Tag: Biology

Chapter 11 (Us Versus Them) discussed Us (in-group) and Them (out-group). We show preference for persons that we view as an Us, this could be someone who is the same age as us, has the same color hair, is a fan of the same team, someone who went to the same college, and endless other categories of sameness. We view someone as a Them when they fall into a different category than the one we are focusing on, and they are perceived as being threatening, shady, and they fill us with rage. The author discussed ways in which we can increase feelings of either affection or disdain that we have towards an Us or a Them, and circumstances in which the normal reactions one would have towards a Them disappear, this being when individuals on opposing sides find a category to which they both belong that takes precedence over the category that separates them.  I really enjoyed the warmth/competence matrix detailed out by the author, along with the feelings associated with the various pairings of high and low as well as the feelings that fall between the squares.

Chapter 12 (Hierarchy, Obedience, and Resistance) explains ranking systems, first discussing the different types amongst animals. Humans are animals, and there are similarities between the hierarchies we have and the ones that some animals have. But we also have a ranking system that is unique to us (I will let you read to discover what it is). Following this, the author goes into how we determine a persons rank using biological factors. Determining a persons rank can be as simple as looking at their face or checking out their body language. Glucocorticoids are brought up again, and the way in which a high-ranking job can make you sick from the stress of it, but it all depends on how much authority you have, how many people are above or below you in the chain, and how many people you actually work with day to day. The CEO of company may have a very prestigious job, but the people directly below them or a few levels below them are the ones most likely to experience considerable stress. Next, there is a section about leaders and how we choose them. Following this, the author discusses obedience and conformity while mentioning the author of one of my favorite books, The Lucifer Effect by Philip Zimbardo (which I suggest you read if you want to learn more about just how far things can go in the name of conforming). After going through several examples of people doing terrible things in the name of conforming or being obedient, Sapolsky does tell us how it’s possible to reduce the chances of doing something horrible if the only reason you would be doing the act in question is because someone in position of power or great esteem has told you to do it.

Chapter 9 (Centuries to Millenia Before) discussed culture and how it molds behavior. The author begins with declaring his goals for the chapter, which I appreciated. Culture can be defined in many ways, but to make things easier, he tells us how he will be defining it for the purpose of books subject. I enjoyed learning about the types of cultures, why certain cultures exist where they do, and how culture creates a society’s morals. The concept of honor killing and how it is defined relative to culture was very gripping, at least for me, you might find another topic in this chapter far more engaging. This lengthy chapter has many more topics, you will just have to discover them by reading it for yourself.

Chapter 10 (The Evolution of Behavior) put in the simplest of terms, is about selection. Group selection is how behavior evolves by one learning that for the good of the species you need to act a certain way. Individual selection involves doing what you feel you must do to make sure your genes survive, which usually means destroying someone else’s genes. Kin selection is when you help your closest relatives reproduce in order that some of your genes forge ahead. I also learned why we cooperate with others, how we know it is beneficial to do so, and how cooperation begins when it does not exist. I got really caught up in pair bonding species and tournament species, and the various ways in which you could guess to which group a subject belongs based on physical characteristics. There was a small section about genotype and phenotype, with an amazing analogy to help remember the difference between the two if you find yourself struggling. The chapter ends with the author trying to explain where humans fit into all of this, which is difficult because there is so much variation in what we all value. Also, there is an amusing anecdote about the nicknames given to sociobiologists by people in favor of punctuated equilibrium, and vice versa, and another one about male nipples.

Chapter 7 (Back to the Crib, Back to the Womb) discusses the roots of our behavior, which began in childhood. Warning, this chapter is insanely long, and if you are the type of person who must read an entire chapter in one sitting once you begin it (as I am), make sure you have nothing immediately planned in the future and devote a block of time. I am not going to detail the stages of development, Theory of Mind, or the reasoning stages, because even though the author discusses these topics, there is plenty of literature out there that goes into much more detail about the topics on their own. What really drew me into this chapter was the section about how childhood influences adult life, specifically the section about mothers. I got the impression that mothers were the greatest influence on an individual from pre-birth, if the mother gives birth to the child, and through childhood. A mothers’ actions and choices influence the child even while they are in the womb, from the sound of her voice, which Is preferred by babies more so than the voice of their fathers, to the substances she chooses to put into her body while carrying, a healthy diet producing a healthy child, poor nutrition producing a sickly child. Of course, there are other childhood influences that have just as much of an impact as mothers, but they were not discussed in as much detail as mothers, the author stating that these other influences had many similarities. In kind, if you want to read a little bit about negative reinforcement in order to ponder the reasons why some people become attached to their abuser, there is some good information here. The chapter then continues with the effects of violence, bullying, and culture on behavior, which I also found to be incredibly interesting. Finally, there was a section about transgender studies and how certain parts of the brain may explain why some people feel as though they were born into the wrong body.

