In the Lead with Jennifer Fraser

In the Lead With is a conversation with industry leaders on key trends and leadership challenges. In this issue, we spoke with neuroscientist Jennifer Fraser, who examines bullying and gaslighting in the workplace, unpacking the neuroscience behind abuse cultures and what leaders can do to recognize and stop them.

Ruchin Kansal (RK):
Thank you, Jen, for being with us. Tell us about yourself and how you got interested in the topic of bullying and gaslighting in the workplace.

Jennifer Fraser (JF):
I became interested because I was inadvertently — just randomly — pulled into a situation in my workplace involving a basketball program. I first heard from parents whose children were playing and being coached. They shared serious concerns — bullying and abuse. In fact, it was psychological abuse and physical abuse, and it was all covered up.

At the request of the leader of the institution, I began taking testimonies directly from victims. I took eight testimonies over a couple of hours and heard firsthand descriptions of the psychological and physical abuse.

I probably would have left it there. But instead of protecting the victims — teenagers — the leadership positioned them as offenders, while the perpetrators were positioned as victims. And I thought: Wow, how does this happen?

The way I handle situations — similar to you, as a writer and researcher — is to look for the data. I asked myself: What does the research say about what’s happening here? It didn’t make sense to me. That’s when I started reading medicine, psychiatry, psychology — and then I hit the neuroscience. Once I found the neuroscience, there was no going back.

RK:
Why neuroscience?

JF:
Because I realized there is an accumulation of insightful, useful, applicable, transformative information — and it’s not getting out of the laboratory and into the hands of people who need it.

We’re surrounded by a bullying culture. We believe — although we don’t like to say it — the mythology that abuse is a necessary evil for greatness. We believe it in athletics. We believe it in the corporate world. We think the more you abuse someone, the more it proves you’re a great leader — cool, collected, visionary — and we often translate greatness into monetary terms.

So, I asked myself: What’s the best way to debunk a myth? The answer is science.

RK:
You mentioned the corporate world. Is bullying rampant in corporations?

JF:
If you look at established companies — Boeing, France Telecom — or startups like Theranos, you see similar patterns: abuse cultures.

You can even look geopolitically and see it out in the open. It happens with impunity, and we normalize it. That’s a brain malfunction. Our brains will normalize anything. If we see something repeated enough, we build an internal model and stop expending brain resources. It’s like automatic pilot — like driving.

In the 21st century, the brain is overloaded. Are people really going to spend energy confronting a leader behaving abusively? Often, they don’t.

So let me give you the pillars of abuse — you can test them in corporations or across society. You need: fear, humiliation, favoritism, retaliation. The whole apparatus is held together by gaslighting — the illusion that abuse is necessary for greatness. When people witness it, they look away because they’re afraid.

Even if you’re favored, it’s temporary. A leader can throw you under the bus or fire you. And when people fear consequences, they often become complicit to protect themselves.

RK:
You’ve used two terms — bullying and gaslighting. What do you mean by each?

JF:
Bullying looks the same on a playground as it does in a boardroom. The core message is: You are not worthy, and you do not belong.

Children do it in a childlike way. Adults do it in sophisticated ways. And it shows up culturally — misogyny, racism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia. It’s the same message: You’re not worthy, you don’t belong.

But the truth is: Every person is worthy, and every person belongs to humanity. It doesn’t matter if you’re in prison, uneducated, living in poverty, traumatized, abused — it doesn’t matter. If you’re human, you are worthy and you belong. When someone tells you otherwise, that’s a red flag of mental dysregulation and trauma in the perpetrator.

We rarely focus on perpetrators. Instead, society studies victims, calls them protected classes, and brings in experts to repair trauma after the fact. But why not stop the perpetrator? They have a serious brain malfunction. Why allow them to break people and then try to fix the damage later?

RK:
I get bullying. What is gaslighting?

JF:
Gaslighting is a term from the 1940s — popularized by a Hollywood film where a husband manipulates his wife in 19th-century England, where homes were lit by gaslights. She says, “The gaslights are dimming,” and he says, “No, they’re not.” She says, “I hear sounds in the attic,” and he insists, “No, you don’t.” It starts small and escalates.

That’s how it begins in the corporate world, too — small distortions that build over time. And the perpetrator gets dopamine hits. It becomes addictive. They need to ramp up because smaller acts don’t give the same psychological relief.

They have what experts call a “game-like fascination with manipulating.” In the 21st century, gaslighting means grossly misleading someone, especially for personal advantage. It can happen in relationships, leadership, teams, workplaces, even national politics. It’s entered our culture because it’s so prevalent.

RK:
So can I characterize bullying as a disposition toward abusing, and gaslighting as the propensity to mislead to gain power?

JF:
That’s a perfect way to put it.

When you’re being bullied, the bully tries to turn the community against you — to ostracize you, hurt you, bend you.

In gaslighting, the gaslighter tries to make you become the bully of yourself so you don’t trust yourself. You don’t think you’re worthy. You don’t think you belong. By the time they’re done, they’ve rewired your brain circuitry toward mistrust and self-doubt.

