Thinking embodiment with genetics: epigenetics and postgenomic biology in embodied cognition and enactivism

Meloni, Maurizio; Reynolds, Jack

doi:10.1007/s11229-020-02748-3

Cited by 12 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 90 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…The "epigenetic turn" in the neurosciences has recently been proposed as a "bridge" between biological and socio-cultural effects in psychopathology (Frost, 2020;Landecker & Panofsky, 2013;Malabou, 2008Malabou, , 2012Meloni & Reynolds, 2021;Reul, 2014). It removes the focus of neurogenetics from a necessarily linear or unidirectional model (the "gene-for" paradigm), bringing it closer to more complex notions of epidemiology (Freitas-Silva & Ortega, 2016, 2014.…”

Section: Beyond Polymorphisms and Gene X Environment Interactions: Ep...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Serotonin as a Biocultural Molecule: Circular Causality, Stress, and Psychopathology

Maximino¹

2022

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Serotonin (5-HT) show important relations to stress, and this relationship is crucial to understanding the psychobiology of common mental disorders. Environmental stressors regulate phasic and tonic serotonin levels, which are related to valence and outcome probabilities. This regulation takes place at smaller timescales, but also at the level of gene expression regulation. Moreover, genes related to the synthesis, metabolism, and transport of 5-HT are also involved in this regulation. Genetic variations in these genes modulate how stressors can lead to mental distress, but stressors also modulate gene expression in a genotype-dependent manner. As a result, the relationship between psychosocial stress and the regulation of the expression of 5-HTergic genes is bidirectional. This suggests a “circular causality” in which gene variations control tonic and phasic 5-HT signals (“upward causality”), while configurations and functions of the entire organism determine which genes are up- or downregulated, or which gene products are actually relevant in each situation (“downward causality”). The highly important role of social factors in human psychopathology is highlighted, and factors such as attachment and socioeconomic status modulate how the circular vertical causality between genes, neurotransmitters, and behavior is organized, representing circular horizontal causality. These complex interrelationships also suggest that more refined epistemologies are needed to fully grasp the relationship between 5-HT and common mental disorders.

show abstract

Section: Beyond Polymorphisms and Gene X Environment Interactions: Ep...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Serotonin as a Biocultural Molecule: Circular Causality, Stress, and Psychopathology

Maximino¹

2022

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Thus, in this view, the brain is no longer compared with a computer made of modules but rather is considered as a hierarchically organized system of neurocognitive mechanisms that interact in a dynamic, bidirectional fashion and that vary in the degree of functional specialization and integration (Badcock et al 2019). As phenotypes emerge from interacting with the environment, neural dynamics depend heavily on the coupling between the organism and the environment suggesting that the body has a primary role in cognition (Meloni and Reynolds 2020). It is increasingly recognized that the body's physiological state underpins mental processes (Damasio and Carvalho 2013;Seth 2013;Pezzulo and Cisek 2016).…”

Section: A Proscriptive Definition Of Adaptation and Its Implication ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This view is prescriptive, as phenotypes that do not optimize adaptative value should not survive natural selection. According to this view, genes are the origin of phenotype when they are heritable (genecentrism) (see Meloni and Reynolds 2020). This prescriptive and gene-centered neo-Darwinian view has been challenged by recent advances in biology and genetics (Müller 2007;Danchin et al 2019).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

When the “satisficing” is the new “fittest”: how a proscriptive definition of adaptation can change our view of cognition and culture

