Brains On Purpose™

Warnings about brain scans, empathy, and oxytocin

With the mass popularization of neuroscience in many arenas, including conflict resolution, one hears much dumbing down of how the brain works. I read an excellent blog post today at Lucid Thoughts titled fMRI and "locationism": Something Old, Something New and wanted to point it out to you since it explains a factor in this dumbing down. Blogger Steve Genco calls it "locationism.'

Locationism is when one describes an activity in the brain as if we know exactly where that activity occurs, i.e., giving it a location. From Lucid Thoughts:

I haven’t picked on the fMRI folks for awhile, but was inspired today by a new post over at the excellent neuroscience-of-language blog Talking Brains entitled “Functional brain imaging, it’s not always where you think it is.”  And that reminded me that I also want to write something about an excellent article in Scientific American Mind from about a year ago entitled “Five Ways Brain Scans Mislead Us.”

I’m taking this opportunity for a “two-fer” because both these items draw attention to a central dogma of fMRI interpretation that is particularly prevalent in the popular media.  I call it

Neuro-talk? Keep talking neuro-talk? Talk about things you'd like to know

In Seduction by neuroscience: Resisting the allure, I wrote about the problems with neuro-talk or using neuroscience incorrectly. That post was written nearly two years ago and I believe neuro-talk has since then greatly increased.

These days the brain is a hot topic and people will even believe otherwise implausible assertions and explanations if they are told that neuroscience proves what is being put forth as true. I hear and read some of the oddest statements about the brain and what it does and does not like. There is much New Age, pop neuroscience floating around. Beware. And be aware.

I was moved to write another neuro-talk warning when reading a post at Language Log. The post has a number of good links to aticles about neuro-talk and the misuse of neuroscience. One link goes to "Caveat Lector: The Presentation of Neuroscience Information in the Popular Media." [pdf] From the article:

[R]ecent research in cognitive psychology shows that people are often unduly swayed by neuroscience studies, ... . There is thus a danger that members of the public wiIl uncriticaIly accept neuroscience-based claims, or applications of neuroscience information to public questions and debates, without regard to their merits. Because of this danger, scientists can and should do more to monitor the ways in which these claims and applications are reported in the media.

I urge you to go to the Language Lab post and follow some of the links.

And I urge you to remember that there is so much we do not know about the brain. Question what people tell you. Be skeptical. Ask

Some hard questions about neurolaw: If you are interested in law and neuroscience, read this article

This blog takes the position that there is a difference between the mind and the brain. That point of view is probably obvious since I collaborate with one of the leading non-materialist neuroscientists Jeff Schwartz. (For more about non-materialist neuroscience, read his book The Mind and the Brain.) Because of my interest in the mind/brain question, I was intrigued with a new article I recommend to you.

I also found this article blog-worthy because I have been concerned about claims being made about what the brain can show us about legal matters such as liability, truth-telling, and criminal propensity. (See my posts here and here.) This new article entitled "Philosophical Foundations of Law and Neuroscience" looks at both the mind/brain and the use of neuroscience by the legal system. The abstract:

According to a wide variety of scholars, scientists, and policymakers, neuroscience promises to transform law. Many neurolegalists - those championing the power of neuroscience for law - proceed from problematic premises regarding the relationship of mind to brain. In this Article, we make the case that their accounts of the nature of mind are implausible and that their conclusions are overblown. Thus, their claims of the power of neuroscience for law cannot be sustained. We discuss a wide array of examples including lie detection, criminal-law doctrine, economic decision-making, moral decision-making, and jurisprudence.

Download the article here.

Here's an excerpt from the authors' take on the brain/mind question (footnotes removed):

Rather than arguing about where the mind is located (e.g., in the brain or elsewhere) we need to step back and contemplate whether this is the right question to ask. First, notice that the question of the mind’s location presupposes that the mind is a kind of “thing” or “substance” that is located “somewhere” (e.g., in the body). Why must this be so? Our answer is that it need not be, and is not. An alternative conception—the one that we contend is more plausible—of mind is as a diverse array of abilities exercised by a person. These abilities implicate a wide range of psychological categories including sensations, perceptions, cognition (i.e., knowledge, memory), cogitation (i.e., beliefs, thought, imagination, mental imagery), affectations (i.e., emotions, moods, appetites), and volition (i.e., intentions, voluntary action).

