הרצאת המכון ללימודים מתקדמים: מה קורה במוח כשהשליטה העצמית קורסת?

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN SELF-CONTROL BREAKS DOWN?

As part of her visit to the Institute for Advanced Studies as an IAS Distinguished Scholar, Prof. Nelly Alia-Klein will deliver a lecture titled “When Self-Control Fails: Brain Mechanisms of Anger, Aggression, and Addiction in Humans.”

This lecture explores how failures of self-regulation contribute to anger, aggression, and addiction, and how these conditions can be understood within a shared neuroscientific and clinical framework. Drawing on brain imaging, genetics, and behavioral research, it offers a perspective that connects psychological experience with underlying biological mechanisms and treatment-relevant outcomes.

View the full invitation here

  COURSE DETAILS

When:  Monday, 11 May 2026, 12:15–13:45

Where: Room 214, Sharett Building

Light refreshments will be served before the lecture.
The lecture will be conducted in English and is open to the public.
 

 MORE ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Prof. Nelly Alia-Klein is a neuroscientist whose research focuses on the brain mechanisms underlying self-regulation, addiction, and aggression. Using multimodal imaging approaches alongside genetic and behavioral methods, her work investigates how disruptions in self-control are expressed in both brain function and behavior.

Her research bridges neuroscience and clinical practice, with a particular emphasis on identifying measurable markers of dysregulation that can inform treatment, recovery, and prevention. She collaborates with clinical and rehabilitation settings, including ongoing work with hospital-based partners in Israel.

 FULL ABSTRACT

WHEN SELF-CONTROL FAILS: BRAIN MECHANISMS OF ANGER, AGGRESSION, AND ADDICTION IN HUMANS

Self-regulation sits at the center of my research program. In this talk, I will discuss how failures of self-regulation contribute to pathological anger, reactive aggression, and addiction, and how these conditions can be studied within a common human translational framework. Drawing on multimodal PET, fMRI, genetics, and clinically informed behavioral paradigms, I will first present work showing that brain monoamine oxidase A activity predicts trait aggression, that anger regulation varies with genetic risk for violence, and that reactive aggression engages mesocorticolimbic salience circuitry and prefrontal-habenular interactions.

I will then turn to addiction, where I examine craving, salience processing, impaired control, and the broader body-level burden of addiction, including vascular disease, inflammation, and accelerated aging. Throughout, I will emphasize a clinical approach in which psychological constructs—anger, provocation, impulsivity, craving, trauma-related dysregulation—are studied alongside brain and peripheral markers and linked to treatment-relevant outcomes.

Finally, I will outline a longitudinal, clinically embedded model for future work, including collaborations with rehabilitation settings and hospital-based partners in Israel. The broader aim is to identify mechanism-based phenotypes of dysregulation and to use them to guide intervention, recovery, and prevention.

The Institute of Advanced Studies
https://ias.tau.ac.il