This article has three parts. It deals with somatosensory deprivation as a potential cause of violence. I have scanned and HTMLized much of Dr. Prescott's research (with his permission and consent for free distribution). You can find it online at <http://www.violence.de>. Outside of E2, please refer to that URL, since it includes improved formatting and images.
Part 2 is here. Part 3 is here.
This article does not include further hard links for the reason of source authenticity. Feel free to add relevant soft links.
BODY PLEASURE AND THE ORIGINS OF VIOLENCE
By James W. Prescott
From "The Bulletin of The Atomic Scientists", November 1975, pp.
10-20
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(Introduction of the article in the "Bulletin of the Atomic
Scientists":)
James W. Prescott, a neuropsychologist, is a health scientist
administrator at the National Institute of Child Health and Human
Development in Bethesda, Maryland. He is a member of the Board of
Directors of the American Humanist Association. This article
appeared in part in the April 1975 issue of The Futurist ,
published by the World Future Society, and is reprinted here with
their permission. The views and opinions expressed here are those
of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the
National Institutes of Health.
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A neuropsychologist contends that the greatest threat to world
peace comes from those nations which have the most depriving
environments for their children and which are most repressive of
sexual affection and female sexuality.
James W. Prescott
Human violence is fast becoming a global epidemic. All over the
world, police face angry mobs, terrorists disrupt the Olympics,
hijackers seize airplanes, and bombs wreck buildings. During the
past year, wars raged in the Middle East, Cyprus, and Southeast
Asia, and guerrilla fighting continued to escalate in Ireland.
Meanwhile, crime in the United States grew even faster than
inflation. Figures from the Federal Bureau of Investigation show
that serious crimes rose 16 percent in the first six months of
1974 -- one of the largest crime increases since FBI
record-keeping began.
Unless the causes of violence are isolated and treated, we will
continue to live in a world of fear and apprehension.
Unfortunately, violence is often offered as a solution to
violence. Many law enforcement officials advocate 'get tough'
policies as the best method to reduce crime. Imprisoning people,
our usual way of dealing with crime, will not solve the problem,
because the causes of violence lie in our basic values and the
way in which we bring up our children and youth. Physical
punishment, violent films and TV programs teach our children that
physical violence is normal. But these early life experiences are
not the only or even the main source of violent behavior. Recent
research supports the point of view that the deprivation of
physical pleasure is a major ingredient in the expression of
physical violence. The common as-
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p. 11, November 1975, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
sociation of sex with violence provides a clue to understanding
physical violence in terms of deprivation of physical pleasure.
Unlike violence, pleasure seems to be something the world can't
get enough of. People are constantly in search of new forms of
pleasure, yet most of our 'pleasure' activities appear to be
substitutes for the natural sensory pleasures of touching. We
touch for pleasure or for pain or we don't touch at all. Although
physical pleasure and physical violence seem worlds apart, there
seems to be a subtle and intimate connection between the two.
Until the relationship between pleasure and violence is
understood, violence will continue to escalate.
As a developmental neuropsychologist I have devoted a great deal
of study to the peculiar relationship between violence and
pleasure. I am now convinced that the deprivation of physical
sensory pleasure is the principal root cause of violence.
Laboratory experiments with animals show that pleasure and
violence have a reciprocal relationship, that is, the presence of
one inhibits the other . A raging, violent animal will abruptly
calm down when electrodes stimulate the pleasure centers of its
brain. Likewise, stimulating the violence centers in the brain
can terminate the animal's sensual pleasure and peaceful
behavior. When the brain's pleasure circuits are 'on,' the
violence circuits are 'off,' and vice versa. Among human beings,
a pleasure-prone personality rarely displays violence or
aggressive behaviors, and a violent personality has little
ability to tolerate, experience, or enjoy sensuously pleasing
activities. As either violence or pleasure goes up, the other
goes down.
