Classic Study - Raine Etc Al. (1997)

Question 1

APFC

Answer 1

A - To identify brain impairments in people charged with murder who had pleaded Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity (NGRI)
P - 39 men & 2 women // Matched on sex, age and ethnicity from a group of non-murderers // Injected with a radioactive tracer, then PET scanned whilst doing a Continued-Performance Task, 32 mins after the injection
F - Murderers had much lower glucose activity in the cortical regions // Lower glucose activities in the Corpus callosum, left amygdala
C - Murderers pleading NGRI had different brain activity // Concluded that this cannot explain violent behaviour, yet these impairments create a predisposition to violence when the conditions are right

Question 2

GRAVE

Answer 2

G - Sample of 82, largest for this type of study at the time // Not all ppts. murdered violently
R - Standardised procedure as ppts. did same CPT for same time (32mins), PET procedure the same,
A - To be cautious about biological evidence // The study suggests that certain brain structures can cause aggression, and thus should be altered through medication, Raine et al. argues against this, saying the evidence is only partial
V - Extraneous Variables e.g. Raine acknowledged that a history of brain injury on 23 of the ppts. could have affected results. ppts. matched across the control groups on 3 potentially confounding variables
E - Conclusion could be misinterpreted // May encourage people to screen for the ‘murderers brain’ e.g. job interviews even tho Raine et al. state this is not the true conclusion