Article: Moral Judgments Can Be Altered research finding

December 12, 2010

While BPD (and the Cluster B disorders) most certainly involve malfunction in

various parts of the brain,an interesting research project on mentally healthy

subjects has revealed that manipulation of the right temporo-parietal junction

of the human brain (identified as the region from whence we get our notions of

" morality " ) results in the suspension of functional moral judgment.

Apparently this particular area of the brain doesn't fully develop until we

are in our twenties--which made me wonder if,for the Cluster B camp,the RTPJ

never fully develops at all.

Here is a brief description of the RTPJ region's role:

" Accumulating evidence from cognitive neuroscience indicates that the

right inferior parietal cortex, at the junction with the posterior temporal

cortex, plays a critical role in various aspects of social cognition such as

theory of mind and empathy. With a quantitative meta-analysis of 70 functional

neuroimaging studies, the authors demonstrate that this area is also engaged in

lower-level (bottom-up) computational processes associated with the sense of

agency and reorienting attention to salient stimuli. It is argued that this

domain-general computational mechanism is crucial for higher level social

cognitive processing. "

" Theory of mind " is the ability to *accurately assess* someone else's

intentions. " Reorienting attention to salient stimuli " would be making a

functional judgment as to how to react when confronted with data which may or

may not be congruent with what had proceeded it based on one's own sense of

personal agency.

If this area of your brain isn't working,you are going to have some

pretty wacky moral judgment.

Here's the article about a research experiment where the functioning of

the RTPJ was purposefully suspended.Remind anyone of their nada?

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100329152516.htm

--

December 14, 2010

Hi AFB and Annie,

Science gives me a context too for the craziness and it helps me

to take a rational " step back " from the whole FOO vortex of pain,shame and blame

like you said as the *only* cause.

What I found most interesting about this research experiment is

that when the RTPJ functioning was suppressed that the subjects focused solely

on outcome as the basis for their moral judgment and were unable to consider the

actor's intentions.I've read posts from people here many times about

painful,dangerous,harmful or frightening incidents they've had that their nadas

completely disregarded as insignificant simply because the poster didn't die

from it.Which is similar to how the research subjects deemed the boyfriend in

the dangerous bridge example as morally blameless simply because his girlfriend

survived crossing it--it didn't *matter* to them that he might have wanted her

to cross that bridge *because* it was dangerous in order to kill her.When our

nadas (or fadas) disregard the bad things that happen to us ( " But you're fine

now,what's the problem? " ) it comes off as contempt or extreme selfishness and

therefore feels very personal--but it could also be because a part of their

brain such as the RTPJ literally doesn't function.

Only considering the outcome tends to lead to immoral behavior: " the

ends justify the means " ...which is a thought process seen again and again in the

Axis 2 disorders.

Annie,I think it will be very interesting how a more thorough

understanding of how the human brains works (or doesn't work) and how that is

related to genetics will play out on a social level as growing scientific

discovery and knowledge has to reckon with how to apply what is known to how we

all live.

>

> , thanks for this. I read the article you supplied the link to;

medical science always gives me comfort when applied to the pain of family. It

gives me a context for the craziness and steps me outside of the family dynamics

the use only tools of shame and blame as the cause of everything.

> Many thanks,

> AFB

December 14, 2010