Jane on the Brain by Wendy Jones

Author:Wendy Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pegasus Books

Incidentally, what most of us think of as handsome or beautiful is by definition a schema. We cull the most regular and symmetrical features from the thousands of faces we see and from this generalized composite form a schema for attractiveness. Nevertheless, attractiveness is largely culturally determined even if regular features tend to be favored. Scholars have concluded that Mr. Darcy didn’t look like Colin Firth because nineteenth-century standards of attractiveness were different from our own.

In the same way that we form generalized schemas about houses and good looks, a baby culls the common features of his interactions with his mother or other close caregivers and develops a schema of what relationships look and feel like. A securely attached baby develops an internal working model of close relationships as warm and supportive because most of his encounters with his mother or other close caregivers have been characterized by such qualities. For securely attached children, malattuned or inadequate responses are quickly repaired most of the time. Sadly, an avoidantly attached baby learns that intimacy is likely to be painful and disappointing—better to keep your distance. An anxious-ambivalent child learns that people are not dependable.

To put this in neurological as well as psychological terms, repeated instances of attunement on the part of caregivers create the right neurochemical environment for babies to develop the neurological structures that correspond to secure attachment. The experiences that generate insecurity also create stress, and stress is toxic for developing neurons and developing brains. If the child’s environment is sufficiently stressful, actual brain damage or diminished development might result. This topic will be considered in more detail, especially with regard to the capacity for emotional regulation, in future chapters.

In addition, our understanding of what relationships feel like is stored in emotional and bodily memory, while our knowledge of how to behave in relationships and what to expect of them is stored in procedural (how-to) memory, candidates for the subconscious discussed in Chapter Four. The neurological content of this knowledge consists of neural patterns, the particular neurons and network configurations that are key in forming our thoughts and behaviors. Hebb’s theorem explains that this knowledge becomes neurologically ingrained because “Neurons that fire together wire together.” Once a neuron has fired, it’s more likely to fire again, and when two neurons fire simultaneously the linkage of activation has a better than random chance of recurring. The child’s knowledge about relationships is stored in this dispositional form, in the likeliness that the neurons that represent this knowledge will activate.

Habitual neural patterns translate into knowledge, feelings, and actions in relationships. They also translate into expectations; the world you’ve come to know is the one you often create. People who avoid forming close relationships with others tend to produce conditions that confirm their sense that such relationships aren’t possible. Darcy keeps his distance, and so he lives in a world in which distance from others is the norm.Conversely, when we’re able to form relationships that contradict our expectations, that’s when change, and often healing, are possible.

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