Dr Christopher Robert Badcock is Emeritus Reader in Sociology at the LSE, having retired in 2011. Born in 1946, he was educated at Maidstone Grammar School and LSE (First Class Honours BSc Sociology and Social Anthropology, 1967, PhD, 1973.). He was Lecturer in Sociology at Polytechnic of the South Bank from 1969-73, and was appointed to the staff of the LSE Sociology Department in 1974.
He continues with his research, which is devoted to elaborating the imprinted brain theory which he developed along with Prof Bernard Crespi (Killam Research Professor, Department of Biosciences, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, Canada) and which seeks to explain brain evolution, the mind, and mental illness in terms of genetic conflict. His book on the subject, The Imprinted Brain: how genes set the balance between autism and psychosis was published by Jessica Kingsley in May 2009. He also maintains the Imprinted Brain blogsite at Psychology Today online, and can be found on ResearchGate.
Selected Publications
Books
The Imprinted Brain: how genes set the balance between autism and psychosis. Jessica Kingsley, 2009
Evolutionary Psychology: A Critical Introduction. Polity Press, 2000
Articles and Book Chapters
Badcock, Christopher and Crespi, Bernard (2008) Battle of the sexes may set the brain. Nature, 454 pp. 1054-1055. ISSN 0028-0836
Crespi, Bernard and Badcock, Christopher (2008) Psychosis and autism as diametrical disorders of the social brain. Behavioral and brain sciences, 31 (3). pp. 241-260. ISSN 0140-525X
Badcock, Christopher (2008) Nature or nurture? Genes or society? Autism or psychosis? A new theory resolves some long-standing contradictions in explaining mental illness. Sociology research news: Newsletter of the London School of Economics and Political Sciences. Sociology Department, 5 (3). pp. 2-4.
Badcock, Christopher (2008) Selfish genes and sanity. The Great Debate Website,
Badcock, Christopher (2007) An evolutionary theory of mind and of mental illness : genetic conflict and the mentalistic continuum. In: Krebs, D. and Crawford, C.B., (eds.) Foundations of evolutionary psychology : ideas, issues and applications. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc., London, UK.
Badcock, Christopher (2006) Sociobiology. In: Bryant, Clifton and Peck, Dennis, (eds.) 21st Century Sociology : A Reference Handbook. Sage Publications, London, UK, pp. 295-305. ISBN 9781412916080
Badcock, Christopher and Crespi, Bernard (2006) Imbalanced genomic imprinting in brain development: an evolutionary basis for the etiology of autism. Journal of evolutionary biology, 19 (4). pp. 1007-1032. ISSN 1420-9101
Badcock, Christopher (2006) Evolutionary origins of autism and psychosis? Sociology research news, 4 (2). pp. 10-11.
Badcock, Christopher (2004) The morality of markets: taxation as a prisoner's dilemma. In: O'Keeffe, Dennis, (ed.) Economy and virtue: essays on the theme of markets and morality. Institute of Economic Affairs, London, pp. 52-67. ISBN 0255365047
Badcock, Christopher (2004) Emotion versus reason as a genetic conflict. In: Evans, D. and Cruse, P., (eds.) Emotion, Evolution, and Rationality. Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, pp. 207-222.
Badcock, Christopher (2004) Mentalism and mechanism: the twin modes of human cognition. In: Crawford, Charles B and Salmon, Catherine A, (eds.) Evolutionary Psychology, Public Policy and Personal Decisions. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, N.J., pp. 99-116. ISBN 9780805843774
Badcock, Christopher (2003) Eugenics. In: Christensen, Karen and Levinson, David, (eds.) Encyclopedia of community: from the village to the virtual world. Berkshire Publishing Group, Great Barrington, MA, pp. 469-470. ISBN 0761925988
Badcock, Christopher (2003) Eugenics. In: Christensen, Karen and Levinson, David, (eds.) Encyclopedia of community: from the village to the virtual world. Sage Publications, Thousands Oaks, Calif.
Badcock, Christopher (2003) "Incest", "The Libido Theory", "Sociobiology & Psychoanalysis". In: Erwin, Edward, (ed.) The Freud Encyclopedia. Routledge, pp. 273-275.
Badcock, Christopher (2001) Genetic conflict and Freudian psychology. Psychology review, 7 (3). pp. 16-19. ISSN 1750-3469