I was lucky enough to hear Dr Tania Singer on BBC Radio 2, speaking to DJ Stuart Marconi about this study and I think that what has happened is open to a great deal of speculation. I'd heard she was going to be on the show and after reading what the press had to say, I wanted to listen to exactly what she'd 'discovered'. It wasn't what I'd expected.
For a start she came across as a scientist and not as someone with an agenda, especially as she actually took the opposite stance to that of the DJ. Plus she pretty much dismissed everything that had already been said as the research hadn't been completed.
Sir Percy said:What if they had called it a 'Justice' area? Would they be saying that women have no inherent sense of justice? Nah. Of course not. How about calling this crap science.
Well actually Sir Percy I think you might have been pleasantly surprised. Although she didn't actually say that 'women have no sense of justice' she did say that so far it appeared that men weren't swayed by who had cheated and this possibly could be a sign of an inherent sense of justice. If fact throughout the interview she didn't really say a bad word about either sex, and believe me I was waiting for her too do just that.
I think that what's happened is they've done some research on brain mapping, University College London have told the press some of their findings in order to get publicity or sponsorship and then made some of the scientists reluctantly talk about what little information they have gleaned.
At some level the study proves for the first time in physical terms what many people assume they already know: That women are generally more empathetic than men and that men are more prone to schadenfreude - malicious joy when faced with another's misfortune.
And this is exactly how a piece of unfinished research can be said to 'prove'.
I wouldn't blame the scientists in this case, just the press for using their expansive scientific knowledge (read: zero) to sell a few newspapers. People here have already pointed out that the study has more holes in it than Swiss cheese, but as far as I can tell this isn't a 'study of revenge', it's about mapping electrical impulses in the brain.