“Dopamine is not just about reward anticipation; it fuels the goal-directed behavior needed to gain that reward; dopamine “binds” the value of… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share Image
“Lots of work has examined the genes involved, most broadly showing that variants that produce lowered dopamine signaling (less dopamine in the… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share Image
“Schultz’s group has shown that the magnitude of an anticipatory dopamine rise reflects two variables. First is the size of the anticipated… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share Image
“So dopamine is more about anticipation of reward than about reward itself.” — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share Image
“In other words, once reward contingencies are learned, dopamine is less about reward than about its anticipation. Similarly, work by my Stanford… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share Image
“Logically, gambling shouldn’t evoke much anticipatory dopamine, given the astronomical odds against winning. But the behavioral engineering—the 24-7 activity and lack of… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share Image
“This is central to understanding the nature of motivation, as well as its failures (e.g., during depression, where there is inhibition of… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share Image
“Knutson’s group shows that the greater the probability of reward, the more activation in the medial PFC.96 But switches from 50 to… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share Image
“Secure-attachment 7Rs show more generosity than average. Thus 7R has something to do with generosity—but its effect is entirely context dependent.” — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
But if you get chronically, psychosocially stressed, you're going to compromise your health. So, essentially, we've evolved to be smart enough to make ourselves… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“Finally, for the same criminal conviction, the more stereotypically Af-rican a black individual’s facial features, the longer the sentence.15 In contrast, juries view black… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“So testosterone does subtle things to behavior. Nonetheless, this doesn’t tell us much because everything can be interpreted every which way. Testosterone increases anxiety—you… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“pain makes aggressive people more aggressive, while doing the opposite to unaggressive individuals.” — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“Thus, for our purposes, genes aren’t about inevitability. Instead they’re about context-dependent tendencies, propensities, potentials, and vulnerabilities. All embedded in the fabric of the… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“If we accept that there will always be sides, it’s a nontrivial to-do list item to always be on the side of angels. Distrust… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“In other words, the more genomically complex the organism, the larger the percentage of the genome devoted to gene regulation by the environment.” — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“The subject of one experiment is a rat that receives mild electric shocks (roughly equivalent to the static shock you might get from scuffing… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“No brain region is an island, and the formation of circuits connecting far-flung brain regions is crucial—how else can the frontal cortex use its… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“We process emotionally salient information more rapidly and automatically, but with less accuracy. Frontal function—working memory, impulse control, executive decision making, risk assessment, and… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“Most broadly, the PFC chooses between conflicting options—Coke or Pepsi; blurting out what you really think or restraining yourself; pulling the trigger or not.… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“One stretch of the gene is repeated a variable number of times, and the version with seven repeats (the “7R” form) produces a receptor… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
“some people always get more than their share of equality than others” — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
It's probably even the case that if you stoked up some Buddhist monks with tons of testosterone, they'd become wildly competitive as to who… — Robert M. Sapolsky Copy Share