To be clear, we do not deny that a properly working brain is necessary for a person to engage in the diverse array of abilities that we collectively identify as mental life. Again, nothing could be further from the truth. But, while certain neural activity is necessary for a human being to

More words of caution: Are you a wise mediator or a woolly mystic?

Lots of pseudoscience being tossed around these days, sometimes by people you might likely assign credibility. Last month, I attended a talk by George Lakoff about his new book The Political Mind: Why You Can't Understand 21st-Century American Politics with an 18th-Century Brain and was appalled at how he used the science. After reading an article "Mind Games" (The National), I knew I was not alone. Jeremy Freeman writes:

In a typical argument, Lakoff starts by describing a fairly well-established neuro-scientific theory and then generalises it to apply to a highly abstract and unstudied context. That simply does not work in neuroscience. One of the central challenges of studying the brain is that an understanding at a particular level of analysis does not always translate to others. A theory about learning at the level of individual neurons may or may not apply to the learning of complex metaphorical relationships. A theory about how the brain binds simple visual features into complex objects may or may not apply to the way it binds simple emotional experiences into complex narratives. In making these leaps, Lakoff reveals himself as someone distinctly out of touch with neuroscience.

Unfortunately I see all too much of that leaping from neuroscience to the abstract. The leapers say something like this: "Well, we know this about the brain so we must know that about how businesses run or what employees need." Some of the leaps are astounding.

And these leaps would be laughable if so many people were not being misled.

How many of you have been e-mailed that Jill Bolte Taylor TED talk? At idealawg, I have posted the need for critical thinkng about Taylor's thoughts and "facts." Last week, I saw another

Brain Overclaim Syndrome: Expecting too much from neuroscience —and the cure

Brain Overclaim Syndrome. I wish I had thought up that name to describe the tendency to exalt neuroscience to unwarranted heights. I did not, but I will be using it from now on. When I hear someone making claims about human behavior based on neurosience that leap beyond what we know through research or that are flimsy extrapolations, I will now say, "Why, that is BOS!" Sometimes, if the guesswork is particularly egregious, I may utter a second statement which is very similar but leaves out the "O".

Does BOS occur in the field of conflict resolution. Yes, although I have seen it much more frequently in the business arena where people are drawing shaky conclusions and engaging in large stretches about the brain and what it does in the workplace. Even more frequently, you can find wild and wispy assertions about the brain's behavior in the sales process. On the whole, those working at the nexus of conflict resolution and neuroscience are using caution and care. Let's be grateful for the integrity.

Click for more about Brain Overclaim Syndrome, its cure, and links to interviews and articles about neurolaw.

Image credit: nevermindjez and stretchynick

The Myth of Mars and Venus: A new book dispelling some entrenched myths

Gender differences can play a part in conflict—both the differences themselves, and the assumptions we  make and the myths we believe about the differences between men and women. Those assumptions and beliefs may be not only about parties to a dispute but about others involved, including lawyers and ourselves. Let's make sure we have good information about any differences.

"Rewire Your Brain to Systematize, Empathize" is an article in today's Boston Herald about "brain differences based on gender." On that topic, the author recommends two books: The Essential Difference: The Truth about the Male and Female Brain by Simon Baron-Cohen and The Female Brain by Louann Brizendine, MD. Before you head on over to Amazon, consider The Myth of Mars and Venus, a book coming out later this month. The author is not a fan of either book.

This soon-to-be-released book was written by Oxford professor Deborah Cameron. Beginning today, The Guardian is running three book extracts. Click to read the first: "What language barrier?"

In today's extract, Cameron writes about three sources of information on gender differences. First, are the self-help and pop psych books.

Countless self-help and popular psychology books have been written portraying men and women as alien beings, and conversation between them as a catalogue of misunderstandings. The most successful exponents of this formula, such as Deborah Tannen, author of You Just Don't Understand, and John Gray, author of Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus, have topped the bestseller lists on both sides of the Atlantic.

The next source are the pop science books . . .

with titles such as Brain Sex, Sex on the Brain, The Essential Difference, and Why Men Don't Iron. These

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.