If you have been following my series, "The Influential Mind Made Me Think", you know that we have been discussing how the actions of others affect us and how our actions affect others. In addition, we have also talked about how these influences usually happen under our radar, therefore we do not notice. I think this whole subject will help me introduce my next series, "The Moral Molecule Under The Microscope". The Influential Mind Made Me Think is a collection of thoughts and analyses that "The Influential Mind" has triggered in me. Mirroring it, The Moral Molecule Under The Microscope will be the collection for "The Moral Molecule". Next week I have to give in an essay debating if human cooperation is innate or learned. In addition to formal papers, I think this book will help me get a lot ideas for it. I will be sharing my discoveries in this series. I hope you enjoy them.
Paul J. Zak, author of The Moral Molecule, has dedicated a good portion of his life to study oxytocin. Oxytocin is most known for being the responsible for the contractions while giving birth. It's commercial synthetic version is called Pitocin, which is what women are injected in order to induce delivery. Oxytocin is also responsible for the calm, focused attention mothers give to their babies while breast-feeding. Furthermore, it is also responsible for the warm glow we feel during sex, a massage, or a hug. Zak's research has made him come to the conclusion that oxytocin is the key to moral behavior. By moral behavior, he means (and I will mean for the purpose of this series) the generous and caring behavior that every culture, everywhere, endorses as the right way to live, the cooperation, benign, pro-social way of living that every culture everywhere describes as "moral".
To prove actual causation between oxytocin levels and moral behavior he ran a number of experiments, starting in 2001. First the experiments showed that when someone's oxytocin levels go up, he or she responds more generously and caringly, even with strangers. That proves a correlation, but to prove causation a further step was needed. Later, they infused sinthetic oxytocin into the subjects' nasal passages, which is the next best thing to shooting it directly into their brains. They found out that they could turn on and off their behavioral responses like a garden hose.
Here is where we will start connecting the dots between this post and the last one of my other series. In the last post of The Influential Mind Made Me Think, we talk about how our decisions are somewhat shaped by the decisions of others. In this post, I will talk about how just experiencing an act of trust can change your oxytocin levels and therefore the way you behave. In other words, I will continue proving how the actions and decisions of the people around us influence us, and how we influence the ones around us. Previous to this experiment, it had been proven that seeing or experiencing a sign of trust or more generally, empathy, makes us release oxytocin. To further prove this, Zak's following experiment took part in a wedding.
Zak took blood samples from people at a wedding, ranging from the bride to distant cousins. The samples were taken right at the beginning and after the ceremony, but before the party and the drinking started. The results came out as expected, everyone's levels had shot up. It was a simple snapshot of oxytocin's ability to read and reflect the nuances of social life. But what was more interesting is the amount by which each one shot up. As Zak portrays it, it was as if you could map them like a solar system with the bride being the sun. There was only an hour between the first blood sample and the second. That hour was enough for the bride's level to go up by 28%. The mother of the bride showed an increment of 24%. The father showed 19%. The groom showed 14%. This pattern continued for more peripheral people at the wedding. You might ask yourself why did the groom's level go up by merely 14% which in comparison seems small. This might have to do with testosterone. Testosterone can interfere with the release of oxytocin. When Zak measured his testosterone levels, they had gone up by 100%!
In conclusion, I am saying that witnessing a display of trust or empathy can trigger the release of oxytocin in you. In turn, the oxytocin would make you behave in a more pro-social, moral way. Yet again, I am showing how little control we have over ourselves and how much influence the external environment actually has over us. The question of free will rises sooner or later. If you want to know some of my thoughts, you can check this post, which is an essay I wrote on free will for school.
What do you think? I'd like to hear your opinions.
Best,