Sensory Deprivation
The reciprocal relationship of pleasure and violence is highly
significant because certain sensory experiences during the
formative periods of development will create a neuropsychological
predisposition for either violence-seeking or pleasure-seeking
behaviors later in life. I am convinced that various abnormal
social and emotional behaviors resulting from what psychologists
call 'maternal-social' deprivation, that is, a lack of tender,
loving care, are caused by a unique type of sensory deprivation,
somatosensory deprivation. Derived from the Greek word for
'body,' the term refers to the sensations of touch and body
movement which differ from the senses of light, hearing, smell
and taste. I believe that the deprivation of body touch, contact,
and movement are the basic causes of a number of emotional
disturbances which
-------------------------------------
Violence against sexuality and the
use of sexuality for violence,
particularly against women, has very
deep roots in Biblical tradition.
-------------------------------------
include depressive and autistic behaviors, hyperactivity, sexual
aberration, drug abuse, violence, and aggression.
These insights were derived chiefly from the controlled
laboratory studies of Harry F. and Margaret K. Harlow at the
University of Wisconsin. The Harlows and their students separated
infant monkeys from their mothers at birth. The monkeys were
raised in single cages in an animal colony room, where they could
develop social relationships with the other animals through
seeing, hearing, and smelling, but not through touching or
movement. These and other studies indicate that it is the
deprivation of body contact and body movement -- not deprivation
of the other senses -- that produces the wide variety of abnormal
emotional behaviors in these isolation-reared animals. It is well
known that human infants and children who are hospitalized or
institutionalized for extended periods with little physical
touching and holding develop almost identical abnormal behaviors,
such as rocking and head banging.
Although the pathological violence observed in isolation-reared
monkeys is well documented, the linking of early somatosensory
deprivation with physical violence in humans is less well
established. Numerous studies of juvenile delinquents and adult
criminals have shown a family background of broken homes and/or
physically abusive parents. These studies have rarely mentioned,
let alone measured, the degree of deprivation of physical
affection, although this is often inferred from the degree of
neglect and abuse. One exceptional study in this respect is that
of Brandt F. Steele and C. B. Pollock, psychiatrists at the
University of Colorado, who studied child abuse in three
generations of families who physically abused their children.
They found that parents who abused their children were invariably
deprived of physical affection themselves during childhood and
that their adult sex life was extremely poor. Steele noted that
almost without exception the women who abused their children had
never experienced orgasm. The degree of sexual pleasure
experienced by the men who abused their children was not
ascertained, but their sex life, in general, was unsatisfactory.
The hypothesis that physical pleasure actively inhibits physical
violence can be appreciated from our own sexual experiences. How
many of us feel like assaulting someone after we have just
experienced orgasm?
The contributions of Freud to the effects of early experiences
upon later behaviors and the consequences of repressed sexuality
have been well established. Unfortunately time and space do not
permit a discussion here of his differences with Wilhelm Reich
concerning his Beyond the Pleasure Principle.
The hypothesis that deprivation of physical pleasure results in
physical violence requires a formal systematic evaluation. We can
test this hypothesis by examining cross-cultural studies of
child-rearing practices, sexual behaviors, and physical violence.
We would expect to find that human societies which provide their
infants and children with a great deal of physical affection
(touching,
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p. 12, November 1975, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
holding, carrying) would be less physically violent than human
societies which give very little physical affection to their
infants and children. Similarly, human societies which tolerate
and accept premarital and extramarital sex would be less
physically violent than societies which prohibit and punish
premarital and extramarital sex.
Cultural anthropologists have gathered exactly the data required
to examine this hypothesis for human societies -- and their
findings are conveniently arranged in R. B. Textor's A
Cross-Cultural Summary 1. Textor's book is basically a research
tool for cross-cultural statistical inquiry. The survey provides
some 20,000 statistically significant correlations from 400
culture samples of primitive societies.
Infant Neglect/Adult Violence
Certain variables which reflect physical affection (such as
fondling, caressing, and playing with infants) were related to
other variables which measure crime and violence (frequency of
theft, killing, etc.). The important relationships are displayed
in the tables. The percent figures reflect the relationships
among the variables, for example, high affection/low violence
plus low affection/high violence. This procedure is followed for
all tables.
Societies ranking high or low on the Infant Physical Affection
Scale were examined for degree of violence. The results (Table 1)
clearly indicated that those societies which give their infants
the greatest amount of physical affection were characterized by
low theft, low infant physical pain, low religious activity, and
negligible or absent killing, mutilating, or torturing of the
enemy. These data directly confirm that the deprivation of body
pleasure during infancy is significantly linked to a high rate of
crime and violence.
