Futurity

Brain scans offer clues to extremist violence

New research uses brain scans to investigate how "sacred values" can motivate extremist violence.
purple grainy shot of back of man's head

To gain insight into the psychology of radicalization and terrorist violence, researchers scanned the brains of men who support a terrorist organization associated with Al Qaeda.

Artis International, a group of academics and policymakers, conducted the research with funding from the Minerva Program and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research of the US Department of Defense, and from the BIAL Foundation. The study appears in Royal Society Open Science.

Here, Scott Atran, an adjunct research professor at the University of Michigan’s Ford School and Institute for Social Research, details the findings and delves into the psychology of the respondents:

The post Brain scans offer clues to extremist violence appeared first on Futurity.

More from Futurity

Futurity3 min read
Intervention Could Help Young Women Avoid Criminal Justice System
Adolescence is the prime time to help young women who’ve had repeated run-ins with the US juvenile justice system find a different path, a new study shows. In one of the longest ongoing intervention studies focused on delinquency in women, researcher
Futurity3 min readDiet & Nutrition
Diet Quality Goes Up When Kids Eat School Lunches
A new study found that children improved their diet quality when they ate school-prepared lunches following the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act nutritional guidelines instead of home-prepared lunches. Lower-income and non-Hispanic Black students saw th
Futurity3 min read
Team Solves Mystery Of How Phages Disarm Bacteria
New research that clarifies how bacteria-infecting viruses disarm pathogens could lead to new treatment methods for bacterial infections. Bacterial infections pose significant challenges to agriculture and medicine, especially as cases of antibiotic-

Related