Jorge Barraza

ABSTRACT Persuasive narratives can induce some individuals to engage in costly actions. Entrepreneurs of suicide missions frame the necessity of violent behavior within the context of persuasive narratives to attract potential recruits. Herein we report results from an experiment to test factors involved with costly action linked to a persuasive narrative. We recruited 164 participants (M = 21, SD = 5.20) and measured hormones, electrodermal activity, and personality to predict who would be influenced by the narrative's message. We found that the persuasive narrative we tested resulted in costly action by those who are high-perspective takers and are more physiologically aroused by the narrative. The findings fill lacunae in the literature, providing a novel approach to examine costly behavior (like martyrdom missions) in the laboratory.

ABSTRACT Persuasive narratives can induce some individuals to engage in costly actions. Entrepreneurs of suicide missions frame the necessity of violent behavior within the context of persuasive narratives to attract potential recruits. Herein we report results from an experiment to test factors involved with costly action linked to a persuasive narrative. We recruited 164 participants (M = 21, SD = 5.20) and measured hormones, electrodermal activity, and personality to predict who would be influenced by the narrative's message. We found that the persuasive narrative we tested resulted in costly action by those who are high-perspective takers and are more physiologically aroused by the narrative. The findings fill lacunae in the literature, providing a novel approach to examine costly behavior (like martyrdom missions) in the laboratory.

Influence is a social process.  Social cues dictate how an influence target attributes trust or truthiness to an influence source.  As such, influence is not purely calculative (or “rational”) as a myriad of both cognitive (thought) and affective (emotion) factors are involved in the process. The neuroscience of trust provides a framework for examining how emotions, pre-existing beliefs, and individual differences can impact influence at individual and group levels.  In particular, the hormone oxytocin illustrates that influence can have ancient roots in our evolutionary development as a social species.  Some highlights of this research are provided with a discussion of their implications to deterrence.

This chapter reviews and puts into context recent findings on the role oxytocin (OT) in producing prosocial behaviors in humans.  We also connect this physiologic mechanism to psychological states that produce these behaviors, particularly empathy.  Empathy causes one to attend to another’s plight, and can be a motivation to invest resources to assist someone in distress.  An OT-empathy relationship has been suggested based on similar behavior effects, but several lines of emerging research appear to show that OT does instantiate the experience of empathy.

The neuropeptide oxytocin (OT) modulates functioning of the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis and regulates a range of social processes. Clinical studies have used intranasal OT administration to treat symptoms arising from a number of psychiatric disorders including autism, schizophrenia, and depression. Most of this research, however, has been based on single dose treatments of OT in younger adult populations. The present study examined the impact on the health and psychological well-being of a 10-day OT administration in an older adult population.  Residentially housed older adults (N= 41, mean age of 80) were enrolled in a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study. Participants received 40 IU intranasal OT or placebo for 10 consecutive days.  No changes in mood or cardiovascular states were observed across the 10-day period. Repeated-measures ANOVAs showed that dispositional gratitude improved for the OT infused participants, while gratitude declined for placebo controls over the 10 days (p = .015). Those in the OT condition did not report a decline in physical functioning over time as was observed in the placebo condition (p = .05), and also reported less fatigue compared to controls (p = .03).  No significant adverse events were reported throughout the entirety of the study, indicating that OT can be safely used with older adults.

This essay introduces a neurologically-informed mathematical model of collective action (CA) that reveals the role for empathy and distress in motivating costly helping behaviors. We report three direct tests of model with a key focus on the neuropeptide oxytocin as well as a variety of indirect tests. These studies, from our lab and other researchers, show support for the model. Our findings indicate that empathic concern, via the brain's release of oxytocin, is a trigger for CA. We discuss the implications from this model for our understanding why human beings engage in costly CA.

Emotional expectations are likely to influence behavioral outcomes, even when entering novel situations. The present study proposed that positive emotional expectations would influence volunteer outcomes for new volunteers. New and continuing volunteers were recruited for a two-part longitudinal study. Study hypotheses were confirmed. Emotional expectations (i.e., sympathy, satisfaction) were positively associated with intentions to continue volunteering, identification with the volunteer role, and volunteer persistence six months later for new volunteers. For continuing volunteers, emotional expectations were only significantly and positively associated with volunteer role identity. Moreover, the intent to persist as a volunteer was found to have a stronger positive association with actual persistence for continuing volunteers than for new volunteers.