Could a gene be partly responsible for the behaviour of some of the worlds most infamous dictators?
Posted on 04/05/2008 8:27:42 PM PDT by neverdem
Could a gene be partly responsible for the behaviour of some of the worlds most infamous dictators?
Selfish dictators may owe their behaviour partly to their genes, according to a study that claims to have found a genetic link to ruthlessness. The study might help to explain the money-grabbing tendencies of those with a Machiavellian streak — from national dictators down to 'little Hitlers' found in workplaces the world over.
Researchers at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem found a link between a gene called AVPR1a and ruthless behaviour in an economic exercise called the 'Dictator Game'. The exercise allows players to behave selflessly, or like money-grabbing dictators such as former Zaire President Mobutu, who plundered the mineral wealth of his country to become one of the world's richest men while its citizens suffered in poverty.
The researchers don't know the mechanism by which the gene influences behaviour. It may mean that for some, the old adage that "it is better to give than to receive" simply isn't true, says team leader Richard Ebstein. The reward centres in those brains may derive less pleasure from altruistic acts, he suggests, perhaps causing them to behave more selfishly.
Prosocial hormone
Ebstein and his colleagues decided to look at AVPR1a because it is known to produce receptors in the brain that detect vasopressin, a hormone involved in altruism and 'prosocial' behaviour. Studies of prairie voles have previously shown that this hormone is important for binding together these rodents' tight-knit social groups.
Ebstein's team wondered whether differences in how this receptor is expressed in the human brain may make different people more or less likely to behave generously.
To find out, they tested DNA samples from more than 200 student volunteers, before asking the students to play the dictator game (volunteers were not told the name of the game, lest it influence their behaviour). Students were divided into two groups: 'dictators' and 'receivers' (called 'A' and 'B' to the participants). Each dictator was told that they would receive 50 shekels (worth about US$14), but were free to share as much or as little of this with a receiver, whom they would never have to meet. The receiver's fortunes thus depended entirely on the dictator's generosity.
About 18% of all dictators kept all of the money, Ebstein and his colleagues report in the journal Genes, Brain and Behavior 1. About one-third split the money down the middle, and a generous 6% gave the whole lot away.
Long and short
There was no connection between the participants' gender and their behaviour, the team reports. But there was a link to the length of the AVPR1a gene: people were more likely to behave selfishly the shorter their version of this gene.
It isn't clear how the length of AVPR1a affects vasopressin receptors: it is thought that rather than controlling the number of receptors, it may control where in the brain the receptors are distributed. Ebstein suggests the vasopressin receptors in the brains of people with short AVPR1a may be distributed in such a way to make them less likely to feel rewarded by the act of giving.
Though the mechanism is unclear, Ebstein says, he is fairly sure that selfish, greedy dictatorship has a genetic component. It would be easier to confirm this if history's infamous dictators conveniently had living identical twins, he says, so we could see if they were just as ruthless as each other.
Keen players
Researchers should nevertheless be careful about using the relatively blunt tool of the Dictator Game to draw conclusions about human generosity, says Nicholas Bardsley at the University of Southampton, UK, who studies such games.
His research suggests that players who routinely give money away as Dictators are also perfectly happy to steal money off other players in games that involve taking rather than giving. This suggests that the apparently more altruistic players in Ebstein's game may in fact be motivated by a desire simply to engage fully with the game, perhaps just because they feel that that is what's expected of them.
If that is true, then apparently ruthless dictators may be motivated not by out-and-out greed but by a simple lack of social skills, which leaves them unable to sense what's expected of them.
That certainly fits with the image of a naïve yet arrogant dictator with no sense of the inappropriateness of his actions and attitudes. Such figures have cropped up with surprising regularity throughout history, all the way from the emperors of Rome, through to Napoleon Bonaparte, Benito Mussolini, Saddam Hussein or Robert Mugabe, now tenaciously clinging to power in the face of uncertain electoral results.
References Knafo, A. et al. Genes Brain Behav. 7, 266–275 (2008).
Original sin.
Sociopaths are made, not born.
These clowns that don’t believe in souls, think they have to find a gene to explain various behaviors.
i’d post a picture of my old boss, but i can’t find one. :)
Frightening thought...
God said … for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Man says … all sin can be attributed a gene somewhere. Quandary? Not for the believer.
Uh oh......
Don’t anyone tell my sainted wife...
She has suspected this since BEFORE we were married -— 46 years ago.
Poor Hitler, Pol Pot, etc. ....they just couldn’t help themselves.
The same gene makes one nearly immune to dying in bed.
No reason “souls” cannot work in conjunction with genes. After all, at a minimum we all have several dimensions. Right off hand that would be body, mind, soul, heart and spirit. Some Orthodox go up to 11 full dimensions.
> Sociopaths are made, not born.
Does that mean that you would want your daughter to marry Ted Bundy’s son?
If sociopathy can be inherited in dogs, why not in humans?
Sociopaths choose to be sociopaths, no matter whether they have a genetic predisposition to be one or not.
Our nature is what we are put on earth to rise above.
TEST HER UNROYAL LOWNESS—HER HIDEOUS HEINOUS IMMEDIATELY!
Publish results far and wide.
LOL!
Assuming the research is accurate . . . I have 0.0% doubt she’d have the gene.
that and some heavy duty demonic possession . . .
Your examples and assertions are ridiculous.
If Ted raised his son, then Ted’s behavior would influence his son.
Dogs don’t have souls or free will.
I don't agree that these researchers are clowns. They are trying to understand behavior, a worthy pursuit. They do not attribute the described behavior solely to genetic influence, but rather say their data point to a genetic component.
I am not aware of any measurable psychological trait that has been shown to be free of a heritable component. The degree of influence from genetic endowment varies from one trait to another, but I have never seen a psychological trait for which the potential for such influence has been examined and proved to be zero.
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Talk about a career ladder, eh? |
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That's the natural assumption. In fact, two genetically unrelated people raised in the same home turn out no more alike than two people picked randomly off the street.
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