Neurobiology of violence

• April 18, 2024

The moral paradigm can be read at the brain level, in the activation of temporary zones , Dr. Feggy Ostosrky said in her conference "Neurobiology of Violence" presented this August 18 and 19 at the Universum Museum of Sciences during the 2nd Symposium of Cognitive Neurosciences of the UNAM.

Dr. Ostorsky's team has been trying for years to discover and analyze the relationship between brains and criminal behavior of some of the most dangerous prisoners in the country. He mentions that emotions play an important role in the development of violence and that violent behaviors are due to individual, family and social risk factors

During his conference he mentioned that there are two types of violence :

Secondary violence: It is one in which there are no consequences of violent behaviors because the subject presents some clinical condition , such as depression, abuse of substances such as alcohol, psychiatric disorders, among others.

• 37% of people with depression report irritability and 60% of them report physically attacking another.
• Between 40% and 80% of cases of violence in the emergency room are related to drug abuse.
• Several studies show that alcohol abuse decreases the levels of serotonin, a neurotransmitter responsible for regulating moods, which causes an increase in the violent reactions of those who consume it.

Primary violence: This type of violence can be caused by an antisocial personality disorder or because the person is a psychopath .

Emotions of violence

Dr. Ostorsky indicates that emotions are also divided into primaries (fear, sadness, joy, disgust) or complex emotions (guilt, pride, shame, among others).

Complex emotions have an interaction between the subcortical centers of the brain, which generates unconscious emotions. They can be of the type of social or moral emotions, which are linked to interests of the welfare of society, such as contempt, guilt or empathy.

In studies conducted in state prisons and high security federal prisons, Dr. Ostorsky and her team and research analyzed, through functional magnetic resonances, the responses of some of the most dangerous inmates from Mexico.

Through a collection of images shown to imprisoned volunteers it was observed that in the case of psychopaths, there was no clear differentiation between the four measured emotions, which were: pleasant, unpleasant, neutral or repulsive. They do not present nuances.

The researcher and author of books like "Killer Minds "indicates that there is a genetic factor that predisposes some cases of psychopathy. These genes are located specifically and intervene in the transmitters of emotions. In the case that the violent subject has had some abuse during his childhood, these are activated, causing an episode of violence.

"It is known that the hippocampus and the cerebral amygdala are responsible for regulating the intensity of aggression. But currently they are detecting what other areas of the brain are the ones that are activated in the violence to achieve finding a medical treatment to solve it "says the specialist.