The Anatomy of Violence

by Adrian Raine

  41. Kiehl, K. A., Smith, A. M., Hare, R. D., Mendrek, A., Forster, B. B., Brink, J. & Liddle, P. F. (2001). Limbic abnormalities in affective processing by criminal psychopaths as revealed by functional magnetic resonance imaging. Biological Psychiatry 50, 677–84.

  42. Rubia, K., Halari, R., Smith, A. B., Mohammed, M., Scott, S., et al. (2008): Dissociated functional brain abnormalities of inhibition in boys with pure conduct disorder and in boys with pure attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. American Journal of Psychiatry 165, 889–97.

  43. New, A. S., Hazlett, E. A., Buchsbaum, M. S., Goodman, M., Reynolds, D., et al. (2002): Blunted prefrontal cortical (18)fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography response to meta-chlorophenylpiperazine in impulsive aggression. Archives of General Psychiatry 59, 621–29.

  44. Maratos, E. J., Dolan, R. J., Morris, J. S., Henson, R.N.A. & Rugg, M. D. (2001). Neural activity associated with episodic memory for emotional context. Neuropsychologia 39, 910–20.

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  46. Ochsner, K. N. et al. (2005). The neural correlates of direct and reflected self-knowledge. NeuroImage 28, 797–814.

  47. Fagan, J. (1989). Cessation of family violence: Deterrence and dissuasion. In L. Ohlin & M. Tonry (eds.), Family Violence: Crime and Justice: A Review of Research, pp. 377–425. Chicago: University of Chicago.

  48. Wilt, S. & Olson, S. (1996). Prevalence of domestic violence in the United States. Journal of American Medical Women’s Association 51, 77–88.

  49. Guth, A. A. & Pachter, L. (2000). Domestic violence and the trauma surgeon. American Journal of Surgery 179, 134–40; Hamby, J. M. & Koss, M. P. (2003). Violence against women: Risk factors, consequences, and prevalence. In J. M. Leibschutz, S. M. Frayne & G. M. Saxe (eds.), Violence Against Women: A Physician’s Guide to Identification and Management, pp. 3–38. Philadelphia: American College of Physicians.

  50. Pihlajamaki, M., Tanila, H., Kononen, M., et al. (2005). Distinct and overlapping fMRI activation networks for processing of novel identities and locations of objects. European Journal of Neuroscience 22, 2095–105.

  51. Sevostianov, A., Horwitz, B., Nechaev, V., et al. (2002). fMRI study comparing names versus pictures of objects. Human Brain Mapping 16, 168–75.

  52. George, D. T., Phillips, M. J., Doty, L., Umhau, J. C. & Rawlings, R. R. (2006): A model linking biology, behavior, and psychiatric diagnoses in perpetrators of domestic violence. Medical Hypotheses 67, 345–53.

  53. Ibid.

  54. Babcock, J. C., Green, C. E., Webb, S. A. & Graham, K. H. (2004). A second failure to replicate the Gottman et al. (1995) typology of men who abuse intimate partners … and possible reasons why. Journal of Family Psychology 18, 396–400.

  55. We are not the only group to be thinking along these lines. Others have hypothesized that spouse-abusers are hypersensitive to emotional stimuli that could be interpreted as threatening, such as slights and signs of disapproval, resulting in increased negative emotionality and reacting out of proportion to the social context. See George, D. T., Rawlings, R. R., Williams, W. A., Phillips, M. J., Fong, G., et al. (2004). A select group of perpetrators of domestic violence: Evidence of decreased metabolism in the right hypothalamus and reduced relationships between cortical/subcortical brain structures in position emission tomography. Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging 130, 11–25; also Babcock et al., A second failure to replicate the Gottman et al. (1995) typology.

  56. Babcock, J. C., Green, C. E. & Robieb, C. (2004). Does batterers’ treatment work? A meta-analytic review of domestic violence treatment. Clinical Psychology Review 23, 1023–53.

  57. Twain, M. (1882). On the Decay of the Art of Lying. Boston: James R. Osgood and Company.

  58. Very sadly, Sean Spence died prematurely, at the age of forty-eight, on Christmas Day, 2010, after suffering a long illness. He was a highly creative and energetic scientist that many of us miss.

  59. Lee, T.M.C., Liu, H. L., Tan, L. H., Chan, C.C.H., Mahankali, S., et al. (2002). Lie detection by functional magnetic resonance imaging. Human Brain Mapping 15, 157–64.

  60. Spence, S. A., Farrow, T.F.D., Herford, A. E., Wilkinson, I. D., Zheng, Y., et al. (2001). Behavioural and functional anatomical correlates of deception in humans. NeuroReport 12, 2849–53.

