What Neuroscience May Be Able to Tell Us about Criminal Behavior and Rehabilitation

Abstract

Emerging questions at the interface of law and neuroscience challenge several presumptions at the heart of the legal system. For example, under what circumstances is it a legitimate defense to claim that a brain tumor or idiosyncratic neural wiring was responsible for a behavior? Will neuroscience inform sentencing decisions by offering a better prediction of recidivism? Can novel neuroscience technologies be leveraged for new methods of rehabilitation? I will address these questions with a look toward what neuroscience may and many not be able to tell us about criminal behavior within the next decade. I will additionally cover preliminary experimental data from our novel strategy for real-time functional neuroimaging-based rehabilitation, which I will discuss on both scientific and ethical grounds. Finally, I will touch on Baylor College of Medicine’s Initiative on Neuroscience and Law (www.NeuLaw.org), which brings together a unique collaboration of neurobiologists, legal scholars, and policy makers, with the goal of building modern, evidence-based policy.