Dr. David Anderson: The Biology of Aggression, Mating, & Arousal

Huberman Lab

Scicomm Media

Science, Health & Fitness, Life Sciences

4.8 • 26.2K Ratings

🗓️ 12 September 2022

⏱️ 114 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

My guest is David Anderson, PhD, a world expert in the science of sexual behavior, violent aggression, fear and other motivated states. Dr. Anderson is a Professor of Biology at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), a member of the National Academy of Sciences and an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). We discuss how states of mind (and body) arise and persist and how they probably better explain human behavior than emotions per se. We also discuss the many kinds of arousal that create varying levels of pressure for certain behaviors to emerge. We discuss different types of violent aggression and how they are impacted by biological sex, gender, context, prior experience, and hormones, and the neural interconnectedness of fear, aggression and sexual behavior. We also discuss peptides and their role in social isolation-induced anxiety and aggression. Dr. Anderson also describes novel, potentially powerful therapeutics for mental health. This episode should interest anyone wanting to learn more about mental health, human emotions, sexual and/or violent behavior. For the full show notes, visit hubermanlab.com. Thank you to our sponsors AG1 (Athletic Greens): https://athleticgreens.com/huberman InsideTracker: https://insidetracker.com/huberman Thesis: https://takethesis.com/huberman Supplements from Momentous https://www.livemomentous.com/huberman Timestamps (00:00:00) Dr. David Anderson, Emotions & Aggression (00:03:33) Momentous Supplements (00:04:27) Levels, Helix Sleep, LMNT (00:08:10) Emotions vs. States (00:10:36) Dimensions of States: Persistence, Intensity & Generalization (00:14:38) Arousal & Valence (00:18:11) Aggression, Optogenetics & Stimulating Aggression in Mice, VMH (00:24:42) Aggression Types: Offensive, Defensive & Predatory (00:29:20) Evolution & Development of Defensive vs. Offensive Behaviors, Fear (00:35:38) Hydraulic Pressures for States & Homeostasis (00:38:33) AG1 (Athletic Greens) (00:39:46) Hydraulic Pressure & Aggression (00:44:50) Balancing Fear & Aggression (00:48:31) Aggression & Hormones: Estrogen, Progesterone & Testosterone (00:52:33) Female Aggression, Motherhood (00:59:48) Mating & Aggressive Behaviors (01:05:10) Neurobiology of Sexual Fetishes (01:10:06) Temperature, Mating Behavior & Aggression (01:15:25) Mounting: Sexual Behavior or Dominance? (01:20:59) Females & Male-Type Mounting Behavior (01:24:40) PAG (Periaqueductal Gray) Brain Region: Pain Modulation & Fear (01:30:38) Tachykinins & Social Isolation: Anxiety, Fear & Aggression (01:43:49) Brain, Body & Emotions; Somatic Marker Hypothesis & Vagus Nerve (01:52:52) Zero-Cost Support, YouTube Feedback, Spotify & Apple Reviews, Sponsors, Momentous Supplements, AG1 (Athletic Greens), Instagram, Twitter, Neural Network Newsletter, Huberman Lab Clips Title Card Photo Credit: Mike Blabac Disclaimer

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Uberman Lab podcast where we discuss science and science-based tools for everyday life.
0:08.8	I'm Andrew Uberman and I'm a professor of neurobiology and
0:12.4	Ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine. Today my guest is Dr. David Anderson. Dr. Anderson is a professor of biology at the California Institute of Technology
0:21.8	Often commonly referred to as Caltech University. Dr. Anderson's research focuses on emotions and states of mind and body
0:29.5	and indeed he emphasizes how emotions like happiness sadness anger and so on are actually subcategories of what are
0:37.2	Generally governed by states that is things that are occurring in the nervous system in our brain and in the connections between brain and body
0:45.4	That dictate whether or not we feel good about how we are feeling and that drive our behaviors that is by us
0:51.7	to be in action or inaction and
0:54.3	Strongly influence the way we interpret our experience and our surroundings today
0:58.8	Dr. Anderson teaches us for instance why people become aggressive and why that aggression can sometimes take the form of rage
1:06.7	also talk about sexual behavior and the boundaries and overlap between aggression and sexual behavior and that
1:14.3	discussion about aggression and sexual behavior also starts to focus on particular
1:18.2	Aspects of neural circuits and states of mind and body that govern things like for instance male male aggression versus male female aggression
1:26.1	Versus female female aggression
1:28.4	So today you will learn a lot about the biological mechanisms that govern why we feel the way we feel indeed
1:34.6	Dr. Anderson is an author of a terrific new popular book
1:37.8	entitled The Nature of the Beast how emotions guide us. I've read this book several times now
1:42.6	I can tell you it contains so many gems that are firmly grounded in the scientific research
1:47.2	In fact a lot of what's in the book contrasts with many of the common myths about emotions and biology
1:53.5	So whether or not you're a therapist or you're a biologist or you're simply just somebody interested in
1:58.4	Why we feel the way we feel and why we act the way we act?
2:01.4	I cannot recommend the book highly enough again
	...

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