Raine

• Aim - find out whether participants pleading not guilty for reasons of insanity showed brain dysfunctions in areas of brain associated with violence
• Procedure - participants had not taken any drugs

  Each injected with the radioactive tracer

  More active brain areas sites light up - tracer blinds to glucose

  32 minutes after they did a series of task on a computer - The research has took PET scans to see activating areas - 10 images of the brain at 10mm intervals
• Results - measures have less activity in the prefrontal cortex and control

  murderers have less activation in left hippocampus more in the right hippocampus same as amygdala
• Conclusion - brain structure/activity of murderers significantly different to non-murderers

  Brain difference could be related to violence

  Suggest no single brain area related to violent behaviour
• Strengths of raine

  • High levels of control = standardised procedure - high levels of internal validity as the drug test remove confounding variables affecting brain activation
  • COUNTERPOINT - other elements not controlled - 23 murders had brain injuries - situational factors such as upbringing could affect brain
  • Study matched participants - evenly matched - researchers make fair and direct comparison between brain activation
• Weaknesses of raine

  • That’s population validity - small suspect of violent criminals pleaded not guilty due to reasons of insanity - limited sample - finding that certain brain areas being more active or only applicable to some murderers