Brain scans on street gangs to trace reasons for life of crime
Teenage gang members will have their brains scanned in an experiment to find out why they are so violent.
Scores of "hoodies" will be tested on London streets as scientists attempt to prove their brains have been scarred by years of abuse and neglect.
The research could revolutionise the way extremely violent children and teenagers are treated by the authorities and provide a blueprint for how to integrate them back into society.
Most of the youngsters helped by the charity are homeless and some have been forced into drug running, gangs, or prostitution.
Scientists will perform an Electroencephalography
scan in which 256 electrodes are placed on each child's head to measure electrical impulses
coming out of the brain cells.
They will determine how much stress each child
is under by measuring cortisol levels in the blood and saliva, and take their heart and respiration rate.
The tests will be performed on teenagers aged 13 to 17. Researchers will write to the children's parents giving them the opportunity to opt out.
Camila Batmanghelidjh, founder of Kids Company, is backing the study. She said: "We need to change the natural argument that these children are morally flawed.
We are trying to show that their brains are different and they are impaired in their ability to calm themselves down.
"We think their brain has been altered by the amount of violence they have been exposed to."
Peter Fonagy, Freud Memorial Professor of Psychoanalysis at UCL and chief executive of the Anna Freud Centre, is leading the research. He said: "This is very exciting. These are very hard-toreach young people who have been traumatised and about whom scientists know very little.
"We want to set up a mobile laboratory in a van with Kids Company staff as lab assistants. We are looking for biomarkers that will show the extreme stress these people are under."
One of the experiments will involve the child being shown a photograph of an angry face while wearing the electrodes.
The brains of those children who have been abused are expected to show increased activity in the pre-frontal cortex, the area associated with inhibition. It becomes more active when people are trying to suppress violent instincts.
Children who have not been abused will be able to look at the face without feeling anger, so their brains are not expected to show this activity.
Dr Fonagy said: "A child who has been abused will have an incredibly powerful emotional arousal that they are desperately trying to inhibit. This is a neural signature for maltreatment."
Ms Batmanghelidjh developed the theory that children's brains can be damaged by neglect or abuse after interviewing 400 youngsters at Kids
Company.
She said: "I believe many children living in our city are exposed to the same level of violence as war veterans. They are being traumatised and breaking down. But the point is that this is reparable and reversible."
Scientists need to raise £250,000 before aiming to start the research in the autumn.
