- Picture from Howlsthunder
I recently attended part of a conference at Emory on “prosocial behavior” titled “Neurobehavioral Mechanisms of Affiliative Behavior and Cooperation: Prospects for Translational Advances for Psychiatric Disorders,” hosted by the Emory Center for Translational Social Neuroscience and the Center for Behavioral Neuroscience.
To oversimplify, these folks believe that social behavior is “mediated” by neuropetides such as oxytocin and vasopressin (translation and, again, oversimplification: the more oxytocin/vasopressin receptors you have in your brain, the more “social” you will be). One of the key architects of this idea is Larry Young, who has become famous for his research with voles. Basically, some species of voles are “monogamous” and some species of voles are “promiscuous.” The male voles from monogamous species have more (or a different pattern of) vasopressin receptors than the male voles from promiscuous species. By giving a male vole from a promiscuous species the same pattern of vasopressin receptors as a male from a monogamous species (through fancy genetic manipulation), you can turn this vole from a promiscuous critter to a monogamous critter. Voilà! (See an article about this research from Emory).