Yob genes?

[English assassin]

OK, that got Adrian II's attention...

This is interesting, from Today's Times:

Some yobs are born, others are made
By Mark Henderson, Science Correspondent



ANTISOCIAL behaviour is largely inherited among a significant minority of children who have trouble empathising with others, British scientists have found.



A study of 3,687 pairs of seven-year-old twins revealed strong genetic roots for poor behaviour in children who also show signs of psychopathic traits, such as a lack of remorse or understanding for the feelings of others. The research at King’s College London, also points to environmental factors, such as social and family background, as the chief cause of antisocial activity among a larger group of badly behaved children.

The findings cast light on the origins of yobbish conduct among children and adolescents. The Government made measures to tackle public-order problems and build a “culture of respect” the centrepiece of the Queen’s Speech last week.

Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner, has called for stiffer penalties for young thugs who use hooded tops to conceal their identities.

Essi Viding, of the college’s Institute of Psychiatry, who led the study, said it suggested that much teenage antisocial behaviour has origins earlier in life and that efforts to prevent it need to begin at a young age.

Even when children have a genetic predisposition to such problems, this is likely to respond to environmental triggers that could be reduced by early interventions.

Research led by Temi Moffitt, one of the team members, has established that boys with a particular version of a gene called MAOA are more likely to grow into antisocial adults, but only if they are also maltreated as children. In the study, published today in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, Dr Viding compared pairs of identical and non-identical twins.

Dr Viding investigated children classed by their teachers as among the most antisocial and disruptive 10 per cent, and further split these into two groups. One of the groups showed psychopathic or “callous-unemotional” traits, such as a lack of empathy and guilt, while the other did not.

In the callous-unemotional group, antisocial behaviour was about 81 per cent heritable — meaning that four fifths of the differences between them and the general population appear to be explained by genetic factors.Genetic influence on antisocial behaviour in the other, larger group was much lower — heritability was about 30 per cent, with the remainding variability explained by environmental factors.

Probably this is not that surprising to most of us. But, what should we do? What if you screened for the rogue MAOA gene and put social services onto the case to make double sure those children had fewer environmental triggers for antisocial behaviour? Or is that the shade of Aldous Huxley knocking at the door...?

Interesting though all this stuff is you have to worry about the potential for this sort of research. How about private schools guaranteeing an MAOA free schooling? One thing we don't need to worry about is people aborting MAOA positive babies, presumably the parents will be too antisocial to care...

Also there is definitely a terndancy to see a genetic element as meaning somthing is wholly unchangable, whereas even at a heritability of 80% its clear the environment could be manipulated to reduce the incidence of anti social behaviour. Unfortunately though that would i suppoxse be an argument FOR screening for the gene, whereas if there was nothing you could do about it it would only be a malicious curiosity.

I'm not sure about this. I'm broadly optimistic about technology, and particularly biotech (maybe because its the only sort I actually understand, at least in part), but there seem to be quite major down sides here? Tricky.

[KukriKhan]

I agree. We need to be wrestling with how genetic information is:

1) obtained
2) perceived
3) used
4) protected

Dozens of slippery slopes to ski down, if we're not careful. Some moral, many economic, all legal.

[Adrian II]

OK, that got Adrian II's attention...

I'll grant you that!

Even when children have a genetic predisposition to such problems, this is likely to respond to environmental triggers that could be reduced by early interventions.

Yes. That would be the process formerly known as education, if I am not very much mistaken.

The label 'intervention', however, makes it sound like some sort of social psy-ops operation for which only specialised cohorts, supported by extensive panels of overpaid experts working with protocols, timetables, checks, contractual targets... In other words...

it's &%$@#$ McDonalds again, EA!!

And I am not at all surprised that these researchers have found a genetic basis for antisocial behaviour. I'll do better than they did. As an experienced Dad, let me tell you every child is an uncouth, indifferent, egotistical little pest* and it is the job of adult society to turn it into a functional social being.

I don't need King's College to tell me that.

* I do love mine, don't you worry - but I'm not blind to their shortcomings

[Adrian II]

I agree. We need to be wrestling with how genetic information is:

1) obtained
2) perceived
3) used
4) protected

Dozens of slippery slopes to ski down, if we're not careful. Some moral, many economic, all legal.

LOL! We don't need to wrestle at all, just throw the darn paper in the basket and get on with life.

With all due respect guys, this is a sales-pitch and you're falling for it. Protocols, task forces, intervention schedules -- you can bet your antisocial genes that scores of civil servants, social workers, technocrats and laboratory nerds are mouth-watering at the prospect that they will be officially controlling yobbism in the future. Yeah right. This too will pass, because hairbrained schemes like this never deliver if and when they get off the ground at all.

