This Is Your Brain on Law School: The Impact of Fear-Based Narratives on Law Students
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THIS Is YOUR BRAIN ON LAW SCHOOL: THE IMPACT
OF FEAR-BASED NARRATIVES ON LAW STUDENTS
Abigail A. Patthoff*
1. INTRODUCTION
Fear is primal. Ask any IL in the grips of the Socratic method: fear is one of
the most visceral and powerful human motivators. Indeed, evolution has ensured
that fear has an express lane in our brain circuitry: information from the senses has
a direct route to the amygdala, the brain's fear manufacturer.' Information moves
along this route unfiltered by the neocortex, the area of the brain responsible for
higher-order thinking like reasoning and logic.2 Indeed, before the neocortex
receives information from the senses, the amygdala has already made a quick-and
dirty appraisal of the information for potential threats and has begun sending its
evaluation to the neocortex.3 The amygdala blasts these messages to the neocortex
along profuse pathways-pathways that far outnumber those that travel from the
neocortex back to the amygdala.4 So, while the amygdala is capable of filling the
thinking brain5 with fear messages, the ability of the thinking brain to send rational
* © 2015 Abigail A. Patthoff. Professor of Legal Writing, Dale E. Fowler School of
Law, Chapman University. I.am grateful to the facilitators and participants of the Legal
Writing Institute's 2013 Writers' Workshop, particularly Professors Jill Ramsfield, Diane
Kraft, and Julie Clement for their feedback and encouragement regarding an early draft of
this Article. Thanks are also due to Professors Robin Wellford Slocum, Jane K. Stoever, and
Deepa Badrinarayana for their time and thoughtful comments. Finally, special thanks to
Professor Rita Barnett-Rose for her support and willingness to read multiple drafts.
'JOSEPH LEDOUX, THE EMOTIONAL BRAIN 164 (1996).
2 Joseph LeDoux, professor of neuroscience and psychology at New York University,
describes this circuitry as containing a high road and a low road. Id. at 161-65. The high
road transmits sensory information (sight, touch, sound, smell) from the thalamus to the
cortex (the logical, thinking brain) before sending that information on to the amygdala. Id.
The low road, on the other hand, bypasses the cortex. Id. Sensory information from the
thalamus travels directly to the amygdala with no detours through the thinking brain-
making the low road significantly faster and enabling us to respond more quickly to potential
threats. Id.
3 Id. at 163-65.
4 Id. at 303 ([P]athways from the amygdala to the cortex overshadow the pathways
from the cortex to the amygdala.); see also RITA CARTER, MAPPING THE MIND 98 (1998)
([T]he wiring of the brain favours emotion-the connections from the emotional systems
to the cognitive systems are stronger than the connections that run the other way.).
5 Neuroscientists divide the brain into three basic regions: the primitive brain, the
oldest of the three, which governs basic motor functions and involuntary bodily activities;
the emotional brain, or limbic system, which generates emotions and is responsible for our
fight or flight instincts; and the thinking brain, which governs reasoning, language, and
analysis. See JUDITH HORSTMAN, THE SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN: BRAVE NEW BRAIN 3-4
(20 10). The amygdala is seated in the limbic system. See id. at 4.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/utahlr2015&div=15&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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This Is Your Brain on Law School: The Impact of Fear-Based Narratives on Law Students
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