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Between Soma and Society: Neuroscience and the Ontology of Psychopathy

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Abstract

Contemporary neuroscience links together soma and society in complex ways, casting the brain as the locus of a matrix of reciprocal interactions between soma and society. Accordingly, critiques of such research which revolve around its perceived ‘reductionism’ and ‘determinism’ are rendered somewhat problematic. That is not to say, however, that a critical sociology of neuroscience is redundant. Drawing on interviews with different kinds of neuroscientists investigating psychopathologies associated with antisocial behaviour (specifically, antisocial personality disorder and psychopathy), this article draws attention to the degree to which, by assigning roles to both ‘biology’ and ‘environment’ in the development of antisociality, neuroscience complicates the ontology of these categories, while at the same creating possibilities for the emergence of new kinds of deviancy, and legitimating social intervention in ‘risky’ children. In aligning somatic and societal narratives for the development of psychopathology, contemporary neuroscience may resist older sociological criticisms of biological reductionism, yet, in so doing, generate new claims with novel ethical and political valence.

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Notes

  1. 1 The diverse scientific research into personality disorders associated with antisocial behaviour (Psychopathy, in particular) is dealt with extensively, though in a somewhat partisan manner, by Blair et al. (2005). For a slightly different perspective, see Kiehl (2006).

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Acknowledgements

Thanks are owed to those who read and offered constructive criticism of earlier drafts of this paper, including four anonymous referees, Robert Dingwall, Sheila Jasanoff, Kate Weiner and, in particular, Alison Kraft and Paul Martin. Versions of the argument were presented at Harvard University and the University of York, and at the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) 2007 Annual Meeting in Montreal. The audiences there are thanked for their useful feedback. Financial support was primarily from the ESRC; additional funds are gratefully acknowledged from the University of Nottingham Graduate School, and the Office of NIH History (National Institutes of Health) through their John J. Pisano Grant.

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Pickersgill, M. Between Soma and Society: Neuroscience and the Ontology of Psychopathy. BioSocieties 4, 45–60 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1017/S1745855209006425

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