  61. Langleben, D. D., Schroeder, L., Maldjian, J. A., Gur, R. C., McDonald, S., et al. (2002). Brain activity during simulated deception: An event-related functional magnetic resonance study. NeuroImage 15, 727–32.

  62. Mackintosh, N., Baddeley, A., Brownsworth, R., et al. (2011). Brain Waves Module 4: Neuroscience and the Law. London: The Royal Society.

  63. Greene, J. D., Sommerville, R. B., Nystrom, L. E., Darley, J. M. & Cohen, J. D. (2001). An fMRI investigation of emotional engagement in moral judgment. Science 293, 2105–8.

  64. Koenigs, M., Young, L., Adolphs, R., Tranel, D., Cushman, F., et al. (2007). Damage to the prefrontal cortex increases utilitarian moral judgments. Nature 446, 908–11.

  65. Moll, J. et al. (2002). The neural correlates of moral sensitivity: A functional magnetic resonance imaging investigation of basic and moral emotions. The Journal of Neuroscience: The Official Journal of the Society for Neuroscience 22, 2730–36.

  66. Heekeren, H. R., Wartenburger, I., Schmidt, H., Prehn, K., Schwintowski, H. P., et al. (2005). Influence of bodily harm on neural correlates of semantic and moral decision-making. NeuroImage 24, 887–97.

  67. Kumari, V., Das, M., Hodgins, S., Zachariah, E., Barkataki, I., et al. (2005). Association between violent behaviour and impaired prepulse inhibition of the startle response in antisocial personality disorder and schizophrenia. Behavioral and Brain Research 158, 159–66.

  68. Kiehl, K. A., Smith, A. M., Mendrek, A., Forster, B. B., Hare, R. D., et al. (2004). Temporal lobe abnormalities in semantic processing by criminal psychopaths as revealed by functional magnetic resonance imaging. Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging 130, 295–312.

  69. Yang, Y. L., Glenn, A. L. & Raine, A. (2008). Brain abnormalities in antisocial individuals: Implications for the law. Behavioral Sciences & the Law 26, 65–83.

  70. Raine, A. & Yang, Y. (2006). Neural foundations to moral reasoning and antisocial behavior. Social, Cognitive, and Affective Neuroscience 1, 203–13.

  71. Veit, R., Lotze, M., Sewing, S., Missenhardt, H., Gaber, T., et al. (2010). Aberrant social and cerebral responding in a competitive reaction time paradigm in criminal psychopaths. NeuroImage 49, 3365–72; Kiehl, K. A. (2006). A cognitive neuroscience perspective on psychopathy: Evidence for paralimbic system dysfunction. Psychiatry Research 142, 107–28.

  72. New et al., Blunted prefrontal cortical (18)fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography response.

  73. Lee, T.M.C., Chan, S. C. & Raine, A. (2009). Hyper-responsivity to threat stimuli in domestic violence offenders: A functional magnetic resonance imaging study. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry 70, 36–45.

  74. Rule, A. (2009). The Stranger Beside Me. New York: Pocket Books.

  75. Vronsky, P. (2007). Female Serial Killers: How and Why Women Become Monsters. New York: Berkley Books.

  76. Ibid.

  77. Ibid., p. 132.

  78. Ibid.

  79. Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and Loss, vol. 1, Attachment. New York: Hogarth Press; Rutter, M. (1982). Maternal Deprivation Reassessed (2nd ed.). Harmondsworth, U.K.: Penguin.

  80. Vronsky, Female Serial Killers.

  81. Hare, R. D. (2003). The Hare Psychopathy Checklist—Revised (PCL-R), 2nd ed. Toronto, Canada: Multi-Health Systems.

  82. Crime: Chronic Murder. August 29, 1938. Time. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,789132,00.html.

  83. Glenn, A. L., Raine, A. & Schug, R. A. (2009). The neural correlates of moral decision-making in psychopathy. Molecular Psychiatry 14, 5–6. />
  84. Vronsky, Female Serial Killers.

  85. Blair, The amygdala and ventromedial prefrontal cortex.

  86. Raine & Yang. Neural foundations to moral reasoning and antisocial behavior.

  4. COLD-BLOODED KILLERS

  1. Chynoweth, C. (2005). How do I become a bomb disposal expert? The Times (London), February 24, http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/career_and_jobs/graduate_management/article517604.ece.

  2. Elder, R. K. (2008). A brother lost, a brotherhood found. Chicago Tribune, May 17, http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-unabomber-story,0,7970571.story.

  3. Forty-three years after his first IQ test, at age eleven, Ted Kaczynski was retested, for a score of 138. The drop from 167 is likely due to mental illness, which developed in early adulthood.

  4. Eisermann, K. (1992). Long-term heart rate responses to social stress in wild European rabbits: Predominant effect of rank position. Physiology & Behavior 52, 33–36.

