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.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
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).
References
APA (American Psychiatric Association). (1987). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders, 3rd edn, revised. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association.
Babiak P., & Hare R.D. (2006). Snakes in suits: When psychopaths go to work New York: HarperCollins.
Barnes B., & Dupré J. (2008). Genomes and what to make of them Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press.
Beaulieu A. (2001). Voxels in the brain: Neuroscience, informatics and changing notions of objectivity. Social Studies of Science, 31, 635–680.
Beaulieu A. (2002). Images are not the (only) truth: Iconoclasm, visual knowledge and experimentation in brain mapping. Science, Technology and Human Values, 21, 53–86.
Benning T.B. (2003). Neuroimaging psychopathy: Lessons from Lombroso. British Journal of Psychiatry, 183, 563–564.
Berrios G.E. (1993). European view on personality disorders: A conceptual history. Comprehensive Psychiatry, 34, 14–30.
Blair J.R. (2003). Neurological basis of psychopathy. British Journal of Psychiatry, 182, 5–7.
Blair J., Mitchell D., & Blair K. (2005). The psychopath: Emotion and the brain Oxford: Blackwell.
Borck C. (2008). Recording the brain at work: The visible, the readable, and the invisible in electroencephalography. Journal of the History of the Neurosciences, 17, 367–379.
Caspi A., McClay J., Moffitt T.E., Mill J., Martin J., Craig I.W. et al. (2002). Role of genotype in the cycle of violence of maltreated children. Science, 297, 851–854.
Canguilhem G. (1998 [1966]). The normal and the pathological New York: Zone Books.
Cullen J., & Cohn S. (2006). Making sense of mediated information: Empowerment and dependency. In Webster A. (Ed.), New technologies in health care: Challenge, change and innovation, 112–130. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. doi:https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230506046
Dingwall R., Nerlich B., & Hillyard S. (2003). Biological determinism and symbolic interaction: Hereditary streams and cultural roads. Symbolic Interaction, 26, 631–644.
Dolan M. (1994). Psychopathy—a neurobiological perspective. British Journal of Psychiatry, 165, 151–159.
Dolan M. (2002). What neuroimaging tells us about psychopathic disorders. Hospital Medicine, 63, 337–340.
Dolan M.C. & Anderson I.M. (2003). The relationship between serotonergic function and the psychopathy checklist: Screening version. Journal of Psychopharmacology, 17, 216–222.
Dolan M., & Park I. (2002). The neuropsychology of antisocial personality disorder. Psychological Medicine, 32, 417–427.
Dumit J. (2004). Picturing personhood: Brain scans and biomedical identity Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP.
Duster T. (2006). Comparative perspectives and competing explanations: Taking on the newly configured reductionist challenge to sociology. American Sociological Review, 71, 1–15.
Eastman N., & Starling B. (2006). Mental disorder ethics: Theory and empirical investigation. Journal of Medical Ethics, 32, 94–99.
Foley D.L., Eaves L.J., Wormley B., Silberg J.L., Maes H.H., Kuhn J. et al. (2004). Childhood adversity, monoamine oxidase A genotype, and risk for conduct disorder. Archives of General Psychiatry, 61, 738–744.
Fontaine N., & Viding E. (2008). Genetics of personality disorder. Psychiatry, 7(3), 137–141.
Gilber G.N., & Mulkay M. (1984). Opening Pandora's Box: A sociological analysis of scientists' discourse Cambridge: Cambridge UP.
Hacking I. (2002) Historical ontology Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP.
Hagner M., & Borck C. (2001). Mindful practices: On the neurosciences in the twentieth century. Science in Context, 14, 507–510.
Hedgecoe A. (2001). Schizophrenia and the narrative of enlightened geneticisation. Social Studies of Science, 31, 875–911.
Jansy B.R., Kelner K.L., & Pennisi E. (2008). From genes to social behaviour. Science, 322(5903), 891.
