Personality Responsibility for Behavior

[bluechillj]

Personal Responsibility for Behavior

Alright, I'll give this philosophical musings thing a spin.....I'm curious to hear about people's conceptualizations of personal responsibility for one's behavior.

To me, this is a complicated issue. My own notions of a person's ability to choose and be in control of behavior have been shaken as I've learned more and more about the factors that influence behavior outside of our control.

For instance, there are now countless studies showing genetic influences on a person's behavior. So if I am 50% more likely than another person to commit a crime based upon my genetics, then surely I am less responsible for that behavior. Even when I do "choose" the behavior, the fact that I am biased toward choosing that behavior is not fair within my personal conceptualization of responsibility. In either case, the behavior is by definition less under my control than for other people.

There are many other external factors that are less intuitive than genetics but that are nonetheless influential on behavior too. For instance, over time we pick up associations between different concepts that influence our behavior toward those concepts, particularly in situations that are stressful, or occur quickly. To give a harmless example, perhaps I learn during my life that walking through a dark alley is dangerous. I never even give this a conscious thought, I just am exposed to the idea through television programs and movies. Later in life, I own an island where no one else lives, and that has perfect security. However, one day, when walking through a dark alley there, I hear a noise and jump at it and turn around fearfully, raising my arm to defend myself. This behavior is not under my control in the sense that I did not consciously decide to react is such a way...in fact, there was no rational reason to react that way. So am I responsible for that behavior? While my example is harmless, this type of automatic behavior happens in many situations that have important consequences, such as police confronting a suspect in an ambiguous situation that requires a split second decision about whether to shoot or not.

I think an interesting obstacle that prevents us from seeing this phenomenon in others is that we can't see it in ourselves very clearly. A bunch of recent research shows that we undertake many behaviors rather reflexively, or come to a decision before we are consciously aware of the decision. We later generate reasons for ourselves about why we acted like we did, and feel like we chose for ourselves, but are often woefully inaccurate about the true causes of our behavior. Some people may have read "Blink" or "Strangers to Ourselves," a couple good popular science books summarizing this type of research.

Personally, I am in the process of incorporating all of this into my model of responsibility. My solution thus far has been to adopt a continuous model of responsibility, although I admit that it is case by case and results in a lot of "I don't know's." So, most of the time in my model a person is only partially responsible for their behavior. I still think it is important to find a clear role for personal choice and control of behavior, but all of our best understanding about what governs behavior sure throws kinks into the traditional models.

Finally, note that the responsibility I am talking about is different than the question of whether a person should be sanctioned by the community for behavior, although this question easily follows from the discussion. So, for example, I'm not suggesting that a murderer be given a lenient sentence due to a heavy genetic influence on his behavior. However, I do think it is interesting to flesh out the implications of the models we use on things like sentencing, what the goal of punishment is, etc.

 

[Buckeyeskickbuttocks]

Seems to me you're mixing and matching what I would consider two seperate bodily functions, as it concerns outward behaviors/choice to behave. (Another alternative is that I'm simply misunderstanding you )

For example, given the opportunity to choose act A or B, and time to contemplate the choice, I might choose either A or B fairly independent of my genetics or predisposition. In other words, I can sorta think of my continual decision to enjoy pizza might have some sort of genetic material behind it (Meaning something within my genetics makes me enjoy certain flavors over others), but given time to contemplate Pizza over Hamburger, I do not necessarily choose Pizza as a determined consequence.

On the other hand, flight or fight responses such as you raising your arm do not afford us the time to choose A or B, necessarily. In these cases your "behavior" is far more instinctual and geared towards your own survival. If I see a car pulling out in front of me, I swerve to avoid it not because I've learned to do so... not because I've choosen to do so over some alternative...

So, to me, there are two factors in play.... behaviors which are learned - such as deciding to do an act over some other act, taking in to account environmental consequences - and behaviors which are not learned, but are instinctual - such as anything geared towards immediate survival.

I am hard pressed to accept that someone is or is not genetically determined to be a criminal. This is two fold in that crimes don't have their basis in the essence of anything. I'm not saying that well.. what I mean is, what is a crime is a cultural determination. There's nothing genetic about it, per se... If I'm predisposed to take other people's things, there is no "crime" there unless we have said it is. Which, of course, we have, but we could quite easily choose as a society to say stealing is not a crime (the intelligence of such a decision notwithstanding). Likewise, we already do not consider it a crime to "behave" in an instictual manner.. ie killing in self defense.