  5. Cherkovich, G. M. & Tatoyan, S. K. (1973). Heart rate (radiotelemetric registration) in macaques and baboons according to dominant-submissive rank in a group. Folia Primatologica 20, 265–73; Holst, D. V. (1986). Vegetative and somatic compounds of tree shrews’ behavior. Journal of the Autonomic Nervous System, Suppl., 657–70.

  6. One reason it is hard for people to believe that low heart rate can predispose an individual to antisocial behavior is the idea that exercise reduces resting heart rate and we view people who exercise in a favorable light. Although this is technically true, surprisingly the effect is much smaller than people imagine. Even twenty weeks of endurance training lowers resting heart rate only by two beats per minute. The type of moderate exercise some of us regularly engage in has even smaller effects. See Wilmore, J. H., Stanforth, P. R., Gagnon, J., et al. (1996). Endurance exercise training has a minimal effect on resting heart rate: The HERITAGE study. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise 28, 829–35.

  7. Raine, A. & Venables, P. H. (1984). Tonic heart rate level, social class and antisocial behaviour in adolescents. Biological Psychology 18, 123–32.

  8. Raine, A. & Jones, F. (1987). Attention, autonomic arousal, and personality in behaviorally disordered children. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology 15, 583–99.

  9. Ortiz, J. & Raine, A. (2004). Heart rate level and antisocial behavior in children and adolescents: A meta-analysis. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 43, 154–62.

  10. The overall “effect size” was -0.44. Effect sizes tell us the strength of the relationship. To put this into context, .2 is a small relationship, .5 is medium, and .8 is large.

  11. For more examples of effect sizes in medicine and psychology, see Meyer, G. J. et al. (2001). Psychological testing and psychological assessment: A review of evidence and issues. American Psychologist 56, 128–65.

  12. The correlation between smoking and lung cancer is .08, between alcohol use during pregnancy and premature birth is .09, and between taking aspirin to reduce the risk of death by a heart attack is .02. The effect of taking antihypertensive medication in reducing the risk of stroke is a correlation of .03. In comparison, the correlation between heart rate and antisocial behavior is .22.

  13. Raine, A., Venables, P. H. & Mednick, S. A. (1997). Low resting heart rate at age 3 years predisposes to aggression at age 11 years: Evidence from the Mauritius Child Health Project. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry 36, 1457–64.

  14. Voors, A. W., Webber, L. S. & Berenson, B. S. (1982). Resting heart rate and pressure rate product of children in a total biracial community: The Bogalusa Heart study. American Journal of Epidemiology 116, 276–86.

  15. Ibid. The effect size here is quite strong, at d = 0.36, p < .0001.

  16. Shaw, D. S. & Winslow, E. B. (1997). Precursors and correlates of antisocial behavior from infancy to preschool. In D. M. Stoff, J. Breiling & J. D. Maser (eds.), Handbook of Antisocial Behavior, pp. 148–58. New York: Wiley.

  17. Baker, L. A., Tuvblad, C., Reynolds, C., Zheng, M., Lozano, D. I., et al. (2009). Resting heart rate and the development of antisocial behavior from age 9 to 14: Genetic and environmental influences. Development and Psychopathology, 21, 939–60.

  18. Farrington, D. P. (1987). Implications of biological findings for criminological research. In S. A. Mednick, T. E. Moffitt & S. A. Stack (eds.), The Causes of Crime: New Biological Approaches, pp. 42–64. New York: Cambridge University Press; Venables, P. H. (1987). Autonomic and central nervous system factors in criminal behavior. In Mednick et al., The Causes of Crime, pp. 110-36.

  19. Farrington, D. P. (1997). The relationship between low resting heart rate and violence. In A. Raine, P. A. Brennan, D. P. Farrington & S. A. Mednick (eds.), Biosocial Bases of Violence, pp. 89–106. New York: Plenum.

  20. The reason parental crime may be such a well-replicated risk factor for offspring crime is that it combines significant genetic and environmental risks. Criminal parents pass on the genetic risk for crime to their offspring, and they also give their children poor parenting, an unstable lifestyle, and abuse, important social risk factors for crime.

  21. Farrington, The relationship between low resting heart rate and violence.

  22. Raine, A., Venables, P. H. & Williams, M. (1995). High autonomic arousal and electrodermal orienting at age 15 years as protective factors against criminal behavior at age 29 years. American Journal of Psychiatry 152, 1595–1600.

  23. Connor, D. F., Glatt, S. J., Lopez, I. D., Jackson, D. & Melloni, R. H. (2002). Psychopharmacology and aggression, vol. 1: A meta-analysis of stimulant effects on overt/covert aggression-related behaviors in ADHD. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 41, 253–61.

