L9 - A Biosocial Perspective on Antisocial and Violent Behaviour

Question 1

What did Raine et al., (1996) find about the rates of criminal offending in groups with both biological and social risk factors?

Answer 1

3 groups identified through cluster analysis:

• biosocial
• obstetric/biological risk factors
• poverty

Found that the rate of criminal offenders within the biosocial group was 14 times higher than that of the poverty group. The biosocial group accounted for 70% of all crimes committed in the entire sample.

Question 2

What did Brennan et al., (2003) find about the risk factors that were most likely to lead to persistent, early onset aggression?

Answer 2

Non-aggressive, early onset aggression, or adolescent onset aggression. 370 15-year-olds.

Those high on:

• both social and biological risk factors were more likely to be the persistent, early onset aggressive participants (65%).
• social risk factors only - 25%
• biological risk factors only - 17%
• neither (controls) - 12%

Question 3

What did Rasanen (1999) find about the effect of smoking during pregnancy on the risk of violent/persistent offending?

Answer 3

The offspring of Mothers that smoked during pregnancy were twice as likely to become violent offenders, and more than twice as likely to become persistent offenders.

Those smoking during pregnancy, and did not want the pregnancy lead to offspring that were 14 times morel likely to be offenders compared to controls without the risk factors.

Question 4

What did Raine et al., (2014) find about biosocial interactions between low resting heart rate and reactive aggression/impulsivity?

Answer 4

Reactive aggression and impulsivity were higher in those with low resting heart rates, only if they had experienced high levels of adversity.

Question 5

What did Rowe et al., (2004) find about the interaction between testosterone and peer deviance, and how it predicts CD in boys aged 9-15?

Answer 5

Aggression (physical fights, etc), non-aggressive CD symptoms (truancy, lying, shoplifting, etc)

Testosterone predicted non aggressive CD symptoms in those who had definite affiliations with deviant peers.

Those with high testosterone and without deviant peers were much more likely to show a high level of leadership.

(example of Multifinality - both groups have high levels of testosterone, but have endpoints for leadership or CD)

Question 6

What is the social push perspective (Raine, 2002)?

Answer 6

Where an antisocial child lacks social factors that predispose him/her to antisocial behaviour, then biological factors may more likely/evident in explaining the antisocial behaviour.

In contrast, social causes of criminal behaviour may be more important explanations, and may be more evident even when biological causes are also an influence, of anti-sociality in those exposed to adverse home conditions early on. Social risk factors mask/camouflage any biological risk factors

Question 7

What is the empirical examples of the social push hypothesis?

Answer 7

Tuvblad et al., (2006):

In those coming from high SES (low social risk factors), the ASB in boys and girls is much more likely to be explained by genetic risk factors.

Those in low SES - (high social risk factors), the shared and non-shared environmental factors were more prevalent in explaining their ASB, for both boys and girls.

Question 8

What were sex differences in the heritability of ASB when genetics and SES was taken into account (Tuvblad et al., 2006)?

Answer 8

In boys, heritability was quite low for ASB regardless of the neighbourhood. In girls, genetics were more important than high/low SES in determining ASB.

Question 9

What did Sharkey (2010) show about the effect of homicide on children’s cognitive performance?

Answer 9

On assessments of cognitive performance closer to the time of homicides, children scored lower than when the assessment was later temporally.

Closer the homicide occurred to the assessment, the poorer children performed on reading tests.

Question 10

What did Sharkey et al., (2012) find about the relationship between proximity of living to community violence and scores on attention and impulsivity?

Answer 10

Children living closer to the source of local violence in their community scored much lower on attention and impulse control.

If these children already have a propensity for decreased impulse control/attention, we can see how the interaction can significantly impact on the likelihood for offending.

Question 11

What are the two main forms of information in the genome of the cell?

Answer 11

1. Genetic information, which provides the building block for the manufacture of all proteins needed for the cell functional activity
2. Epigenetic information: provides additional instruction on how, when and where these information should be used (i.e. expression)

Question 12

What is DNA methylation?

Answer 12

A process by which methyl groups are added to the DNA molecule, usually cytosine.

Question 13

What did Fraga et al., (2005) find about methylation in twins?

Answer 13

By age 50, the twin pairs were remarkable different in their patterns of methylation. These differences are likely to have a significant impact on gene expression. Over the lifespan, methylation can turn genes on or off.

More similarities in patterns of methylation at 3 than at 50.

Question 14

What do animal studies of epigenetics show?

Answer 14

Licking and grooming represents caregiving in rats.

Offspring of mothers who are more nurturing have a decreased startle response, more likely to explore in an open field paradigm, can adapt to novel environments better.

Opposite pattern in offspring of mothers that are less nurturing.

Pups of nurturing mothers show increase in glucocorticoid receptor in the hippocampus (which improves ability to deal with stress).

Pups reared away from inattentive mothers looked mores similar to pups with attentive mothers

Question 15

What did Hyde (2016) find about biosocial interactions on CU behaviour using an adoption design?

Answer 15

Antisocial mothers were associated with high CU behaviour in the offspring.
The adoptive mother positive reinforcement was negatively related to CU behaviour and ODD in the child at 27 months.
For children with a mother showing high ASB, if the adoptive mother was low on positive reinforcement, there was a positive relationship between the biological mothers self reported ASB and CU behaviour in the child.
However, relationship was decreased when the adoptive mother was high in positive reinforcement.

Question 16

Is there evidence of epigenetic effects across generations? If yes, what is the evidence? If no, why has this not been found?

Answer 16

Yes - Yehuda et al., (2016):

Found that the pattern of methylation in study participants was similar to the pattern of methylation in ancestors who had experienced the holocaust.

– gene expression was similar to that of holocaust survivors despite never experiencing the holocaust themselves, suggesting epigenetics had been passed down the generations.

Question 17

What did Cecil et al., (2014) show about differences in oxytocin methylation patterns between subgroups of children high on CU traits?

Answer 17

Two groups both high on CU traits.

• didn’t show internalising problems, primary psychopaths, low anxiety (higher the methylation, the higher the CU traits)
• did show internalising problems, secondary psychopaths, high anxiety (greater the methylation, the lower the CU traits).

Methylation patterns at birth, age 7 and age 9 same in the two groups in relation to CU traits.

Question 18

What did Cecil et al., (2014) show about the relationship between oxytocin methylation and CU traits in groups of children/what predicted CU traits?

Answer 18

Depending on anxiety, the relationship between oxytocin methylation and CU traits was different:

In primary psychopaths, oxytocin methylation at birth was related to Cu traits at age 13. More methylation - more CU traits

The more the oxytocin gene was methylated, the more it was switched off, and the less the children were victimized by their peers (top of hierarchy, they were the bullies)

In secondary psychopaths, the level of CU traits was predicted by the risk factors in the mother before birth (prenatal factors affecting the mother)