Brain Activity Exposes Those Who Break Promises

Eugen Leitl eugen at leitl.org
Tue Dec 15 07:38:02 PST 2009


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091209121156.htm

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Brain Activity Exposes Those Who Break Promises

ScienceDaily (Dec. 10, 2009) b Scientists from the University of Zurich have
discovered the physiological mechanisms in the brain that underlie broken
promises. Patterns of brain activity even enable predicting whether someone
will break a promise.

The results of the study conducted by Dr. Thomas Baumgartner and Professor
Ernst Fehr, both of the University of Zurich, and Professor Urs Fischbacher
of the University of Konstanz, will be published in the journal Neuron on
December 10, 2009.

The promise is one of the oldest human-specific behaviors promoting
cooperation, trust, and partnership. Although promises are generally not
legally binding, they form the basis for a great many everyday social and
economic exchange situations. Promises, however, are not only kept, but also
broken. Material incentives to deceive are in fact ubiquitous in human
society, and promises can thus also be misused in any social or economic
exchange scenario in order to cheat one's interaction partner. Business
people, politicians, diplomats, attorneys, and private persons do not always
behave honestly, as recent financial scandals have dramatically demonstrated.

Despite the ubiquity of promises in human life, we know very little about the
brain physiological mechanisms underlying this phenomenon. In order to
increase understanding in this area, neuroscientist Thomas Baumgartner
(University of Zurich) and economists Ernst Fehr (University of Zurich) and
Urs Fischbacher (University of Konstanz) carried out a social interaction
experiment in a brain scanner where the breach of a promise led both to
monetary benefits for the promise breaker and to monetary costs for the
interaction partner. The results of the study show that increased activity in
areas of the brain playing an important role in processes of emotion and
control accompany the breach of a promise. This pattern of brain activity
suggests that breaking a promise triggers an emotional conflict in the
promise breaker due to the suppression of an honest response.

Furthermore, the most important finding of the study enabled the researchers
to show that "perfidious" patterns of brain activity even allow the
prediction of future behavior. Indeed, experimental subjects who ultimately
keep a promise and those who eventually break one act exactly the same at the
time the promise is made -- both swear to keep their word. Brain activity at
this stage, however, often exposes the subsequent promise breakers.

Catching culprits

As neuroscientist Thomas Baumgartner elucidates, these findings indicate that
brain activity measurements may already reveal malevolent intentions at a
point in time prior to commitment of a dishonest or deceitful act. "Such a
finding thus permits the speculation that the measurement of brain activity
could be applied in the (distant) future not only to catch culprits, but even
beyond this perhaps to aid in the prevention of fraudulent and criminal
intrigues -- a vision already made reality in the science fiction film
'Minority Report'."

"We've discovered critical elements of the neuronal basis of broken
promises," economist Ernst Fehr explains. "In light of the significance of
promises in everyday, interpersonal cohabitation in society, these findings
offer the prospect of being able to fathom and better understand the brain
physiological basis of pro-social and especially of antisocial behavior in
general."





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