  24. Stadler, C., Grasmann, D., Fegert, J. M., Holtmann, M., Poustka, F., et al. (2008). Heart rate and treatment effect in children with disruptive behavior disorders. Child Psychiatry and Human Development 39, 299–309.

  25. Rogeness, G. A., Cepeda, C., Macedo, C. A., Fischer, C., et al. (1990). Differences in heart rate and blood pressure in children with conduct disorder, major depression, and separation anxiety. Psychiatry Research 33, 199–206.

  26. Moffitt, T. E., Arseneault, L., Jaffee, S. R., Kim-Cohen, J., Koenen, K. C., et al. (2008). Research Review: DSM-V conduct disorder: Research needs for an evidence base. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 49, 3–33.

  27. Raine, A. (1993). The Psychopathology of Crime: Criminal Behavior as a Clinical Disorder. San Diego: Academic Press.

  28. Raine, A., Reynolds, C., Venables, P. H. & Mednick, S. A. (1997). Resting heart rate, skin conductance orienting, and physique. In Raine et al., Biosocial Bases of Violence, pp. 107–26.

  29. Cox, D., Hallam, R., O’Connor, K. & Rachman, S. (1983). An experimental study of fearlessness and courage. British Journal of Psychology 74, 107–17; O’Connor, K., Hallam, R., and Rachman, S. (1985). Fearlessness and courage: A replication experiment. British Journal of Psychology 76, 187–97.

  30. Scarpa, A., Raine, A., Venables, P. H. & Mednick, S. A. (1997). Heart rate and skin conductance in behaviorally inhibited Mauritian children. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 106, 182–90; Kagan, J. (1994). Galen’s Prophecy: Temperament in Human Nature. New York: Basic Books.

  31. Raine, A., Reynolds, C., Venables, P. H., Mednick, S. A. & Farrington, D. P. (1998). Fearlessness, stimulation-seeking, and large body size at age 3 years as early predispositions to childhood aggression at age 11 years. Archives of General Psychiatry 55, 745–51.

  32. Oldehinkel, A. J., Verhulst, F. C. & Ormel, J. (2008). Low heart rate: A marker of stress resilience. The TRAILS Study. Biological Psychiatry 63, 1141–46.

  33. Zahn-Waxler, C., Cole, P., Welsh, J. D. & Fox, N. A. (1995). Psychophysiological correlates of empathy and prosocial behaviors in preschool children with behavior problems. Development and Psychopathology 7, 27–48.

  34. Lovett, B. J. & Sheffield, R. A. (2007). Affective empathy deficits in aggressive children and adolescents:
A critical review. Clinical Psychology Review 27, 1–13.

  35. Eysenck, H. J. (1997). Personality and the biosocial model of antisocial and criminal behavior. In Raine et al., Biosocial Bases of Violence, pp. 21–38.

  36. Raine, A., Reynolds, C., Venables, P. H. & Mednick, S. A. (1997). Resting heart rate, skin conductance orienting, and physique.

  37. El-Sheikh, M., Ballard, M. & Cummings, E. M. (1994). Individual differences in preschoolers’ physiological and verbal responses to videotaped angry interactions. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology 22, 303–20.

  38. Raine et al., Fearlessness, stimulation-seeking, and large body size at age 3 years.

  39. Zuckerman, M. (1994). Behavioral Expressions and Biosocial Bases of Sensation Seeking. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

  40. Moffitt, T. E. (1993). Adolescence-limited and life-course persistent antisocial behavior: A developmental taxonomy. Psychological Review 100, 674–701.

  41. Raine, A., Liu, J., Venables, P. H., Mednick, S. A. & Dalais, C. (2010). Cohort profile: The Mauritius Child Health Project. International Journal of Epidemiology 39, 1441–51.

  42. WHO Scientific Group (1968). Neurophysiological and behavioural research in psychiatry. WHO Technical Report No. 381. Geneva: World Health Organization.

  43. Raine, et al., Fearlessness, stimulation-seeking, and large body size at age 3 years.

  44. Achenbach, T. M. (1991). Manual for the Child Behavior Checklist/4-18. Burlington, Vt.: Department of Psychiatry, University of Vermont.

  45. Over Aggressie (2001). KRO network Amsterdam, Netherlands, http://www.kro.nl/.

  46. Ibid.

  47. Ibid.

  48. Ibid.

  49. Ibid.

  50. Ibid.

  51. Kenrick, D. T. & Sheets, V. (1993). Homicidal Fantasies. Ethology and Sociobiology 14, 231–46.

  52. Crabb, P. B. (2000). The material culture of homicidal fantasies. Aggressive Behavior 26, 225–34.

  53. Ibid.

  54. Galvanic skin response (GSR) is an older term for skin conductance (SC), while electrodermal activity (EDA) is a more generic term encompassing both skin conductance and skin potential.