14 DAY TRIAL // In a set of recent investigations, scientists determined that boys who act out inappropriately, who drink and consume drugs, and who are generally considered to be “bad” may in fact have brains that are literally malfunctioning.
The research team says that each single brain is unique in the way it goes on to interpret daily stimuli, but add that young boys who engage in dangerous and violent behavior may have something wrong with the way their brains are wired.
“Brain responses to everyday rewards and punishments gradually guide most youngsters’ decisions to conform with society’s rules,” explains Thomas Crowley, MD.
“However, when these seriously troubled kids experience rewards and punishments, and make decisions, their brains apparently malfunction,” the expert argues.
“Our findings strongly suggest that brain malfunction underlies their frequent failure to conform to rules, to make wise decisions, and to avoid relapses back to drug use and antisocial acts,” he adds.
Crowley is a professor of psychiatry at the University of Colorado School of Medicine (UCSM). Experts from the University of Colorado in Boulder (UCB) and the University of Maryland were also involved in the investigation.
The research team conducted its investigation on a group of 20 particularly troublesome young boys, all of whom had spent more than 139 of the last 180 days on probation, Science Blog reports.
Of the test group, 19 had been previously diagnosed with conduct disorder, and all 20 had been found to experience substance abuse.
This troublesome group was compared to another one, also made up of 20 teen boys from similar backgrounds, bu who had no past experiences with drugs or violent behavior.
In the study, members of both groups were asked to play risk-taking computer simulations, while their brains were hooked up to functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) machines.
While playing the game, the two group experienced different activation patterns in a region of the brain called the anterior cingulate cortex, which plays a large role in understanding rewards and punishments.
The area is also responsible for sending signals to another cortical region, called the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, which is in charge of selecting as choice from a number of possible behaviors.
The tests revealed that the boys who had exhibited antisocial behavior showed lower levels of activation in both these regions. Other areas involved in decision-making, such as the orbitofrontal cortex, the amygdala, and the insula were also found to exhibit the abnormality.