Maybe this explains why Nabby hates Buddhists so much, why Buck has such vehemence for those he calls "non-meditators," and why other long-term TMers seem so homophobic. Their TM-enhanced oxytocin levels make them biased towards people they perceive as their "group."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21220339 Oxytocin promotes human ethnocentrism. De Dreu CK1, Greer LL, Van Kleef GA, Shalvi S, Handgraaf MJ. Author information Abstract Human ethnocentrism--the tendency to view one's group as centrally important and superior to other groups--creates intergroup bias that fuels prejudice, xenophobia, and intergroup violence. Grounded in the idea that ethnocentrism also facilitates within-group trust, cooperation, and coordination, we conjecture that ethnocentrism may be modulated by brain oxytocin, a peptide shown to promote cooperation among in-group members. In double-blind, placebo-controlled designs, males self-administered oxytocin or placebo and privately performed computer-guided tasks to gauge different manifestations of ethnocentric in-group favoritism as well as out-group derogation. Experiments 1 and 2 used the Implicit Association Test to assess in-group favoritism and out-group derogation. Experiment 3 used the infrahumanization task to assess the extent to which humans ascribe secondary, uniquely human emotions to their in-group and to an out-group. Experiments 4 and 5 confronted participants with the option to save the life of a larger collective by sacrificing one individual, nominated as in-group or as out-group. Results show that oxytocin creates intergroup bias because oxytocin motivates in-group favoritism and, to a lesser extent, out-group derogation. These findings call into question the view of oxytocin as an indiscriminate "love drug" or "cuddle chemical" and suggest that oxytocin has a role in the emergence of intergroup conflict and violence. ________________________________ From: TurquoiseBee <turquoi...@yahoo.com> To: "FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com" <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Wednesday, April 2, 2014 9:50 AM Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Are TMers Oxytocin Junkies? >From http://www.chopra.com/files/newsletter/Apr12/Apr12-Meditation.html What happens in the brain during meditation? The emotional effects of sitting quieting and going within are profound. The deep state of rest produced by meditation triggers the brain to release neurotransmitters, including dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, and endorphins. Each of these naturally occurring brain chemicals has been linked to different aspects of happiness: ... Oxytocin (the same chemical whose levels rise during sexual arousal and breastfeeding), is a pleasure hormone. It creates feelings of calm, contentment, and security, while reducing fear and anxiety. ________________________________ From: TurquoiseBee <turquoi...@yahoo.com> To: "fairfieldlife@yahoogroups.com" <fairfieldlife@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Wednesday, April 2, 2014 8:50 AM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Are TMers Oxytocin Junkies? You've gotta admit...it *does* explain the group apologetics thang. It also explains FFL cliques... http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/39595/title/Oxytocin-Boosts-Dishonesty/
