Violence and the brain (6478RTVY) (GOT AN 8!) samenvatting/summary and the book: The Anatomy of Violence

VIOLENCE
AND THE
BRAIN Summary




Charlotte Huijzers

,Content
Lecture 1: introductory lecture....................................................................................................................... 2
Article Fairchild.....................................................................................................................................................5
Article de Brito......................................................................................................................................................6
Introduction of the book.......................................................................................................................................6
The anatomy of violence Chapter 1......................................................................................................................6
The anatomy of violence Chapter 3......................................................................................................................8
The anatomy of violence Chapter 5......................................................................................................................8

Lecture 2: neuro-bio-psychosocial jigsaw........................................................................................................ 9
The anatomy of violence Chapter 4....................................................................................................................14
The anatomy of violence Chapter 6....................................................................................................................17
The anatomy of violence Chapter 8....................................................................................................................17

Lecture 3: forensic treatments and the influence on criminal behavior of adolescents...................................19
The anatomy of violence Chapter 9....................................................................................................................22

Lecture 4: juvenile delinquency.................................................................................................................... 23
The anatomy of violence Chapter 10..................................................................................................................28
The anatomy of violence Chapter 11..................................................................................................................29

Lecture 5: empathy, violence and endocrinology..........................................................................................29

Lecture 6: suicide prevention....................................................................................................................... 39
Article O’Connor & Kirtley..................................................................................................................................43
Article Turecki.....................................................................................................................................................43

,Lecture 1: introductory lecture
Program lecture
 Introduction
 Abnormal behavior: what is it?
 Conduct disorder
 Psychopathy
o Conduct disorder and psychopathy: key in understanding severe (and
chronic!) antisocial behavior
o They are the strongest predictors

Introduction
The juvenile antisocial brain, PhD – Moji
 The youngsters rather wanted to be out of the juvenile for a day, to participate
in research of Moji.
 But the ones that could go home at the end of the day, got a reward: money.
But getting picked up by a Mercedes worked too.

Are dangerous people born or made?
 We don’t know it
 In most cases, it must be a combination
o Need negative contextual factors to trigger genes
 Most biological = dangerous group, difficult to treat them

Abnormal behavior: what is it?
Normal behavior
 So, what is normal or typical behavior?
 When does it become antisocial or abnormal behavior?
o Not a simple thing
 Abnormal behavior: 3 lines/different ways of what is normal or abnormal
o Social, ethical, laws, daily life, surroundings
3 cases of individuals and most relevant personal characteristics, what they’ve done
and what is normal and abnormal. 3 boys, participated in studies.
 Case 1: Cut of tail of family cat
o Proud of serial amputations, interested in cat’s reactions
 Case 2: Pushed toddler into swimming pool
o Watched toddler drown, interested in seeing someone drown, not afraid of
punishment, liked the attention
 Case 3: used excessive violence during assault
o Was apparently provoked by victim, not troubled by incarceration, no feelings of
remorse or regret, his perspective: he simply reacted to the situation
o More complex case

Abnormal behavior is not category, it’s spectral/dimension!

Different criteria abnormal/atypical/antisocial
 Cultural/social/ethical
 Statistical model
 Medical model

DSM-5

,  Descriptive, doesn’t say anything about underlying causes, treatment and
ignores comorbidity (= having multiple psychiatric disorders at a time)

Conduct disorder (CD) - externalizing
 Only used when age <18/19 years
 Symptoms:
o Aggression to people and animals
- Physical cruelty to people and animals
- Forced someone in sexual intimacy
o Destruction of property
o Deceitfulness or theft
o Serious violations of rules
- They don’t believe in rules if they’re not their own rules
o The disturbance in behavior causes clinically significant impairment in
social, academic, or occupational functioning
o If the individual is 18 or older, criteria are not met for antisocial personality
disorder
 Limited prosocial emotions (was psychopathic tendencies, but is the same)
o Lack of guilt
o Lack of empathy
o Unconcerned about performance
o Shallow or deficient affect
 Symptoms must be persistent
 Most often showcases itself around the age of 7-8, symptoms become more
severe/excessive
 Most adolescents grow out of this disorder by aging/developing
 More persistent is the group that still show the symptoms >18/19 years

Why is it relevant?
 Prevalence around 7%
 High referral rates
 Societal/economic/emotional burden
 Precursor/predictor to adult psychopathology
o Antisocial personality disorder, substance abuse, anxiety etc.
 Highly chronic & persistent in a substant of youngsters
 Notoriously difficult to treat
o We do not have a scientifical proven treatment

Core symptoms:
 Aggression/intimidation
 Destruction/vandalism
 Lying/stealing
 Breaking rules
 More males than females

Psychopathy
 Disorder in personality, collection of abnormal personality traits
 Replaced: antisocial personality disorder (85% overlap with psychopathy)
 Inability to treat them, can’t change personality