistic optimism, and aggression, yet they buffer decision makers from indecision, risk aversion, and overanalysis, write Jennifer Lerner and her colleague Larissa Tiedens of Stanford University. In addition, anger can motivate us to stand up for ourselves and others in the face of injustice.

Given these different patterns, Lerner and Tiedens raise the interesting question of whether anger, despite being widely regarded as a negative emotion, can be considered a positive force in some instances.  . . .

Of course, it can. But I think we are in need of a clear description of anger. From "Are you happy?" an article in The New York Review of Books:

Let us agree to a moratorium on the use of single words, such as fear, anger, joy, and sad, and write about emotional processes with full sentences rather than ambiguous, naked concepts . . .  .

Read "Law Professor Urges Courts to Re-consider Bar on Emotions in the Courtroom" for a discussion of the relationship between reason and emotion. Excerpt:

In his article "The Emotional Juror," published recently in the Fordham Law Review, [Todd] Pettys points to recent advances in psychology and neurology that suggest emotion plays a much larger role in formulating our logical thinking than was previously known.

For instance, he cites research demonstrating that when we feel a powerful emotion, our brain looks for evidence that supports that emotion while discounting evidence that is in opposition. In this way, our emotional response over time becomes a belief borne of what we think is a logical assessment of the evidence.

How true! Have you observed that search for evidence to support emotion in yourself? Your clients? I answer "yes" to both questions. The line between emotion and reason is fuzzy and shifty and situational, don't you think? And there is a time and a place for every emotion—including anger. Agree?

Don't let the nut run the conflict resolution

In an earlier post, I mentioned a fear center in the brain and a method to facilitate its calming. That part of the brain is the amygdala. At Neurophilosophy, I learned that Dr. Joseph LeDoux, a leading expert on the amygdala and author of The Emotional Brain, has written a primer on the amygdala. The primer has much good information for those of you wishing to learn more about this part of your and your client's brain.

More about the nut reference in a moment . . .

During the seminar on Neuroscience and Conflict Resolution last week in Denver, Jeffrey Schwartz talked often about the amygdala. At one point, he became the amygdala and I interviewed him as that reactive part of the brain—a part of the brain that, during conflict resolution, we do not want to be running the show.

In beginning the interview, I asked Jeff if he wanted to be called Mr. Amygdala or Dr. Amygdala. He told us to call him simply Amyg. Who knows? Maybe in Portland next month he will be just Amy. As you may be able to guess, some fun was included in the seminar learning.

On another neuroscience note mixed with some fun, Dr. LeDoux has founded a rock group, The Amygdaloids. He calls his musical genre Heavy Mental. One of his songs is called "All In a Nut," a reference to the fact that the amygdala is shaped like an almond and its name comes from the Greek word for that nut. You can listen to previews of the Amygaloid songs here. Here's an article from The Scientist: "The Amygdaloids: Scientists who rock out." And their performance at Madison Square Garden. A longer clip of "All in a Nut" at Madison Square Garden. Here LeDoux blogs about the Amgdaloids.

Why, why, why do we feel so afraid?
Why, why, why do we feel so afraid?
Don't have to look very far
Don't get stuck in a rut
Don't go looking too hard
It's all in a nut
In your brain.

-excerpt from "All in a Nut" lyrics

Note (added November 25, 2007, 1:17 PM Mountain): Click to see the Amygdaloids debut on November 1, 2006, at Union Hall, Park Slope, Brooklyn.

Note (added January 4, 2008, 7:55 Mountain): Today the Dana Press Blog posted about the Amygdaloids performing at Kennedy Center. Excerpt:

Who is drawn to a rock band starring neuroscientists? More than 300 people in Washington, D.C., apparently, who grooved in the foyer of the Kennedy Center on Thursday to the Amygdaloids’ songs about fear, love and passion, not only from the inner depths of experience but also from the band mates’ extensive knowledge of neural pathways.

Joseph LeDoux—songwriter, lead vocalist, rhythm guitar player and member of the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives—leads this “heavy mental” garage band, which also includes Tyler Volk on lead guitar, Nina Curley on bass guitar and Daniela Schiller on drums. All are New York University scientists—three neuroscientists plus an environmental biologist (Volk).

Feelings as facilitators: Emotions can either enhance or impede communication

Jeff was interviewed on national radio last week when he was in Australia. Several of the points he made are very useful for conflict resolution. (Click to listen to Dr. Jeffrey Schwartz) [no longer available]. Jeff begins right about one-quarter of the way in.) Just one example: he talked about the role of emotion in communication.

