Networks and academia (Clara B. Jones)

Networks and Academia

As a Biopsychologist trained in Ethology, Behavioral Ecology, and Behaviorism, my academic work has stressed the biological basis of behavior, in particular, the evolution of social* behavior and social organization, studied with the tools and questions of behavioral ecology. For each behavioral pattern, one might ask, “Are these responses likely to benefit or be deleterious to the actor’s lifetime survival and/or reproductive success and inclusive fitness?”. Unlike many behavioral scientists, I am not an extreme environmentalist. Parsimony, alone, would lead to the conclusion that behavior and social organization result from interaction between/among endogenous and exogenous factors [G x E] and that the relative contribution of each will vary with situation or context, anatomy, phylogeny, neural networks, physiology, stochasticity, and, in my opinion, most importantly, genotype.

The evidence for intrinsic [neural, physiological (e.g., hormonal) and genetic] effects as inducers of behavior exists in two domains. First, temperament, the “physical” basis of personality, differentiates children from birth and may affect mood, responses to environmental stimuli, and metabolism. In general, according to empirical research, non-immigrant African-American neonates (children?) exhibit more heightened “excitability” and precocious motor development than Caucasians, traits that may interfere with cognitive development if they inhibit processes such as thresholds of sensation, attention, and perception, precursors to learning, memory, language, thinking, and problem-solving. Related to this, Darwin argued that human emotions, phenomena that may interact with cognitive processes, express ancient behavioral tendencies, reservoirs of our evolutionary past (also, see I. Eibl-Eibesfeldt, one of my post-doctoral advisors).

The second intrinsic trait that I find compelling as a possible explanatory mechanism for some component of the behavioral differences between non-immigrant African-Americans and Caucasians is the existence of differential “phenotypic plasticity” (or, flexibility), the variable extents to which organisms respond to environmental change, including, perturbation[s]. The optimal response to heterogeneous conditions may be “tracking” the environment or resistance to its differences, its variations, and each biological strategy has its costs and benefits relative to context. For the phenotype as a whole, the individual is hypothesized to exhibit a “reaction norm” across all possible environments, but the theoretically optimal response sets (e.g., dedicated,networks) may or may not be achieved due to maintenance costs such as the costs of learning or the upkeep of fine-tuned perceptual systems (e.g., for the detection of change and the prevention of cheating by other organisms). While little is known about the biological basis of behavioral plasticity in mammals (but see literature on neural switching), future research in the field may yield some understanding of intrinsic differences among individuals and groups. IF non-immigrant African-Americans are less “flexible” or, “plastic” than Caucasians, ON AVERAGE, they may be at a disadvantage when environments change, at least, when they change at certain rates or frequencies.

The “norms of reaction” of non-immigrant African-Americans and Caucasians (or men and women**, etc.) to environmental stimuli may differ, ON AVERAGE, and the environment may disfavor the responses of individuals and groups defined by race or sex, respectfully, conditional upon situation/context. Research on behavioral plasticity in humans and other primates would facilitate our understanding of reaction norms in humans and the costs and benefits (e.g., in time and energy) associated with these. An adaptationist program (e.g., Social Biology) would extend these studies to hypotheses concerning differential reproduction and resilience of genotypes and the evolution of alternative social strategies in different environmental regimes. While ethical considerations might prevent direct experimental testing of the hypotheses, evidence would be obtained from natural “experiments”, physiological and case studies and other quantitative work [in particular, simulations and the conduct of experiments using agent-based (individual-based) modeling]. If the average performance of non-immigrant African-Americans in US society is to some degree a function of intrinsic factors, one is led to speculate that non-immigrant African-American (and, for sex comparisons, female*) genetic and physiological networks are more canalized (more conservative and or “hardwired” biologically) than those of Caucasian-Americans or other ethnic or racial groups (or, for sex comparisons, females may be more canalized than males).

The discussion of academic networks and their relationship to Panopticon Networks requires assessment of differential quality [relative to situation], survival, and reproduction of genotypes determining inclusive fitness and the individual’s assessment of her advantages and disadvantages. An increasing body of research suggests that one process may be labeled “phenotype matching” (“greenbeards”) whereby individuals copy or imitate or model, consciously or otherwise, hard-wired or otherwise, the responses of conspecifics who are like themselves. Psychologists and primatologists claim that few taxa are capable of imitation; however, phenotypic matching does not necessarily rely upon conscious and aware processes. Phenotypic matching [a type of  "social learning"]is a mechanism whereby organisms may maximize their chances of favoring themselves and genotypes like their own to the extent that phenotype and genotype are correlated (“genetic accommodation”).

Observational learning (“social learning”—where, in this instance, “social” is employed in the sense of the Social Sciences cum “interindividual interactions”) theory, a cognitive learning paradigm, may help to explain how individuals “match” (see Herrnstein's classic work) their responses to those of others. The capacity for observational learning will be intrinsic (hard-wired) and entails observing a model (e.g., another individual’s phenotype) to increase the likelihood of new responses that might be applied to new situations (a type of response flexibility or plasticity***). The efficacy of observational learning depends upon attention and memory, properties of the neural system that are generally-agreed to be hard-wired to a significant degree and that may differ among individuals and groups [and that, in all likelihood, are responsive to Gene x Environment (G x E) interactions]. Thus, although the connections between stimuli and responses are not themselves wholly intrinsic in all cases, individuals may respond differentially to abiotic and biotic, as well as, endogenous and exogenous social and non-social temporal, spatial, and energetic events.

*In this instance, I use the term, “social,” in the sense of W.E. Hamilton (1964), whereby, “social” is limited to cooperation and altruism.

**In experimental genetics [see, for example, classic work by M. Lerner on "genetic homeostasis"], females have been found to be more “canalized” than males, ON AVERAGE. Are non-immigrant African-Americans more canalized, ON AVERAGE, than Caucasian-Americans or other ethnic or racial groups [as determined by, say, SNP analyses/methods]? There are bound to be genetic differences between men & women, ON AVERAGE, and among the races, ON AVERAGE, because there will be variability, ON AVERAGE, in genetic architecture[s]. What these differences may be, ON AVERAGE, remain to be seen in most cases other than, say, body size, skin color, hair texture. There are not sufficient comparative genetic data for most traits. In order to determine biological differences x sex,  gender, race, class or other factors, it will be necessary to investigate gene regulation in addition to brain structure & cognitive function. The importance of G x E interactions is understood.

***It is conventional to consider “flexible” responses to be reversible, while it is conventional to consider “plastic” responses to be non-reversible. In her tome on developmental plasticity, West-Eberhard does not make this distinction.