American neuroscientists suggest that altruism and generosity are innate qualities. They would even have discovered a way to develop them.
Is the human being a selfish being by nature, or is he driven by altruism? This question has agitated the scientific world for decades. Many researchers are carrying out work to demonstrate that man is not a wolf for man but on the contrary that he acts for the good of all. A thesis confirmed today by a series of published studies Human Brain Mapping.
Scientists at the University of California – Los Angeles (UCLA) have explored the different areas of the brain responsible for empathy and those that oppose it. And they discovered that selflessness is written deep within us.
Restricted altruism
In a first study, neuroscientists studied about twenty volunteers. They examined their brains using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with a particular interest in the activity of the amygdala, somatosensory and insular cortex involved in the perception of pain. They also studied regions in the prefrontal cortex that regulate behavior and impulsivity.
In addition to these neurological examinations, the participants were invited to play a gambling game. Players were given a certain amount of money that they could keep, or share with others. It appears that the participants who spent the least during the game are those with significant activity in the prefrontal cortex. Conversely, a third of the volunteers with increased activity in the areas responsible for the perception of voluntary pain were the least stingy. For the authors, “the force” pushing the players to generosity is altruism.
A therapeutic avenue
From this discovery, the researchers wanted to understand how the prefrontal cortex could block the natural tendency to altruism. For a second study published in Social Neuroscience, scientists studied 58 volunteers. They experimented with transcranial magnetic stimulation for 40 seconds. Objective = to modulate the activity of certain neurons in specific brain regions to “turn off” their selfish nature. To be able to evaluate the effectiveness of this technique, the participants were divided into two groups to form a control group.
According to the results, participants who received magnetic pulses in the prefrontal cortex were 50% more generous than the control group. “Blocking this area seems to develop their capacity for empathy and generosity. We believe that by tempering this area we can reveal altruism. This is potentially revolutionary, ”enthuses Leonardo Christov-Moore, one of the study’s researchers and researcher at the Institute of Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA. The neuroscientist emphasizes that this therapeutic avenue is particularly interesting for people who have lived in desensitizing environments such as prison or war zones.
.
