Neuromodulation of virtue circuits: ethical considerations of modulating positive character traits via neuroplasticity
Creators: name: Larrivee, Denis
name: Gini, Adriana
Publisher: name: F1000Research
Year: 2015

description: Phineas Gage, the handsome but unfortunate survivor of a railroad demolitions accident, has retained an iconic imagery as a medical marvel for demonstrating while living a purported correlation between neural activity and behavior. Although the historical, and even medical, facts of the case remain contested, particularly in regard to the extent to which Gage’s behavior actually changed, it has long been cited as supporting the notion of a causal relationship between neural activity and expressed human behavior. In recent decades another neurophysiological phenomenon, neuroplasticity, has been accorded a role in underwriting human behavior in numerous, socially important contexts. Neuroplasticity, understood as activity dependent synaptic alteration, has been shown to enable a spectrum of experience dependent behaviors including learning, motor skill acquisition, and therapeutic, behavior modification, among others. Its latent potential for individual transformation has thus prompted numerous calls within the neuroscience community to promote human flourishing through use of experiential principles that promote synaptic strengthening (Merzenich, 2013). The confluence of recommendations parallel current developments in psychiatric theory which propose a volitional strengthening of habitual character traits, virtues, as a form of preventive mental therapy (Peterson and Seligman, 2004). Philosophically, virtues acquisition depends on innate capacities, that can be potentiated by reinforcement and converted into habits, both processes resulting in some form of cerebral remodeling. By extension neuroplasticity affords a biologically based mechanism by which virtuous habits may be established. Positive psychology categorizes a broad range of human behaviors that can be subsumed within a taxonomic profile of positive character traits, including prudence. While some theories of neural operation however, based on physical principles of network operation, argue that human behavior deterministically follows cerebral function, the breadth of neuroplastic potential is more consilient with a natural freedom, within a process of rational deliberation coupled to the repeated volitional execution of task activities. The range of positive human behaviors, including the process of their willful engagement, raises the question of the ethical and social impact of contemporary neuromodulatory techniques on either their implementation or deferral or on their volitional execution (Glannon, 2012). Modification of neuroplastic changes, which are likely to undergird virtuous habits, can be effected through pharmacological, genetic, and/or elicited neural stimulation in animal models; and in humans transcranial magnetic stimulation can affect human learning. In this poster we explore neuroethical issues which may arise in relation to proposals for neuromodulation of habits, including modulation of neural processes associated with free will.<br><br>References<br>Merzenich, M. (2013). Soft-Wired: How the New Science of Brain Plasticity Can Change Your Life. San Francisco, CA: Parnassus Publishing.<br>Peterson, C. and M.E.P. Seligman (2004). Character strengths and virtues. New York,<br>NY: Oxford University<br><br>