Chapter 8 (Back to When You Were Just a Fertilized Egg) was another very long chapter, which discussed the roles of genes in behavior. It was divided into three parts, each part concluding with a wrap up of all the key points. Part one was about genes and their role in proteins, transcription factors (the regulators of genes), and the environmental influences that regulate transcription factors. I could not possibly explain this chapter in a better way than the author did, and I will not try. Part two was about looking at traits, explaining the difference between what it means when a trait is inherited versus when a trait has a degree of heritability. What I got out of this section was that genes can affect behavior depending on the environment, but the environment can affect behavior depending on the genes. You cannot look at a gene exclusively when trying to explain a behavior, you must consider the environmental factors as well. One gene can act a specific way in one type of environment, but place that same gene into another environment and there could be a completely different outcome. By only observing a gene in one environment, you could end up thinking that the genetic input towards a behavior is more important than it actually is because you are not considering the environmental role. The most thought-provoking passages from part three were about the mess that is serotonin and the many different studies that have been conducted to try to find validation in the theory that low serotonin increases aggression. This undertaking is not going well, as sometimes high serotonin can increase aggression. Towards the end of the chapter, we are told that the effect a single gene has on behavior is very small, behavior is influenced by several genes at once, each gene contributing a very small influence.  

Chapter 5 (Days to Months Before) begins by reminding us of the focus of the previous chapters, Seconds being the nervous system, Minutes to Hours being sensory cues, and Hours to Days being hormones. This chapter focuses on memory. Memory comes from the connection between the axon terminal and the dendritic spine. You would think new memory means new connections between these two, but it is rather a strengthening bond between the two which creates new memories. Putting it in the simplest terms I could follow, this happens in this way because of receptors on the dendritic spine. The spine contains one receptor, called the non-NMDA receptor. The axon releases glutamate, which causes an excitement. This excitement can only be detected by NMDA receptors. So how does the brain know to get excited about something if the spine only has non-NMDA receptors? After a length of time the axon will have released a lot of glutamate, this release will activate the NMDA receptor so that the dendritic spine becomes aware of the excitement. Lots of excitement over a long period of time leads to the NMDA receptors being more open in the future. This is how we remember. There is a lot more to it, but after reading through this section many times, this is how I came to understand the process. I then read an interesting piece about compensation. It is a common saying or belief that if you lose one of your senses the others will grow stronger, and there is proof of this being valid. The brain knows how to utilize areas of the brain that are not being used, say the visual area in the brain of a person who is blind, to improve the hearing area of the blind individual. Additionally, the visual area of the brain becomes activated when a blind person reads in Braille. Reading pieces like this make me want to learn more about compensation.

Chapter 6 (Adolescence; or, Dude, Where’s My Frontal Cortex?) did not interest me all that much. I learned that the teen years are the years when we take the most risks and are most interested in things that are unique and different, and this is because the prefrontal cortex is not fully developed and won’t be until we reach our mid-twenties. This also attributes to the reason why we are the most violent when we are teens and young adults, because we are less sensitive to pain, less sensitive to negative feedback (I like to think of it as the “I don’t care” attitude), and there isn’t a strong connection between moral reasoning and empathy. Why is there a delay in the prefrontal cortex? You’ll just need to read this chapter to hear some of the theories.

Chapter 3 (Seconds to Minutes Before) discussed outside stimuli and their influences on behavior. Sounds, sights, smells, and touch are all sensory cues that can have an effect on your behavior, but in ways so subtle they are not noticed by you. I think my favorite parts in this chapter involved the things I learned about smell. In many mammals, humans not included, smell contributes a great deal to behavior. Animals can sense things through smell that we cannot, and they know how to react when they catch a whiff of a certain smell. Us humans cannot smell the difference between a sample of sweat that came from someone who was working out over a sample that came from someone who was watching a horror film. But our brains know the difference, due to studies showing that a certain area in our brain will activate. If we smell fear, we cannot tell another person that the surrounding air smells of fear, but if you are put in a room full of frightened people, your brain will conclude that you are scared too. For those who studied psychology or just have an interest in it, there are brief mentions of operant conditioning. As a former student of psychology, I was particularly intrigued at the utterance of certain behaviors not following the rules of conditioning.

Chapter 4 (Hours to Days Before) is another very long chapter, but for me it was not as difficult to get through as Chapter 2. If you want to learn about hormones and how everything you thought you knew about them is wrong, please read this chapter. I first learned about testosterone, and how it does not cause aggression. As an example, men who are castrated, eunuchs, or given blockers, chemical castration, do not become less aggressive. In reality, the more aggressive behaviors a person, usually male, has demonstrated in the past, the more likely they are to display continued aggressive behavior in the future because it is a learned behavior. Aggression stimulates testosterone, which is why you see more of it in persons showing aggressive behavior, and thus the backwards thinking that testosterone is the cause. Testosterone is very complicated, and it does far more than most people know, but you will have to read to find out what exactly. I next learned about oxytocin and vasopressin, which are involved with bonding. I grew very interested in a small section towards the end that mentioned cross species bonding, which has existed for an extremely short period of time when compared to how long these neuropeptides have been around for. Next, came female aggression, which does not entirely have to do with a certain hormone, estrogen. Aggression in females, which is not studied as extensively as male aggression, can come from many factors that males do not have to deal with. Hormone ratio, the fact that hormone levels in the female can change within hours, breeding being either year-round or during certain seasons, and perimenstrual aggression and irritability, all factors that play a part in female aggression that cannot be found in the human male. Finally, I learned about stress and its effects on behavior. Apparently, there is stress that is good for you, called stress that we love by the author, and stress that is bad for you, the kind that can kill you if you find yourself in a constant state of stress. The chapter ends with a conclusion, which I thought summed everything up very well in bullet point form.

I was going to include Chapter 5, but I considered that might be a bit much as I wrote a lot about Chapter 3 and 4. Look for Chapter 5 plus more next week.