Taking Psychiatric Drugs Does a Number on Our Moral Decision-Making

by Monica Joshi

SSRIs, anti-depressants, pills to treat Parkinsons are all treated as god-send medications. What's sometimes lacking in these high-praises are its side-effects, or even worse, affecting your moral decision making skills. While our moral decisions can be influenced by a variety of decisions, a fascinating new study has suggested that moral decisions could even be influenced by the medication we take.

The study, collaborated by scientists from the University College of London and Oxford, set out to examine the effect of commonly prescribed anti-depressants, SSRIs and other prescription drugs. Earlier work had suggested that levels of the brain chemicals serotonin and dopamine influenced aggression or anti-social behaviour. In either case, there would be an effect on the way in which harming others is disturbed by the drug-taker.

In order to determine whether there was any truth to the matter, the observed how much pain people were willing to dish out in return for money. Hence, they set out to examine whether an altruistic disposition displayed by most people – a greater aversion to inflicting pain on others rather than themselves – could be influenced by certain signaling molecules, or neurotransmitters.

Of the 175 healthy adults enrolled, 89 were randomly assigned either a placebo or the antidepressant citalopram, which influences serotonin levels, and 86 were randomly chosen to receive a placebo or levodopa, a drug used to raise dopamine levels in patients with Parkinson’s.

Participants were randomly assigned one of two roles: a decider or a receiver. They were then anonymously paired up. Deciders were then isolated and given 170 different trials in which they had to decide how many mildly painful electric shocks would be given by experimenters. They could, for example, choose to select 7 shocks in return for £10 ($25), or 10 shocks for £15, or @23. Half of the scenarios involved self-harm, but in the other half the receiver was given the shocks. But in all of the trials, the decider was the one who ended up with the cash.

The researchers didn’t act out every single scenario.However, one of the results was randomly selected to be implemented at the end, so the decision-makers knew that the situation was not entirely hypothetical and thus had very real consequences.

They found that the majority of people behaved altruistically, displaying a preference for self-harm rather than harm directed at others. Those in the placebo groups were willing to forgo, on average, about 35 pence ($0.54)  per shock to prevent self-harm. In addition, they were also willing to forgo the 44 pence ($0.68) for harm to others.

Citalopram, however, seemed to make people much more averse to harm, willing to pay around twice as much per shock to prevent harm. They paid more, therefore, to prevent harm to others.

On the contrary, this altruistic tendency was not seen in those given levodopa. Those in this group were willing to forfeit an average of 35p ($0.54) per shock, whether that was to prevent self-harm or harm to others. They also spent less time thinking about the number of shocks to be divvied out to others than those in the placebo group.

The experiment results, in other words, showed that people given a common anti-depressant paid significantly more to avoid harm to themselves or others than those in the placebo group. Contrast that with a drug used to treat Parkinson’s reduced selflessness. They were not inclined to favor harming themselves over others.

As these results may show what happens to those, healthy adults, that take the serotonin or the dopamine, it does not include those that take the drugs for medical reasons or those that have a deficiency of either neurotransmitter. It would be interesting to see if there are similar or completely different results in those who take them for medical reasons.

Dr. Julie Holland relays the dangers related to overprescribed medications, specifically how people lose empathy and sensitivity—that could be extremely dangerous for moral decision making. She suggests several alternatives to relying on antidepressants.

Photo credit: lolostock