Why is revenge sweet?

Many of us feel gloating when we take revenge on someone. Thanks to modern technology, scientists have been able to explain the cause of this phenomenon.

The result of an in-depth study of the activities of the brain suggests that we humans have always felt satisfied whenever we punished others for the bad behaviors they had done to us. Scientists discover that it is the expectation of enjoying this gloating feeling that motivates our retaliatory behavior.

The details of the study were published in the journal Science, contributing to explaining human vengeance. Scientists call it 'altruistic punishment': why do we always want to blame or retaliate against those who have taken advantage of us, violated social principles or crumbled our faith, even when revenge does not bring us any material benefits?

' When a person is deceived or betrayed, they are immediately overwhelmed by negative emotions , ' said Ernst Fehr , a scientist. He is the Director of the Institute of Economic Research at the University of Zurich (Switzerland) and a member of the research team. 'The person will feel even worse if the traitor is not punished by what they have just done' - Ernst Fehr continued.

Human society is not like the world of wild animals in nature. Our society is built on the division of labor and the mutual help cooperation between groups of people does not necessarily have to be blood-related. Fehr and his colleagues said that the feeling of satisfaction and satisfaction when punishing others is actually one of the glue that binds people together.

'Both theoretical and empirical evidence shows that altruistic punishment is a way to ensure smoothness in cooperative and coordinated activities among people who do not know each other ,' Fehr explained. "People can hardly work together without penalties. All cooperation can only go well when the troublemakers are properly punished."

Brian Knutson, a working psychologist at Stanford University (Palo Alto, California) described this phenomenon as "a subtle emotional behavior, or blatant, that is the happiness of others' pain."

Research results from PET scanners

The scientists monitored blood circulation in the brains of subjects studied by PET technique (positron tomography) . They injected a harmless liquid that could be present on PET screens into the blood vessels of study subjects to monitor blood flow in the brain. 'Blood flow to the brain is concentrated in certain areas of the brain, absorbing more oxygen and being more active than other brain regions,' said researcher Dominique de Quervain. He is a neurologist at the University of Zurich.

The team asked the male subjects to participate in a game in which the player had the task of exchanging money for each other. If a player uses fraudulent actions to get more money than other people and is discovered, he will be punished. Researchers use PET equipment to keep track of players' brains during the course of their participation.

When a fraudster is discovered, most other players agree to have a penalty for this guy, even if the punishment action causes them to lose part of the money they earn. As a result, the researchers discovered a region of the brain that was most active during the time when players punished cheaters: the dorsal striatum . Many previous scientific studies also agreed that this is the brain region responsible for the happy and gloating feelings of people in life.

The process of monitoring the brain with PET technology also shows the correlation between a person's brain activity and the level of punishment he or she wants to impose on the cheat: Those who have the backbone in the brain work. more powerful, willing to spend more money to apply heavier penalties to fraudsters.

'We obtained a great result from this study: The diversity of activity of the striatum is a determinant of the difference in the behavior of each person ,' the researcher said. Fehr said, "People who have a less flexible backbone are not very interested in punishing others."

Emotional balance

According to Knutson, a psychologist from Stanford University, punishment can be an unintentional or cruel behavior for many people. But in one of his studies, Knutson had an unexpected explanation of this callous behavior, 'Only passion can produce revenge . The rational, cold-blooded and attempted people really don't like revenge. '

Fehr also agrees that passion plays a significant role in punishing or revenge.'However, the results of our research do not show any sign of passion affecting the rational behavior of punishment , ' he said. 'In fact, I believe this study has shown that we humans use our minds to manage our emotions ,' he said.

Fehr's work has demonstrated that the activity of the striatum in the brain reflects people's gloating feelings of satisfaction whenever they are punished by someone for evil behaviors or beyond social norms. their. The stronger the level of activity in the back zone, the more eager people are to take revenge.

However, besides the dorsal area, there is another area of ​​the brain that is also flexible during the study of the prefrontal cortex . This area of ​​the brain is activated when the researchers measure the loss between punishing the fraud and the amount they have to spend to do it.

Experimental results show that the more punishments cost people who punish, the more realistic the punishment will be . 'Therefore, this is a completely rational act,' Fehr concluded. 'People are always thinking of losing between feeling gloating when revenge is successful and the price they have to trade in order to perform that revenge.'

According to researcher de Quervain, insights into the role of the pre-cerebral palsy in punitive and revenge behaviors will help scientists better understand mental disorders associated with behavior. Unusual society or addiction to human addiction.

'Functional defects in the prefrontal cortex will lead to mental disorders in which the patient is unable to perceive the consequences of his actions,' de Quervain said. .