Some societies physically punish their infants as a matter of
discipline, while others do not. We can determine whether this
punishment reflects a general concern for the infant's welfare by
matching it against child nurturant care. The results (Table 2)
indicate that societies which inflict pain and discomfort upon
their infants tend to neglect them as well. These data provide no
support for the prescription from Proverbs (23: 13-14): "Withhold
not chastisement from a boy; if you beat him with the rod, he
will not die. Beat him with the rod, and you will save him from
the nether world."
Adult physical violence was accurately predicted in 36 of 49
cultures (73 percent) from the infant physical affection
variable. The probability that a 73 percent rate of accuracy
could occur by chance is only four times out of a thousand.
Of the 49 societies studied, 13 cultures seemed to be exceptions
to the theory that a lack of somatosensory pleasure makes people
physically violent (see Table 3). It was expected that cultures
which placed a high value upon physical pleasure during infancy
and childhood would maintain such values into adulthood. This is
not the case. Child rearing practices do not predict patterns of
later sexual behavior. This initial surprise and presumed
discrepancy, however, becomes advantageous for further
prediction.
The Long-Term Consequences of Infant Pleasure and Pain
Human societies differ greatly in their treatment of infants. In
some cultures, parents lavish physical affection on infants,
while in others the parents physically punish their infants. A
study of anthropological data by the author 2 found that those
societies which give their infants the greatest amount of
physical affection have less theft and violence among adults,
thus supporting the theory that deprivation of bodily pleasure
during infancy is significantly linked to a high rate of crime
and violence. The tables below show how physical affection -- or
punishment -- given infants correlates with other variables. For
example, cultures which inflict pain on infants appear to be more
likely to practice slavery, polygyny, etc. In the tables, N
refers to the number of cultures in the comparison while P is the
probability that the observed relationship could occur by chance
which was calculated by the Fisher Exact Probability Test.
TABLE 1
Adult Behaviors in Societies Where Physical Affection is
Lavished on Infants
Adult Behaviors PercentN Probability
% P
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Invidious display of wealth is low 66 50.06
Incidence of theft is low 72 36.02
Overall infant indulgence is high 80 66.0000
Infant physical pain low 65 63.03
Negligible killing, torturing or mutilating
the enemy 73 49.004
Low religious activity 81 27.003
TABLE 2
Adult Behaviors in Societies Where Pain is Inflicted on Infants
by Parent or Nurturing Person
Adult Behaviors PercentN Probability
% P
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Slavery is present 64 66.03
Polygyny (multiple wives) practiced 79 34.001
Women status inferior 78 14.03
Low infant physical affection 65 63.03
Low overall infant indulgence 77 66.000
Developing nurturant behavior in child is
low 67 45.05
Supernaturals (gods) are aggressive 64 36.01
The coded scales on infancy were developed by cultural
anthropologists Barry, Bacon and Child 3; on sexual behavior
by Westbrook, Ford and Beach 4; and on physical violence by
Slater 5.
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p. 13, November 1975, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
Two variables that are highly correlated are not as useful for
predicting a third variable as two variables that are
uncorrelated. Consequently, it is meaningful to examine the
sexual behaviors of the 13 cultures whose adult violence was not
predictable from physical pleasure during infancy.
Apparently, the social customs which influence and determine the
behaviors of sexual affection are different from those which
underlie the expression of physical affection toward infants.
When the six societies characterized by both high infant
affection and high violence are compared in terms of their
premarital sexual behavior, it is surprising to find that five of
them exhibit premarital sexual repression, where virginity is a
high value of these cultures. It appears that the beneficial
effects of infant physical affection can be negated by the
repression of physical pleasure (premarital sex) later in life.
The seven societies characterized by both low infant physical
affection and low adult physical violence were all found to be
characterized by permissive premarital sexual behaviors. Thus,
the detrimental effects of infant physical affectional
deprivation seem to be compensated for later in life by sexual
body pleasure experiences during adolescence. These findings have
led to a revision of the somatosensory pleasure deprivation
theory from a one-stage to a two-stage developmental theory where
the physical violence in 48 of the 49 cultures could be
accurately classified.
