Farah, Martha J
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Publication Neuroethics: the practical and the philosophical(2005-01-01) Farah, Martha J.In comparison with the ethical issues surrounding molecular genetics, there has been little public awareness of the ethical implications of neuroscience. Yet recent progress in cognitive neuroscience raises a host of ethical issues of at least comparable importance. Some are of a practical nature, concerning the applications of neurotechnology and their likely implications for individuals and society. Others are more philosophical, concerning the way we think about ourselves as persons, moral agents and spiritual beings. This article reviews key examples of each type of issue, including the relevant advances in science and technology and their accompanying social and philosophical problems.Publication Minds, Motherboards, and Money: Futurism and Realism in the Neuroethics of BCI Technologies(2014-05-15) Attiah, Mark A; Farah, Martha JFrom the Introduction: Brain computer interfaces (BCIs) are systems that enable the brain to send and receive information to and from a computer, bypassing the body's own efferent and afferent pathways. BCIs have been used in experimental animal models to augment perception, motor control and even memory (Velliste et al., 2008; Berger et al., 2011; Torab et al., 2011). Human BCIs include cochlear implants and a host of experimental devices including retinal implants (Niparko et al., 2010; Klauke et al., 2011). BCI technology holds the potential to benefit humanity greatly, but also the potential to do harm, and its ethical implications have therefore been addressed by a number of commentators.Publication Socioeconomic status and the brain: mechanistic insights from human and animal research(2010-09-01) Hackman, Daniel A.; Farah, Martha J.; Meaney, Michael J.Human brain development occurs within a socioeconomic context and childhood socioeconomic status (SES) influences neural development — particularly of the systems that subserve language and executive function. Research in humans and in animal models has implicated prenatal factors, parent–child interactions and cognitive stimulation in the home environment in the effects of SES on neural development. These findings provide a unique opportunity for understanding how environmental factors can lead to individual differences in brain development, and for improving the programmes and policies that are designed to alleviate SES-related disparities in mental health and academic achievement.Publication Emerging ethical issues in neuroscience(2002-11-01) Farah, Martha J.There is growing public awareness of the ethical issues raised by progress in many areas of neuroscience. This commentary reviews the issues, which are triaged in terms of their novelty and their imminence, with an exploration of the relevant ethical principles in each case.Publication A Meta-Analysis of the Relationship between Socioeconomic Status and Executive Function Performance Among Children(2018-03-01) Lawson, Gwendolyn M; Hook, Cayce J; Farah, Martha JThe relation between childhood socioeconomic status (SES) and executive function (EF) has recently attracted attention within psychology, following reports of substantial SES disparities in children’s EF. Adding to the importance of this relation, EF has been proposed as a mediator of socioeconomic disparities in lifelong achievement and health. However, evidence about the relationship between childhood SES and EF is mixed, and there has been no systematic attempt to evaluate this relationship across studies. This meta-analysis systematically reviewed the literature for studies in which samples of children varying in SES were evaluated on EF, including studies with and without primary hypotheses about SES. The analysis included 8,760 children between the ages of 2 and 18 gathered from 25 independent samples. Analyses showed a small but statistically significant correlation between SES and EF across all studies (r random = .16, 95% CI [.12, .21]) without correcting for attenuation due to range restriction or measurement unreliability. Substantial heterogeneity was observed between studies, and a number of factors, including the amount of SES variability in the sample and the number of EF measures used, emerged as moderators. Using only the 15 studies with meaningful SES variability in the sample, the average correlation between SES and EF was small-to-medium in size (r random = .22, 95% CI [.17, .27]). Using only the 6 studies with multiple measures of EF, the relationship was medium in size (r random = .28, 95% CI [.18-.37]). In sum, this meta-analysis supports the presence of SES disparities in EF and suggests that they are between small and medium in size, depending on the methods used to measure them.Publication Law and Neuroscience(2013-11-06) Jones, Owen D; Marois, Réne; Farah, Martha J; Greely, HenryPublication Socioeconomic status and the brain: prospects for neuroscience-informed policy(2018-06-01) Farah, Martha JSocioeconomic status (SES) is associated with health (physical and mental) and cognitive ability. Understanding and ameliorating the problems of low SES have long been goals of economics and sociology; in recent years, these have also become goals of neuroscience. However, opinion varies widely on the relevance of neuroscience to SES-related policy. The present article addresses the question of whether and how neuroscience can contribute to the development of social policy concerning poverty and the social and ethical risks inherent in trying. I argue that the neuroscience approach to SES-related policy has been both prematurely celebrated and peremptorily dismissed and that some of its possible social impacts have been viewed with excessive alarm. Neuroscience has already made modest contributions to SES-related policy, and its potential to have a more effective and beneficial influence can be expected to grow over the coming years.Publication Neuroethics and the Problem of Other Minds: Implications of Neuroscience for the Moral Status of Brain-Damaged Patients and Nonhuman Animals(2008-01-01) Farah, Martha J.Our ethical obligations to another being depend at least in part on that being's capacity for a mental life. Our usual approach to inferring the mental state of another is to reason by analogy: If another being behaves as I do in a circumstance that engenders a certain mental state in me, I conclude that it has engendered the same mental state in him or her. Unfortunately, as philosophers have long noted, this analogy is fallible because behavior and mental states are only contingently related. If the other person is acting, for example, we could draw the wrong conclusion about his or her mental state. In this article I consider another type of analogy that can be drawn between oneself and another to infer the mental state of the other, substituting brain activity for behavior. According to most current views of the mind–body problem, mental states and brain states are non-contingently related, and hence inferences drawn with the new analogy are not susceptible to the alternative interpretations that plague the behavioral analogy. The implications of this approach are explored in two cases for which behavior is particularly unhelpful as a guide to mental status: severely brain–damaged patients who are incapable of intentional communicative behavior, and nonhuman animals whose behavioral repertoires are different from ours and who lack language.Publication Neuroethics, An Introduction with Readings(2010-01-01) Farah, Martha J.Publication Cognitive Enhancement(2014-01-01) Farah, Martha J; Ilieva, Irena; Hamilton, Roy; Smith, M. ElizabethCognitive enhancement refers to the improvement of cognitive ability in normal healthy individuals. In this article, we focus on the use of pharmaceutical agents and brain stimulation for cognitive enhancement, reviewing the most common methods of pharmacologic and electronic cognitive enhancement, and the mechanisms by which they are believed to work, the effectiveness of these methods and their prevalence. We note the many gaps in our knowledge of these matters, including open questions about the size, reliability and nature of the enhancing effects, and we conclude with recommendations for further research.