The way I see it, this is just another move by a huge social engineering industry that makes money out of parental insecurity, out of a modern-day pandemic insecurity that has been deliberately fostered by the very same industry. Parenting has become a total panic circus. Don't let your kids walk to school or play in the streets, it's irresponsible: check your rear mirror for kidnappers, paedophiles, white slave traders and pimps, they're out to get your kid! Watch out for toxic substances in food, in drinks, in the air your kids breath; spend hours in the supermarket reading labels and looking at how many carbohydrates there are in chips, whether this or that product is organic, natural, holistic. And watch out for your kids themselves or they'll kill you: there are all sorts of things wring with them. Today it's antisocial genes, tomorrow it's killer hormones, like yesterday it was ADHD threatening your family life, your childrens' well-being, everybody's future.

The lesson we are all supposed to draw from this is: you can not raise your kid without expert advice, assistance and intervention at every step of the way. Government and industry are the experts. They know about your kids more than you do.

Did you guys know that shyness is now officially a condition?

Antisocial genes? Come on.

[KukriKhan]

I'm pretty sure I'm with you there, AII, mate. I skipped the 'yob gene' bit to more address the fact that we don't yet have protocols in place to insure that genetic info on individuals isn't misused, or (in this case) presumptious predictions of future social or medical liabilities.

If it can be predicted (and I don't think it can, yet) that my 2 year old grandson is a statistical candidate for future alcoholism, who needs to know that? Schools? Gov't? Employers? Insurance agents? Parents?

[Adrian II]

If it can be predicted (and I don't think it can, yet) that my 2 year old grandson is a statistical candidate for future alcoholism, who needs to know that? Schools? Gov't? Employers? Insurance agents? Parents?

You, Kukrikhan, are the only one who needs to know, and in your own (and the kid's) time. That's what parents are for. And judging by everything you've written about the kids in your life, Mr. K., you'll never need an expert to tell you what's what. You have a clear sense of responsibility on the one hand, yet you haven't forgotten the kid inside. You'll straighten the kid out if need be.

[English assassin]

LOL! We don't need to wrestle at all, just throw the darn paper in the basket and get on with life.

With all due respect guys, this is a sales-pitch and you're falling for it. Protocols, task forces, intervention schedules -- you can bet your antisocial genes that scores of civil servants, social workers, technocrats and laboratory nerds are mouth-watering at the prospect that they will be officially controlling yobbism in the future. Yeah right. This too will pass, because hairbrained schemes like this never deliver if and when they get off the ground at all.

The way I see it, this is just another move by a huge social engineering industry that makes money out of parental insecurity, out of a modern-day pandemic insecurity that has been deliberately fostered by the very same industry. Parenting has become a total panic circus. Don't let your kids walk to school or play in the streets, it's irresponsible: check your rear mirror for kidnappers, paedophiles, white slave traders and pimps, they're out to get your kid! Watch out for toxic substances in food, in drinks, in the air your kids breath; spend hours in the supermarket reading labels and looking at how many carbohydrates there are in chips, whether this or that product is organic, natural, holistic. And watch out for your kids themselves or they'll kill you: there are all sorts of things wring with them. Today it's antisocial genes, tomorrow it's killer hormones, like yesterday it was ADHD threatening your family life, your childrens' well-being, everybody's future.

The lesson we are all supposed to draw from this is: you can not raise your kid without expert advice, assistance and intervention at every step of the way. Government and industry are the experts. They know about your kids more than you do.

Did you guys know that shyness is now officially a condition?

Antisocial genes? Come on.

All please note, May 25 2005 was the day AII officially passed over to the Dark Side...

Spoken like a good social libertarian AII. If dependency is being peddled to create a market, and if that is bad when the peddlar is a company and the market is for Ritalin, surely it must be worse when the peddlar is the biggest corporation of the all and the market is welfare dependancy...?



Seriously though, we interest ourselves with the causes of antisocial behaviour in the hope of removing those causes and having less of it. Unlike made up syndromes like ADHD (curiously now being cured in many UK schools with a proper breakfast and earlier bed times, hmm, well THAT wasn't exactly a disease like malaria is a disease was it) this seems to be good evidence that we can identify people at particular risk of being antisocial. (yeah, I know, or we could just look for the opnes with a Liverpool postcode... )

The question in my mind is should we. How do we decide if the antisocial behaviour was worse than gene screening?

Sure there might be an industry to be made out of this. There's an industry in race relations and equal opportunities and main battle tanks and a lot of other stuff that someone somewhere is going to object to. The fact that someone has a vested interest is a reason to treat their views with caution but not of itself to discount the worth (or lack of worth) of the underlying proposition.

[Adrian II]

All please note, May 25 2005 was the day AII officially passed over to the Dark Side...

Where am I? Where's the exit? Is that you, Mother Kali?...

There's an industry in race relations and equal opportunities and main battle tanks and a lot of other stuff that someone somewhere is going to object to.

I know, that's because of the 'industry gene'. I discovered that whilst experimenting in my garden shed back in '89. Somehow my cooperative shock therapy never made it into Health Secretary's budget. Anyway, time for my anti-Backroom pills...

[BDC]

I suspect it's true sadly. Basically they can trace every serious disruptive pupil at my school back to one extended family.

[Papewaio]

I suspect it's true sadly. Basically they can trace every serious disruptive pupil at my school back to one extended family.

I didn't know you went to school with the royals...