In short, violence may stem from deprivation of somatosensory
pleasure either in infancy or in adolescence. The only true
exception in this culture sample is the headhunting Jivaro tribe
of South America. Clearly, this society requires detailed study
to determine the causes of its violence. The Jivaro belief system
may play an important role, for as anthropologist Michael Harner
notes in Jivaro Souls 6, these Indians have a "deep-seated
belief that killing leads to the acquisition of souls which
provide a supernatural power conferring immunity from death."
Infant Physical Affection and Adult Physical Violence
Societies that provide infants with a great deal of physical
affection ('tender loving care') are later characterized by
relatively non-violent adults. In 36 of the 49 cultures studied,
a high degree of infant affection was associated with a low
degree of adult physical violence -- and vice versa. When the 13
exceptions were investigated, it was found that the violence of
all but one (the Jivaro tribe of South America) could be
accounted for the presence or absence of premarital sexual
behavior.
TABLE 3
Relationship of Infant Physical Affectional Deprivation to Adult
Physical Violence
High Infant Low Infant High Infant Low Infant
Physical Physical Physical Physical
Affection Affection Affection Affection
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Low Adult High Adult High Adult Low Adult
Physical Physical Physical Physical
Violence Violence Violence Violence
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Andamanese Alorese Cheyenne Ainu
Arapesh Aranda Chir-Apache Ganda
Balinese Araucanians Crow Kwakiutl
Chagga Ashanti Jivaroa Lepcha
Chenchu Aymara Kurtatchi Pukapuka
Chuckchee Azande Zunic Samoansb
Cuna Comanche Tanala
Hano Fon
Lau Kaska
Lesu Marquesans
Maori Masai
Murngin Navaho
Nuer Ojibwa
Papago Thonga
Siriono
Tallensi
Tikopia
Timbira
Trobriand
Wogeo
Woleaians
Yahgan
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Premarital sex punished:
underlined Premarital sex permitted: italic
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a According to Harner (1972) the Jivaro culture is misclassified
and belongs in column 2 (personal communication).
b According to Derek Freeman, Professor of Anthropology,
Australian National University, the Samoans belong in column 2
(personal communication).
c The Zuni are also reclassified to column 1.
Source: Textor 1; infant behavior ratings from Barry, Bacon
and Child 3; and adult violence ratings from Slater 5.
This table is a revised version updated with information from the
article "Can More Touching Lead to Less Violence in Our Society?"
by Lionel Gambill, published in The Truth Seeker, March/April
1989. Gambill writes:
Subsequent to original publication of this material in The
Futurist in April 1975, cultural anthropologists informed
Prescott of errors in some of the original codings in the
reference work on which the comparison was based. When these
errors were corrected, no exceptions remained. The
Pleasure/Violence Reciprocity Theory, applied to the cultures
listed in that reference work, has a predictive validity of 100%.
The original version of the table from the Futurist is available
here.
The strength of the two-stage deprivation theory of violence is
most vividly illustrated when we contrast the societies showing
high rates of physical affection during infancy and adolescence
against those societies which are consistently low in physical
affection for both developmental periods. The statistics
associated with this relationship are extraordinary: The percent
likelihood of a society being physically violent if it is
physically affectionate toward its infants and tolerant of
premarital sexual behavior is 2 percent (48/49). The probability
of this relationship occurring by chance is 125,000 to one. I am
not aware of any other developmental variable that has such a
high degree of predictive validity. Thus, we seem to have a
firmly based principle: Physically affectionate human societies
are highly unlikely to be physically violent.
Accordingly, when physical affection and pleasure during
adolescence as well as infancy are related to measures of
violence, we find direct evidence of a significant relationship
between the punishment of premarital sex behaviors and various
measures of crime and violence. As Table 4 shows, additional
clusters of relationships link the punishment and repression of
premarital sex to large community size, high social complexity
and class stratification, small extended families, purchase of
wives, practice of slavery, and a high god present in human
morality. The relationship between small extended families and
punitive premarital sex attitudes deserves emphasis, for it
suggests that the nuclear Western cultures may be a contributing
factor to our repressive attitudes toward sexual expression.
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p. 14, November 1975, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
The same can be suggested for community size, social complexity,
and class stratification.
