The idea that when a person receives a transplant, that the new tissue carries over “memory” that influences a person tastes, personality, etc.
I have seen this theory on a few websites that I would define, for lack of a better term, as “new age”.
Does anyone know of any reputable research on this topic? This is really a factual questions (I want to know where the research is), but it will probably develop into a debate (is the theory true or not), so I put the question here.
Any help?
:rolleyes: Considering that transplanted organs never integrate fully into the new body, & recipients have to take anti-rejection drugs for the rest of their lives, I suppose personality doesn’t integrate either.
See this thread, especially my post. I’ll be updating it shortly.
BTW, did this story trigger the thread?
Patients undergoing open heart surgery often have measureable changes in personality, memory, and cognition even if the surgery is not a heart transplant. This can be attributed to a number of factors, but most often seems to be the result of tiny strokes from debris dislodged from the heart and aorta and/or shed from the heart/lung bypass cannulas. People can become more or less introverted, emotional, or impulsive as a result.
Persons with longstanding liver disease severe enough to warrant transplantation often have varying degrees of hepatic encephalopathy - mental status changes that are due to the presence of bloodstream toxins that would normally be cleared by a healthy liver. Once the transplant is in place and these toxins begin to clear, mental status and personality can change.
Claims that organ transplants have made the recipient more like the donor are also subject to confirmation bias: if a person who didn’t like spinach before the transplant now likes spinach, and the donor liked spinach as well, that’s claimed as a real effect; but there are likely many, many things that the donor liked that the recipient still does not like.
We should also not underestimate the psychological impact of being given a ‘new lease on life’. Patients may change their behavior in unpredictable ways; they may take more risks in order to live their new life ‘to the fullest’, or they may become more risk-averse. One can consider the behavior of cancer survivors to see this effect in action.
At any rate, there are a number of potential explanations for personality/behavior changes after recovery from major illness, much less organ transplantation. To invoke a mechanism of tissue memory or tissue transmission of personality would require extraordinary evidence.