Imagine an entrepreneur explaining his success by "the right testosterone levels," or a person justifying laziness by "bad dopamine." This language has become commonplace—in podcasts, self-help books, even in corporate training. The problem is that it doesn't hold up against the data.
Neurobiologist Vasyl Mykytyuk analyzed dozens of studies with a UNN journalist and reached a conclusion that demolishes convenient biological excuses: hormones and neurotransmitters change the probability of behavior, they don't dictate the outcome.
Testosterone is barely linked to aggression
A meta-analysis by Geniole and colleagues (2020) showed a correlation between baseline testosterone levels and aggression at r = 0.054 — in men 0.071, in women 0.002. This is statistically zero, despite decades of popular explanations about the "aggression hormone."
An even more illustrative experiment by Eisenegger (Nature, 2010): women given testosterone behaved more fairly in the "Ultimatum" game. Those who acted unfairly were those who simply believed they had received the hormone — they hadn't actually been given any testosterone. Expectation proved stronger than biochemistry.
Testosterone doesn't create aggression; it amplifies already existing tendencies in a specific context
When hormones really do matter
Mykytyuk doesn't completely deny the role of hormones. It becomes decisive in pathological states—hypothyroidism, Cushing's syndrome, chronic stress with prolonged glucocorticoid effects on the brain, sleep deprivation or hunger, as well as during puberty, pregnancy, and menopause. Beyond these boundaries, hormonal effects explain only a small fraction of differences between people.
Dopamine calculates the price, not guarantees the result
PET research by Treadway (2012) showed: dopamine release in the striatum and ventromedial prefrontal cortex correlates with willingness to exert effort for a reward—especially when the chance of success is small, only 12%. The brain literally calculates the "effort/reward" ratio.
But a meta-analysis of perseverance by Credé (2017), covering 88 studies and nearly 67,000 participants, gave a clear conclusion: perseverance does not equal effectiveness. You can have "the right dopamine" and still fail to reach your goal—because between motivation and results stand skills, education, access to opportunities, and social environment.
Willpower as a battery myth
Another common model is ego depletion: self-control as a limited resource that depletes throughout the day. Early experiments supposedly confirmed this. But a large pre-registered replication by Hagger (2016)—23 laboratories, 2,141 participants—gave an effect d ≈ 0.04, practically zero.
Subliminal stimuli like scents also turned out to be overestimated. A meta-analysis by Roschk and Hosseinpour (2020, 71 samples, 15,447 participants) showed: a pleasant aroma does have some impact on consumer behavior, but spending increases by only about 3%, and time spent by about 5%. This is a slight shift in probability, not "subconscious programming."
What this means in practice
Mykytyuk's main conclusion concerns not biology but behavior: if heroic willpower doesn't work the way it seems, it makes sense to construct conditions where the desired action becomes more likely—get enough sleep, reduce chronic stress, eliminate unnecessary temptations, plan ahead.
Acknowledging that a huge part of the causes of our behavior is beyond our control doesn't mean acknowledging that our actions change nothing. If behavior depends on causes, it makes sense to look for causes we can change
This also means caution about social conclusions: if testosterone doesn't explain aggression, and willpower isn't simply a resource that successful people have "more" of, then the thesis "the successful deserved everything themselves, and failures are only to blame" loses its biological foundation. The only question is whether we're ready to replace convenient explanations with more inconvenient but more accurate ones.