In the interview, Jeff described self-awareness, and the observing self, and explained some of the benefits of watching what your brain is doing. One of these benefits is the positive use of emotions. Awareness of what our brains are up to allows us to use emotions wisely—instead of them using us. The wise use of emotions is probably one of the most important skills in conflict resolution. As Jeff said in the interview, this awareness allows us to  "use emotions in a way that enhances communication rather than perhaps getting in the way of communication which emotions sometimes do."

Yes, they sometimes do, don't they? Emotions are often an impediment to resolving a dispute. So the more people's minds are in charge of

Listen to Jeffrey Schwartz and me on Tuesday evening: "Leading Your Brain Instead of It Leading You"

From the Brain-Based Coaching Web site . . .

Don't miss the Brain Based Coaching Special Interest Group call Tuesday, 9/18/07 at 7:00 EDT.

We will have the opportunity to hear from and talk with two very important people in the world of emerging neuroscience.

Bridge no: 1-212-457-9879 PIN 700827#

The talk will be: "Leading Your Brain Instead of It Leading You."by Jeffrey M. Schwartz, MD and Stephanie West Allen, JD.

This is going to be so good you'll want to invite everyone you know!

Dr. Schwartz is author of the seminal books on neuroplasticity: "The Mind and the Brain: Neuroplasticity" and "the Power of Mental Force"co-authored with Sharon Begley, and the bestseller "Brain Lock: Free Yourself from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder".

He is a psychiatrist and research professor at UCLA.

Stephanie West Allen is a lawyer, speaker, trainer, author and personal strategist. She writes what has been called the most comprehensive blog on understandable neuroscience, www.brainsonpurpose.com.

One of her specialties is neuroscience and conflict resolution. Together Jeff and Stephanie have authored several widely-quoted articles which make neuroscience accessible to the layperson (find links on the www.brainsonpurpose.com blog site.

Make sure you are there for this incredible call

Notes from the "fascinating" talk Jeffrey Schwartz gave today at the IdeaFestival

( Photo credit: Geoff Oliver Bugbee—click photo for larger image)

As I announced a while back, Jeff Schwartz spoke this morning at the 2007 IdeaFestival™ in Louisville, Kentucky; his talk was called The Mind and the Brain (just as is one of his books). Wayne Hall blogged about Jeff's presentation and concluded the post with: "This has been a fascinating talk that I'm certain my notes don't capture adequately."

You may read the Hall notes on the Schwartz talk here. Some of the highlights (the quotation marks indicate a direct quote of Jeff from the talk) . . .

Cognitive reframing has a big effect on the brain by lowering negative emotion. One can quite easily train people to reframe . . .  .
. . .

Reframing "markedly, radically" changes how the brain responds . . . , and, in fact, college kids can do this after only couple days of training. What happens is that the frontal cortex area is activated and a marked decrease in fear in the brain is observed.
. . .

"The brain puts out the call, the mind decides whether to listen." The brain will respond in an animal-like way, but the human mind has the capacity to focus a very special kind of attention, one that can change or damp down damaging or fearful responses.
. . .

"The brain doesn't create consciousness, but perhaps modulates the consciousness that it receives."

Read the rest of the notes about Jeff's talk here. Thanks to quick-blogger Hall, you also can read notes on the talks of other fine thinkers at the this year's IdeaFestival™. They include . . .

• Michio Kaku: Parallel Worlds
• James McLurkin: Dances with Robots
• Karen Walker's fashion rules
• Tiffany Shlain: A Declaration of Interdependence

For more of the blog posts on the IdeaFestival presentations, go here and read the posts beginning on September 13. All the speakers at 2007 IdeaFestival™.

Note (added September 28, 2007, 10:20 AM Mountain): More about Jeff' Schwartz's talk at the Idea Festival.

"What are you feeling?" "What am I feeling?" These questions are tools for brain taming

A flurry of articles appeared this week about the neuroscience research showing that labeling your feelings can quiet your brain and increase impulse control, including

• Scientific American: "Name that feeling: You'll feel better"
• Daily Telegraph: "Happy chatting"
• Reuters: "Name that feeling: You'll feel better"
• Science Daily: "Putting Feelings Into Words Produces Therapeutic Effects In The Brain"
• Live Science: "Brain Scans Reveal Why Meditation Works"

Of course, a quiet and controlled brain is often an asset in the resolution of conflict, whether that brain belongs to the neutral, advocate, or party. However, when a discussion is hot and contentious, labeling your feelings may be difficult or nearly impossible. We have recommended a way to make it easier, a way to strengthen your labeling skills and labeling synapses.