Anyway, I would say behavior is neither nature (genetics) nor nurture (environmental) but instead is both.

 

[bluechillj]

Seems to me you're mixing and matching what I would consider two seperate bodily functions, as it concerns outward behaviors/choice to behave. (Another alternative is that I'm simply misunderstanding you )

For example, given the opportunity to choose act A or B, and time to contemplate the choice, I might choose either A or B fairly independent of my genetics or predisposition. In other words, I can sorta think of my continual decision to enjoy pizza might have some sort of genetic material behind it (Meaning something within my genetics makes me enjoy certain flavors over others), but given time to contemplate Pizza over Hamburger, I do not necessarily choose Pizza as a determined consequence.

True, I think this is possible; however I would argue that most of our behaviors do not boil down to the type of deliberative choice you are proposing. And even given sufficient time and opportunity like in your scenario, I bet that I could find characteristics of the person that would predict one choice over the other with greater liklihood. Characteristics that have been influenced by "external" factors. I think we are much in the dark about the amount of actual control we have over our decisions. Now, I think we do have a decent amount, but I think the traditional view has tremendously overestimated the amount.

On the other hand, flight or fight responses such as you raising your arm do not afford us the time to choose A or B, necessarily. In these cases your "behavior" is far more instinctual and geared towards your own survival. If I see a car pulling out in front of me, I swerve to avoid it not because I've learned to do so... not because I've choosen to do so over some alternative...

I used a fight or flight scenario because it was easiest to explain, but perhaps I should take it outside of this realm. While the physiological flight or fight reaction is rather instinctual, what it is applied to and how it plays out in a particular situation is heavily influenced by other, external things. Say I am an employer hiring for a position. I have negative associations that have been built up in my brain about a particular race (often times by cultural exposure that I may not agree with). Consciously, I do not consider myself to be biased against this race, and I in fact hold conscious egalitarian beliefs, but nonetheless associations about this race exist outside of my control that influence my behavior. When I "choose" who to give the position to, tons of research says that I am likely to be biased against hiring someone of this race, even though it is against my conscious values. Am I responsible for this behavior? Note that the behavior doesn't necessarily have to be a quick, instinctual reaction in this case.

So, to me, there are two factors in play.... behaviors which are learned - such as deciding to do an act over some other act, taking in to account environmental consequences - and behaviors which are not learned, but are instinctual - such as anything geared towards immediate survival.

Another way of arguing what I am trying to say I guess is that much of what we think of as "instinctual" has a large learning component also. And many of what we view as the most "conscious" decisions are not in fact freely determined decisions, it only appears like it to the decider. Your separation of learned and instinctual makes sense to me in theory of course, but practically speaking the two are difficult to distinguish, as you state below.

I am hard pressed to accept that someone is or is not genetically determined to be a criminal. This is two fold in that crimes don't have their basis in the essence of anything. I'm not saying that well.. what I mean is, what is a crime is a cultural determination. There's nothing genetic about it, per se... If I'm predisposed to take other people's things, there is no "crime" there unless we have said it is. Which, of course, we have, but we could quite easily choose as a society to say stealing is not a crime (the intelligence of such a decision notwithstanding). Likewise, we already do not consider it a crime to "behave" in an instictual manner.. ie killing in self defense.

Ok, I agree with you. However, we could say that a person is genetically influenced to transgress the norms of their society, no matter what content that society chooses. Pretty safe assumption based on the research.

Anyway, I would say behavior is neither nature (genetics) nor nurture (environmental) but instead is both.

Yep, agreed. :)

 

[Buckeyeskickbuttocks]

You make a good point about some of the acts we take even when we're given time to deliberate. That, it seems, is a trickier thing to contemplate because we all do not enjoy the precise same learning environment. So... while I may find decisions based on race deplorable (and I do), if I had been taught to hate other races, my acts which are based on that hatred, as you say, aren't really "my fault" such as it is.

But..

There's a difference too, in that as rational beings we can reason the behavior. I mean, I can behave in some manner which I learned was "normal" (if you will) Then, I reach adult hood and somewhere along the line, I see that this "normal" behavior (to me) is considered poor behavior.... I can choose to change my behavior. The real issue there, I think, is being able to convice someone that their upbringing taught them inappropriate behaviors... I'm thinking of the racism example, here. The whole point is, they don't see how it's inappropriate. Getting beyond that block... not sure how one can... I suppose it depends on our ability to reason.