Not surprisingly, when high self-needs are combined with the
deprivation of physical affection, the result is self-interest
and high rates of narcissism. Likewise, exhibitionistic dancing
and pornography may be interpreted as a substitute for normal
sexual expression. Some nations which are most repressive of
female sexuality have rich pornographic art forms.
Extramarital Sex
I also examined the influence of extramarital sex taboos upon
crime and violence. The data clearly indicates that
punitive-repressive attitudes toward extramarital sex are also
linked with physical violence, personal crime, and the practice
of slavery. Societies which value monogamy emphasize military
glory and worship aggressive gods.
These cross-cultural data support the view of psychologists and
sociologists who feel that sexual and psychological needs not
being fulfilled within a marriage should be met outside of it,
without destroying the primacy of the marriage relationship.
Premarital Sex, Physical Violence and Other Adult Behaviors
Premarital sexual freedom for young people can help reduce
violence in a society, and the physical pleasure that youth
obtains from sex can offset a lack of physical affection during
infancy. Other research also indicates that societies which
punish premarital sex are likely to engage in wife purchasing, to
worship a high god in human morality, and to practice slavery.
Other results are shown in the table below.
TABLE 4
Adult Behaviors in Societies Where Premarital Sex is Strongly
Punished
Adult Behaviors PercentN Probability
% P
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Community size is larger 73 80 .0003
Slavery is present 59 176 .005
Societal complexity is high 87 15 .01
Personal crime is high 71 28 .05
Class stratification is high 60 111 .01
High incidence of theft 68 31 .07
Small extended family 70 63 .008
Extramarital sex is punished 71 58 .005
Wives are purchased 54 114 .02
Castration anxiety is high 65 37 .009
Longer post-partum sex taboo 62 50 .03
Bellicosity is extreme 68 37 .04
Sex disability is high 83 23 .004
Killing, torturing and mutilating the
enemy is high 69 35 .07
Narcissism is high 66 38 .04
Exhibitionistic dancing is emphasized 65 66 .04
High god in human morality 81 27 .01
These findings overwhelmingly support the thesis that deprivation
of body pleasure throughout life -- but particularly during the
formative periods of infancy, childhood, and adolescence -- are
very closely related to the amount of warfare and interpersonal
violence. These insights should be applied to large and
complicated industrial and postindustrial societies.
Crime and physical violence have substantially increased over the
past decade in the United States. According to FBI statistics,
both murder and aggravated assault increased 53 percent between
1967 and 1972, while forcible rape rose 70 percent.
These figures again raise the question of the special
relationship between sexuality and violence. In addition to our
rape statistics, there is other evidence that points to
preference for sexual violence over sexual pleasure in the United
States. This is reflected in our acceptance of sexually explicit
films that involve violence and rape, and our rejection of
sexually explicit films for pleasure only (pornography).
Neighborhood movie theaters show such sexually violent films as
Straw Dogs, Clockwork Orange, and The Klansman, while banning
films which portray sexual pleasure (Deep Throat, The Devil in
Miss Jones ). Attempts to close down massage parlors are another
example of our anti-pleasure attitudes. Apparently, sex with
pleasure is immoral and unacceptable, but sex with violence and
pain is moral and acceptable.
A questionnaire I developed to explore this question was
administered to 96 college students whose average age was 19
years. The results of the questionnaire support the connection
between rejection of physical pleasure (and particularly of
premarital and extramarital sex) with expression of physical
violence. Respondents who reject abortion, responsible premarital
sex, and nudity within the family were likely to approve of harsh
physical punishment for children and to believe that pain helps
build strong moral character. These respondents were likely to
find alcohol and drugs more satisfying than sex. The data
obtained from the questionnaire provide strong statistical
support for the basic inverse relationship between physical
violence and physical pleasure. If violence is high, pleasure is
low, and conversely, if pleasure is high, violence is low. The
questionnaire bears out the theory that the pleasure-violence
relationship found in primitive cultures also holds true for a
modern industrial nation.
Another way of looking at the reciprocal relationship between
violence and pleasure is to examine a society's choice of drugs.
A society will support behaviors that are consistent with its
values and social mores. U.S. society is a competitive,
aggressive, and violent society. Consequently, it supports drugs
that fa-