I have developed "tennis elbow" from lugging this book around the past four weeks, but it is worth the pain, the effort, and the aspirin. It is also worth the (relatively speaking) bargain price. Including appendixes, this book contains 894 pages of text. The entire panorama of the neural sciences is surveyed and examined, and it is comprehensive in its scope, from genomes to social behaviors. The editors explicitly state that the book is designed as "an introductory text for students of biology, behavior, and medicine," but it is hard to imagine any audience, interested in any fragment of neuroscience at any level of sophistication, that would not enjoy this book. The editors have done a masterful job of weaving together the biologic, the behavioral, and the clinical sciences into a single tapestry in which everyone from the molecular biologist to the practicing psychiatrist can find and appreciate his or

Principles of Neural Science

The authors review a range of evidence concerning the motivational underpinnings of anger as an affect, with particular reference to the relationship between anger and anxiety or fear. The evidence supports the view that anger relates to an appetitive or approach motivational system, whereas anxiety relates to an aversive or avoidance motivational system. This evidence appears to have 2 implications. One implication concerns the nature of anterior cortical asymmetry effects. The evidence suggests that such asymmetry reflects direction of motivational engagement (approach vs. withdrawal) rather than affective valence. The other implication concerns the idea that affects form a purely positive dimension and a purely negative dimension, which reflect the operation of appetitive and aversive motivational systems, respectively. The evidence reviewed does not support that view. The evidence is, however, consistent with a discrete-emotions view (which does not rely on dimensionality) and with an alternative dimensional approach.

/pdf/anger-is-an-approach-related-affect-evidence-and-ce7dbmul66.pdf

Anger Is an Approach-Related Affect: Evidence and Implications.

In men, high levels of endogenous testosterone (T) seem to encourage behavior intended to dominate - to enhance one's status over - other people. Sometimes dominant behavior is aggressive, its apparent intent being to inflict harm on another person, but often dominance is expressed nonaggressively. Sometimes dominant behavior takes the form of antisocial behavior, including rebellion against authority and law breaking. Measurement of T at a single point in time, presumably indicative of a man's basal T level, predicts many of these dominant or antisocial behaviors. T not only affects behavior but also responds to it. The act of competing for dominant status affects male T levels in two ways. First, T rises in the face of a challenge, as if it were an anticipatory response to impending competition. Second, after the competition, T rises in winners and declines in losers. Thus, there is a reciprocity between T and dominance behavior, each affecting the other. We contrast a reciprocal model, in which T level is variable, acting as both a cause and effect of behavior, with a basal model, in which T level is assumed to be a persistent trait that influences behavior. An unusual data set on Air Force veterans, in which data were collected four times over a decade, enables us to compare the basal and reciprocal models as explanations for the relationship between T and divorce. We discuss sociological implications of these models.

https://users.ox.ac.uk/~kgroup/publications/pdf/kacelnik_norris_1998_bbs_testosterone.pdf

Testosterone and dominance in men.

Social psychologists have held that when selecting mates women prefer older men and men prefer younger women. In a form of economic exchange based on conventional sex role norms both men and women seek potential partners who are similar to themselves. Behavioral psychologists have proposed an evolutionary model to explain age preferences. The social exchange model does not explain what cross cultural research which is that men and women in other cultures differ in ways that are parallel to gender differences in US society. The evolutionary model submits that men and women pursue distinct reproductive strategies. It also theorizes a more complicated relationship between gender and age preferences than the social exchange model. 2 behavioral psychologists have conducted 6 studies to determine whether the evolutionary model holds true. The hypothesis states that during the early years men prefer women who are only somewhat younger than they are but as they are they prefer women who are considerably younger than they are. On the other hand young women prefer men who are slightly older than they are and this preference does not change much with age. The psychologists examined age preferences in personal advertisements from newspapers in Arizona West Germany the Netherlands and India and in singles advertisements by financially successful US women and men in the Washington D.C. They found the results consistently fit well with the evolutionary model. They also studied marriage statistics from Seattle Washington and Phoenix Arizona which also supported the hypothesis. They conducted a cross-generational analysis using 1923 marriage statistics from Phoenix which indicated consistency across generations. A study of marriages that took place between 1913 and 1939 on the small island of Poro in the Philippines also supported the theory. Thus psychologists should expand previous models of age preferences to incorporate the life history position.

Age preferences in mates reflect sex differences in human reproductive strategies.

Animal studies show clear evidence for a causal link between testosterone and aggression. This review assesses studies involving androgens, principally testosterone, and human aggression. Evidence for a possible effect of prenatal androgens is inconclusive. In adults, higher testosterone levels are found in groups selected for high levels of aggressiveness. Correlations between testosterone and aggression were low when hostility inventories were used, but higher (r = .38) when aggressiveness was rated by others. Regression analysis data and studies of boys at puberty were inconclusive. Other studies show that the outcome of aggressive and competitive encounters can alter testosterone levels, thus confounding interpretation of the correlational evidence. The design of future studies to reveal evidence of a causal link is considered. Suggestions concerning two important methodological problems, the experimental manipulation of hormone levels and the nature of the dependent variable, are made.

The influence of testosterone on human aggression

Free testosterone was measured in the saliva of 89 male prison inmates. Inmates with higher testosterone concentrations had more often been convicted of violent crimes. The relationship was most striking at the extremes of the testosterone distribution, where 9 out of 11 inmates with the lowest testosterone concentrations had committed nonviolent crimes, and 10 out of 11 inmates with the highest testosterone concentrations had committed violent crimes. Among the inmates convicted of nonviolent crimes, those higher in testosterone received longer times to serve before parole and longer punishments for disciplinary infractions in prison. In the housing unit where peer ratings were most reliable, inmates rated as tougher by their peers were higher in testosterone. Language: en

Saliva testosterone and criminal violence in young adult prison inmates.

The relationship of salivary testosterone and cortisol concentrations to personality, criminal violence, prison behavior, and parole board decisions was examined among 113 late-adolescent male offenders. Offenders high in testosterone committed more violent crimes, were judged more harshly by the parole board, and violated prison rules more often than those low in testosterone. No main effects for cortisol emerged. However, as expected, a significant interaction between testosterone and cortisol was found, in which cortisol moderated the correlation between testosterone and violence of crime. Cortisol may be a biological indicator of psychological variables (e.g., social withdrawal) that moderate the testosterone-behavior relationship. Paper and pencil measures of personality and behavior showed little relationship to hormones.

Salivary testosterone and cortisol among late adolescent male offenders.

Testosterone, crime, and misbehavior among 692 male prison inmates

Saliva testosterone and criminal violence among women

Saliva testosterone concentrations were measured upon admission and at four-week intervals among inmates in a 90-day shock incarceration program, modeled after military boot camp. Testosterone was highest on the day of admission, dropped to a low four weeks later, and rose thereafter. There were significant differences among individuals in both mean scores and changes over time. Inmates showing the most improvement dropped less in testosterone early in the program and increased more later in the program. The results extend earlier findings that testosterone concentrations decline under conditions of stress and loss of social status.

Robert L. Frady

Papers

Saliva testosterone and criminal violence in young adult prison inmates.

Salivary testosterone and cortisol among late adolescent male offenders.

Testosterone, crime, and misbehavior among 692 male prison inmates

Saliva testosterone and criminal violence among women

Changes in Saliva Testosterone Levels During a 90-Day Shock Incarceration Program