Joyce K.A. (2008) Magnetic appeal: MRI and the myth of transparency Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP.
Kendler K.S. (2005). ‘A gene for…’: The nature of gene action in psychiatric disorders. American Journal of Psychiatry, 162, 1243–1252.
Kiehl K.A. (2006). A cognitive neuroscience perspective on psychopathy: Evidence for paralimbic system dysfunction. Psychiatry Research, 142(2–3), 107–128.
Latour B. (1987). Science in action: How to follow scientists and engineers through society Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP.
Lewis B. (2006). Moving beyond Prozac, DSM, and the new psychiatry: The birth of postpsychiatry Michigan: University of Michigan Press.
Manning N. (2002). Actor networks, policy networks, and personality disorder. Sociology of Health and Illness, 24, 644–666.
Mol A. (2002). The body multiple: Ontology in medical practice Durham, NC: Duke UP.
Payne G., & Williams M. (2005). Generalization in qualitative research. Sociology, 39, 295–314.
Pickersgill M.D. (forthcoming). From psyche to soma? Changing accounts of antisocial personality disorders in the American Journal of Psychiatry. History of Psychiatry.
Pilgrim D. (2007). New ‘mental health’ legislation for England and Wales: Some aspects of consensus and conflict. Journal of Social Policy, 36, 79–95.
Pinch T., & Bijker W.E. (1984). The social construction of facts and artefacts: Or how the sociology of science and the sociology of technology might benefit each other. Social Studies of Science, 14, 399–441.
Rafter N.H. (1997). Creating born criminals Chicago: University of Illinois Press.
Raine A., Lencz T., Bihrle S., Lacasse L., & Colletti P. (2000). Reduced prefrontal gray matter volume and reduced autonomic activity in antisocial personality disorder. Archives of General Psychiatry, 57(2), 119–127.
Reid W.H. (2001). Antisocial personality, psychopathy, and forensic psychiatry. Journal of Psychiatric Practice, 7, 55–58.
Richards D. (1996). Elite interviewing: approaches and pitfalls. Politics, 16(3), 199–204.
Rose N. (1998). Governing risky individuals: The role of psychiatry in new regimes of control. Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, 5(2), 177–196.
Rose N. (2007). The politics of life itself: Biomedicine, power, and subjectivity in the twenty-first century Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP.
Rosenberg C.E. (1992). Framing disease: Illness, society, and history. In Rosenberg C.E. and Golden J. (Eds), Framing disease: Studies in cultural history, xii–xxvi. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers UP.
Rosenberg C.E. (2007). Our present complaint: American medicine, then and now Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins UP.
Shostak S. (2003). Locating gene–environment interaction: At the intersections of genetics and public health. Social Science & Medicine, 56, 2327–2342.
Soderstrom H., Blennow K., Manhem A., & Forsman A. (2001). CSF studies in violent offenders: I. 5-HIAA as a negative and HVA as a positive predictor of psychopathy. Journal of Neural Transmission, 108, 869–878.
Timmermans S., & Berg M. (2003). The gold standard: The challenge of evidence-based medicine and standardization in health care Philadelphia, PA: Temple UP.
Turner R. (2001). Culture and the human brain. Anthropology and Humanism, 26(2), 167–172.
Viding E., & Jones A. (2008). Cognition to genes via the brain in the study of conduct disorder. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 61, 171–181.
Volkow N.D., & Tancredi L. (1987). Neural substrates of violent behaviour: A preliminary study with Positron Emission Tomography. British Journal of Psychiatry, 151, 668–673.
Werlinder H. (1978). Psychopathy: A history of the concepts—analysis of the origin and development of a family of concepts in psychopathology Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell International.
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.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Pickersgill, M. Between Soma and Society: Neuroscience and the Ontology of Psychopathy. BioSocieties 4, 45–60 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1017/S1745855209006425
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1745855209006425