Magnon

Corbara²

2022

Sci Nat

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Since Darwin's theory of evolution, adaptationism is frequently invoked to explain cognition and cultural processes. Adaptationism can be described as a prescriptive view, as phenotypes that do not optimize fitness should not be selected by natural selection. From an epistemological perspective, the principle of a prescriptive definition of adaptation seems incompatible with recent advances in epigenetics, evolutionary developmental biology, ethology, and genomics. From these challenges, a proscriptive view of adaptation has emerged, postulating that phenotypes that are not deleterious will be evolutionary maintained. In this epistemological investigation, we examine how the shift from adaptationism to a proscriptive view changes our view of cognition and culture. We argue that, while adaptationism leads to cognitivism and a view of culture as strategies to optimize overall fitness, the proscriptive definition favors embodied theories of cognition and a view of culture as the cumulative diffusion of behaviors allowed by the constraints of reproduction.

show abstract

“…Also, in the words of philosopher Samantha Frost (2016Frost ( , 2020, there is potential in epigenetics to imbue matter with meaning and agency, breaking the supposed association of fleshiness "with the unintelligent and the imperceptive." The attentive body that she sees emerging from a theoretically aware connection of epigenetic science and living experience, can be refashioned here as an "attentive brain, " where epigenetic marks of trauma are not just an inert sign established by blind mechanistic forces, but part of the wider "embodied responsiveness" of an organism-in-context that "is at once inhabited by the traces of its past and seeded with traces of its future" (Meloni and Testa, 2014: 15;Frost, 2020; see also Meloni and Reynolds, 2020).…”

Section: Notesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gender Beneath the Skull: Agency, Trauma and Persisting Stereotypes in Neuroepigenetics

Lawson-Boyd

Meloni

2021

Front. Hum. Neurosci.

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Epigenetics stands in a complex relationship to issues of sex and gender. As a scientific field, it has been heavily criticized for disproportionately targeting the maternal body and reproducing deterministic views of biological sex (Kenney and Müller, 2017; Lappé, 2018; Richardson et al., 2014). And yet, it also represents the culmination of a long tradition of engaging with developmental biology as a feminist cause, because of the dispersal of the supposed ‘master code’ of DNA among wider cellular, organismic and ecological contexts (Keller, 1988). In this paper, we explore a number of tensions at the intersection of sex, gender and trauma that are playing out in the emerging area of neuroepigenetics - a relatively new subfield of epigenetics specifically interested in environment-brain relations through epigenetic modifications in neurons. Using qualitative interviews with leading scientists, we explore how trauma is conceptualized in neuroepigenetics, paying attention to its gendered dimensions. We address a number of concerns raised by feminist STS researchers in regard to epigenetics, and illustrate why we believe close engagement with neuroepigenetic claims, and neuroepigenetic researchers themselves, is a crucial step for social scientists interested in questions of embodiment and trauma. We argue this for three reasons: (1) Neuroepigenetic studies are recognizing the agential capacities of biological materials such as genes, neurotransmitters and methyl groups, and how they influence memory formation; (2) Neuroepigenetic conceptions of trauma are yet to be robustly coupled with social and anthropological theories of violence (Eliot, 2021; Nelson, 2021; Walby, 2013); (3) In spite of the gendered assumptions we find in neuroepigenetics, there are fruitful spaces – through collaboration – to be conceptualizing gender beyond culture-biology and nature-nurture binaries (Lock and Nguyen, 2010). To borrow Gravlee’s (2009: 51) phrase, we find reason for social scientists to consider how gender is not only constructed, but how it may “become biology” via epigenetic and other biological pathways. Ultimately, we argue that a robust epigenetic methodology is one which values the integrity of expertise outside its own field, and can have an open, not empty mind to cross-disciplinary dialogue.

show abstract

Thinking embodiment with genetics: epigenetics and postgenomic biology in embodied cognition and enactivism

Cited by 12 publications

References 90 publications

Serotonin as a Biocultural Molecule: Circular Causality, Stress, and Psychopathology

Serotonin as a Biocultural Molecule: Circular Causality, Stress, and Psychopathology

When the “satisficing” is the new “fittest”: how a proscriptive definition of adaptation can change our view of cognition and culture

Gender Beneath the Skull: Agency, Trauma and Persisting Stereotypes in Neuroepigenetics

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About