Jennifer Latson Quotes

“All of us risk being taken advantage of to some degree, but what would it be like to go through life this irremediably vulnerable, biologically unable to peel your heart from your sleeve and lock it safely inside?”
― Jennifer Latson, The Boy Who Loved Too Much: A True Story of Pathological Friendliness

“The more I came to understand Williams syndrome and to meet a wide range of people who had it, the more I saw that the social impulses that partly defined the disorder weren't so clearly a gift. Their unique combination of gregariousness and guilelessness exposed a paradox in Western culture: we say we like extroverts, but when an extreme extrovert comes barrelling toward us with open arms, we shy away. It's not just warmth or openness that we value; these traits must be coupled with a more sophisticated sense of when to turn them on and off. People with Williams syndrome never turn them off. They have the social drive but not the cognitive ability to use it effectively.”
― Jennifer Latson

“There is a wealth of evidence that people with Williams have a much stronger emotional response to music than the average person does. Even young children with Williams who can't talk yet suddenly start crying when they hear a sad song.”
― Jennifer Latson

“Neurobiologists have traced the apparent absence of social fear to abnormalities in the amygdalae of people with Williams. These almond-shaped clusters of neuclei, buried deep in the brain, help process emotions and regulate our fight-or-flight response to danger. In people with Williams, they react more dramatically than normal to images of disasters, such as fires, or plane crashes, which researchers think may explain why people with Williams often develop anxiety disorders. Conversely, they respond with abnormal indifference to images of people making fearful or angry facial expressions. The amygdalae of people without Williams tend to be extremely sensitive to those expressions since we have evolved to see them as warnings. Getting to close to a hostile person, or an aggressive ape, probably cost many of our ancestors their lives. Seeing a look of panic on someone else's face and starting to run probably saved the lives of many more.”
― Jennifer Latson, The Boy Who Loved Too Much: A True Story of Pathological Friendliness