 

[bluechillj]

One of the ideas I'd like to raise is that even someone who was brought up in the "right" environment, has the right beliefs, and chooses to act according to those right beliefs, often still has brain associations influencing behavior in ways contrary to their conscious, rational beliefs. People who would be horrified to act in a biased way according to race often do anyway, due to associations that are thought to develop and exist outside of one's control. In fact, more innoculous types of behavior outside of our conscious control are really common, they happens every day for each one of us. While there is a lot of debate over how these associations develop, it is thought that things like the implicit messages in one's culture can play a big role.

Technically, these are often called implicit associations, here is a link that describes one of the most common ways of assessing them:

Implicit Association Test - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

We tend to view ourselves as rational creatures, and yet in many senses the brain can be thought of as having two systems: one that is more conscious/rational, and one that works more automatically and behind the scenes. However, because we are only aware of the conscious one, we think of it as the primary one, when in fact it developed later evolutionarily than the other system, and often only gets involved in the 'action' after the more automatic system has already had its say.

Sorry these thoughts are a little scattered, these posts are helping me to organize them :)

 

[OCBuckWife]

One of the ideas I'd like to raise is that even someone who was brought up in the "right" environment, has the right beliefs, and chooses to act according to those right beliefs, often still has brain associations influencing behavior in ways contrary to their conscious, rational beliefs. People who would be horrified to act in a biased way according to race often do anyway, due to associations that are thought to develop and exist outside of one's control. In fact, more innoculous types of behavior outside of our conscious control are really common, they happens every day for each one of us. While there is a lot of debate over how these associations develop, it is thought that things like the implicit messages in one's culture can play a big role.

Technically, these are often called implicit associations, here is a link that describes one of the most common ways of assessing them:

Implicit Association Test - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

We tend to view ourselves as rational creatures, and yet in many senses the brain can be thought of as having two systems: one that is more conscious/rational, and one that works more automatically and behind the scenes. However, because we are only aware of the conscious one, we think of it as the primary one, when in fact it developed later evolutionarily than the other system, and often only gets involved in the 'action' after the more automatic system has already had its say.

Sorry these thoughts are a little scattered, these posts are helping me to organize them :)

I hadn't heard of this research. It seems pretty unstable still. I hope to get a chance to take some example tests at this site while at home this evening so I can better decided for myself about this idea.

So far............I am still a firm believer in personal responsiblity for behavior if, as BKB pointed out, it is an action that I had time to evaluate my possible actions first. Without that time, I believe instinct kicks in but I am not particularly convinced thing such as genetics have anything to do with that. Indoctrination or learned types of behaviors can and do influence "quick decisions" but as was also pointed out, those behaviors can be consciously changed if a person so desires. So, again , that brings us right back to personal responsibility again. IE if my mother taught me, through deliberate indoctrination or simply through example, to fear an African-American, I can, if I choose, decided to change that behavior by "retraining" myself.

 

[muffler dragon]

Personally, I believe that all people are born with inclinations. These inclinations are what give people choices to make. I believe that we are to be held accountable for the choices that we make.

 

[fourteenandoh]

if you take a loan for a house you can't afford, take responsibility for your poor judgement and don't expect the gov't to bail you out. don't blame your mortgage broker/wall street/the president etc etc. that's just one example. no one is willing to look in the mirror anymore.

excuses are like assholes. everybody has one.

 

[bluechillj]

I hadn't heard of this research. It seems pretty unstable still. I hope to get a chance to take some example tests at this site while at home this evening so I can better decided for myself about this idea.

So far............I am still a firm believer in personal responsiblity for behavior if, as BKB pointed out, it is an action that I had time to evaluate my possible actions first. Without that time, I believe instinct kicks in but I am not particularly convinced thing such as genetics have anything to do with that. Indoctrination or learned types of behaviors can and do influence "quick decisions" but as was also pointed out, those behaviors can be consciously changed if a person so desires. So, again , that brings us right back to personal responsibility again. IE if my mother taught me, through deliberate indoctrination or simply through example, to fear an African-American, I can, if I choose, decided to change that behavior by "retraining" myself.

FYI...while the research is pretty cutting edge, there are hundreds of studies already on the ideas, and implicit attitudes have great success at predicting behavior in areas where we traditionally haven't been able to understand why people act like they do. So while I think how we interpret the results is up to us, I would say that the research base is very strong (at least in my reading).

 

[Taosman]

At some point we started accepting excuses or blaming others for our problems. When did that happen? Did psychology back such a thing?
Was it a generation wanting to make things easier for their kids? I was horrified when my brother-in-law absolved himself of disciplining his kids because his wife believed in not spanking them. This was in the 70s.