In our recent article "Lead Your Brain Instead Of Letting It Lead You," we talk about the practice of making mental notes (first described by Jeff in his book Dear Patrick: Life is Tough - Here's Some Good Advice). Developing your skill in making mental notes can bring relief when high conflict occurs. We wrote . . .

Sometimes we become distracted from the direction in which we want to be going.  Our purpose may become clouded by anger, annoyance, confusion, jealousy, fear, or other feelings that knock us off balance and take us off the path.  Brain research has provided a handy way to deal with the distraction.

We label the feeling, saying in our mind or, if appropriate, aloud, statements such as "I am angry" or "I am nervous."  When we make statements like this, that part of the brain feeling the distracting emotion is calmed.  We can then return to clarity and purpose.  The neuroscience literature calls this "labeling the affect."

Sometimes in the heat of the moment this labeling is not easy to do. One way to make it easier is to practice it throughout the day when you are not feeling distracted.  You can practice by labeling behaviors as well as feelings.  Here's how.

During the day make mental notes such as "I am eating," or "I am pleased," or "I am thinking about the deposition."  If you practice daily, your skill in mental note taking will grow and you will be able to engage in it, no matter what is happening.  By labeling the affect, by taking mental notes, a self-leader can become calm in the middle of a storm.

Making mental notes are not just advantageous in times of conflict. The more skilled you get at labeling, the more quickly — no matter the situation — you can return to equanimity and composure. Let us know how it works.

Note: Here's a PDF of the research article "Putting Feelings Into Words: Affect Labeling Disrupts Amygdala Activity in Response to Affective Stimuli."

Note (added June 29, 2007, 8:30 AM Mountain): Here's Medical News Today article "Verbalizing Feelings Makes Sadness, Anger And Pain Less Intense."

Good brain, bad brain? Bring it all to the negotiation table

We are hearing much lately about the wise parts of the brain as well as the unruly. Truth be told this division into camps in the cranium is simplistic. David Brooks described part of the simplistic approach in his New York Times column "The Vulcan Utopia" (subscription required) in which he reviews Al Gore's book The Assault on Reason. Brooks wrote . . .

Gore seems to have come up with a theory that the upper, logical mind sits on top of, and should master, the primitive and more emotional mind below. He thinks this can be done through a technical process that minimizes information flow to the lower brain and maximizes information flow to the higher brain.

The reality, of course, is that there is no neat distinction between the "higher" and "lower" parts of the brain. There are no neat distinctions between the "rational" mind and the "visceral" body. The mind is a much more complex network of feedback loops  . . .  .

Without emotions like fear, the "logical" mind can't reach conclusions. On the other hand, many of the most vicious, genocidal acts are committed by people who are emotionally numb, not passionately out of control.

Anger is another emotion which can be very useful in the reaching of conclusions and yet anger is often maligned. Although certainly not in every instance, anger can improve our ability to make rational decisions and that often fiery emotion can assist in the rational evaluation of another person's position. Conflict precipitating anger can sometimes facilitate resolution.

In "Thinking straight while seeing red: The influence of anger on information processing," [available at no charge for a limited time] researchers discussed the impact of anger on decision-making and thinking. The article was summarized by Medical News Today. An excerpt from the summary  . . .

Anger is that powerful internal force that blows out the light of reason. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Anger is appropriately blamed for flawed thinking since it tends to alter perception of risk, increase prejudice, and trigger aggression. But is anger always destructive? Three recent experiments published in the latest issue of Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, an official publication of The Society for Personality and Social Psychology suggest that it is not. Anger can actually prompt more careful and rational analysis of another person's reasoning.

Anger is sometimes destructive and sometimes helpful; its value is variable. Wouldn't it be easier to have a list of the emotions and brain parts that are invited to the negotiation? Yes.

Although it would make life (and conflict resolution) easier if we could draw simple conclusions about the brain's anatomy and about individual emotions, doing so is at best puerile and at worst dangerous. One of many reasons that an oversimplified, single-component focus is misleading is that the  brain part or the emotion does not exist in isolation. We can only get so far by studying the tuba if want to understand the symphony.

May we learn about conflict resolution by having a better understanding of the brain? Absolutely! Neuroscience holds many, many gems. But one of our watchwords will be restraint. We don't want to contribute to the growing neuro-fiddle-faddle.