Non-smoking campaigns that tell teenage boys they will get lung cancer in 30 years if they don\u2019t stop smoking just don\u2019t work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBut prevention programs that tell them that girls don\u2019t like smokers make them go pale with fear,\u201d says Keith Humphreys<\/a>, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Humphreys, an affiliated faculty member of Stanford Health Policy<\/a>, told an audience at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this January that the better approach to public health campaigns are those tailored to the realities of the human brain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of those realities is that our brains have evolved to be vulnerable to addiction, especially if we live in the lower-income tiers of society. An understanding of our evolutionary vulnerability to drugs and alcohol can help us to design effective public policies, Humphreys told the Davos audience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cPrimate research indicates that there may be a political and economic dimension to this,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen lower primates form a hierarchy, those at the bottom undergo a change in their dopamine system. This makes them more likely to consume drugs in an addictive fashion.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Addiction can happen to anyone at any level of society \u2014 the current opiate epidemic is a case in point \u2014 but if you look at wealthy societies, those who have less economic and educational resources are more prone to addiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSo as inequality worsens, we really have a risk of creating a disempowered underclass of people who are literally sedated by ever more available psychoactive substances.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Humphreys is on the NeuroChoice team at the\u00a0Stanford Neurosciences Institute<\/a>\u00a0who attended the forum to present their research into the neural basis of decision-making and how these impact public policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n