Can we put an actual decade on when personal responsibility disappeared?
It seems like we don't remember the lessons of our parents about accepting personal responsibility. Or has this generation just rebelled, again?

 

[AKAK]

For some reason this thread makes me want to start handing out infractions.

 

[bluechillj]

It's interesting, I don't really see the same lack of responsibility-taking that it seems like others do. I think that the younger generation I see today are forced to be much more responsible than many people were at that age, myself included and I'm not that far removed. There is a ton of pressure to get the right grades, be involved in the right activities, etc, as college and other things are more competitive than ever. Yeah, there are still irresponsible people like in any age cohort, but I can't say I buy into the whole "things were better when I was that age, people are irresponsible nowadays" arguments.

And to me, as I argued above, it's not as simple as just "taking responsibility" anyway. Behavior is a complicated things, and while taking responsibility may help in many situations, it doesn't work in all the ones that are influenced by factors beyond our control.

 

[bluechillj]

For some reason this thread makes me want to start handing out infractions.

Perhaps the best philosophy presented here yet :)

 

[Best Buckeye]

Alright, I'll give this philosophical musings thing a spin.....I'm curious to hear about people's conceptualizations of personal responsibility for one's behavior.

To me, this is a complicated issue. My own notions of a person's ability to choose and be in control of behavior have been shaken as I've learned more and more about the factors that influence behavior outside of our control.

For instance, there are now countless studies showing genetic influences on a person's behavior. So if I am 50% more likely than another person to commit a crime based upon my genetics, then surely I am less responsible for that behavior. Even when I do "choose" the behavior, the fact that I am biased toward choosing that behavior is not fair within my personal conceptualization of responsibility. In either case, the behavior is by definition less under my control than for other people.

There are many other external factors that are less intuitive than genetics but that are nonetheless influential on behavior too. For instance, over time we pick up associations between different concepts that influence our behavior toward those concepts, particularly in situations that are stressful, or occur quickly. To give a harmless example, perhaps I learn during my life that walking through a dark alley is dangerous. I never even give this a conscious thought, I just am exposed to the idea through television programs and movies. Later in life, I own an island where no one else lives, and that has perfect security. However, one day, when walking through a dark alley there, I hear a noise and jump at it and turn around fearfully, raising my arm to defend myself. This behavior is not under my control in the sense that I did not consciously decide to react is such a way...in fact, there was no rational reason to react that way. So am I responsible for that behavior? While my example is harmless, this type of automatic behavior happens in many situations that have important consequences, such as police confronting a suspect in an ambiguous situation that requires a split second decision about whether to shoot or not.

I think an interesting obstacle that prevents us from seeing this phenomenon in others is that we can't see it in ourselves very clearly. A bunch of recent research shows that we undertake many behaviors rather reflexively, or come to a decision before we are consciously aware of the decision. We later generate reasons for ourselves about why we acted like we did, and feel like we chose for ourselves, but are often woefully inaccurate about the true causes of our behavior. Some people may have read "Blink" or "Strangers to Ourselves," a couple good popular science books summarizing this type of research.

Personally, I am in the process of incorporating all of this into my model of responsibility. My solution thus far has been to adopt a continuous model of responsibility, although I admit that it is case by case and results in a lot of "I don't know's." So, most of the time in my model a person is only partially responsible for their behavior. I still think it is important to find a clear role for personal choice and control of behavior, but all of our best understanding about what governs behavior sure throws kinks into the traditional models.

Finally, note that the responsibility I am talking about is different than the question of whether a person should be sanctioned by the community for behavior, although this question easily follows from the discussion. So, for example, I'm not suggesting that a murderer be given a lenient sentence due to a heavy genetic influence on his behavior. However, I do think it is interesting to flesh out the implications of the models we use on things like sentencing, what the goal of punishment is, etc.

This is so much bullchit. I don't give a rat's ass about how genetics affect a person or how many studies they do. A person is responsible for his actions and needs to act as a socially responsible party.
That is why we have the options between right and wrong and are taught them by interaction our whole lives.
All this sounds like more of "it's not my fault BS"!

 

[Gatorubet]

This is so much bullchit. I don't give a rat's ass about how genetics affect a person or how many studies they do. A person is responsible for his actions and needs to act as a socially responsible party.
That is why we have the options between right and wrong and are taught them by interaction our whole lives.
All this sounds like more of "it's not my fault BS"!

Oh noes. Not teh gayes threds sum mores!