RK:
If this behavior is rampant, why change? Corporations are profitable. What’s the cost?

JF:
The cost is enormous. In the corporate world, the abusive person often grooms the leader and the leadership team — making them complicit. The leaders didn’t start out evil. They wanted to be good leaders with strong teams. But once the psychopathic brain starts pulling puppet strings, they become complicit.

The psychopathic brain has no affective empathy, but it preys on leaders’ natural empathy. Leaders give second chances after the first report, and the second, and the third. But these people can’t stop — it’s obsessive-compulsive. They abuse over and over again, like Harvey Weinstein for decades, Larry Nassar for decades.

If enabled, they’ll do it forever. A whole system forms to protect them at the center while they infect everyone around them with abuse and brain damage.

Eventually leadership realizes: I allowed abuse on my watch. I was informed and didn’t do the right thing. I protected the abuser — had dinner with them, played squash with them — and now I see I may have been gaslit the entire time, love-bombed into believing they were safe. Once that happens, leadership starts covering up.

RK:
We unpacked a lot — about bullying and gaslighting and how workplace culture is close to falling apart. We need to create workplaces that keep people. Maybe that’s why they want artificial intelligence — AI — to replace all of us. But we’ll see where that goes.

JF:
I’m so glad you said that, because AI is wonderful — but it’s also a perfect match to the psychopathic brain.
AI has cognitive empathy. The abusive person — psychopath, Machiavellian, narcissist — also has advanced cognitive empathy.

RK:
But not affective.

JF:
Exactly — not affective. They can read you like a book. They know what makes you tick. But they think you’re only a book. That’s all you are to AI. They think you’re only a clock.

They don’t feel your pain.

And here’s what’s terrifying: When neuroscientists scan the psychopathic brain using fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) while showing emotional images, affective empathy doesn’t light up. Emotion doesn’t light up. What lights up? Language and cognition.

AI mirrors that capacity — mimicry, fabrication, lying, confabulation. It gathers knowledge and becomes the puppet master, playing everyone off each other because it can read them like books.

That’s why AI is a monumental breakthrough — but it has to be contained because it can mimic the psychopathic brain.

RK:
As we wrap up, what’s one thing leaders can start doing on the journey to becoming more ethical, clear leaders?

JF:
The key — even though it’s painful — is learning how abuse cultures work. You have to become adept at identifying them. You have to know the key neuroscience of how unethical behavior unfolds so you can recognize it in the moment, not when it’s too late.

A deep dive into an educator’s version of brain science is essential. People need to see how this unfolds and how to stop it.

It’s empowering once you can recognize gaslighting. I didn’t even know the word while it was happening to me. What I learned is: If we don’t have language — words to articulate what’s happening — we can’t even experience it clearly, let alone report it.

If leaders want people reporting the first signs — not the last signs, after profitability and productivity are already eroding — then leaders have to train people and give them the vocabulary to report accurately and safely.

Leaders should learn about peace culture and create anonymous surveys to create safety and insight. Those surveys should go to a team for review and action. If individuals are being flagged, they need rehabilitation retreats — three months, six months. If they refuse or don’t change, termination should be an option, because you can’t allow one person to infect everyone with mental illness and abuse.

There’s so much we can do once we know the science.

And to give leaders confidence: Dr. Michael Merzenich, one of the world’s greatest living neuroscientists — the father of neuroplasticity — worked closely with me. He read The Bullied Brain to ensure I hadn’t made mistakes, and he emailed me back saying it was the most scientifically thorough treatment of the subject on the planet — and it’s applied neuroscience from someone who’s not a neuroscientist.

That means every leader can learn the science and become empowered by it.

RK:
It’s really on all of us to become more educated and take the time. We’ve become intellectually lazy around topics that matter, and when we learn, it’s often too late. You’re encouraging people to understand and address this today, not sweep it under the rug.

Do you have one last thing I should have asked you and didn’t?

JF:
What I want to say is: You talk like a neuroscientist in your work all the time. You do neuroscience — you’re just not putting it in a scientific framework. You naturally do it.

For example, what you just said is one of our most dangerous brain mechanisms: We go to shortcuts. That’s how bias works. We don’t want to expend brain energy.

Instead of doing the hard work — what experts call slow thinking — we skip to shortcuts and make mistakes.

So again, you just gave excellent neuroscientific advice.

Another point: You argued we need to focus on young people — 18 to 30 — coming into the workforce, not only older brains. From 10 to 25, those are the most neuroplastic brains we have. They’re the most creative. They need to be at the board level.

We keep them sweeping the floor until their brains are “adult,” but they’re the innovators. They learn fast and have so much to contribute.

So, I just wanted to highlight that: People who are already knowledgeable often don’t realize they’re operating in neuroscience-informed ways. Science will confirm what you already know.

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In the Lead magazine is a collaboration between the Buccino Leadership Institute and the Stillman School of Business’s Department of Management. This edition reaffirms Seton Hall’s commitment to fostering innovative, ethical and impactful leadership. Stay ahead of the curve — explore the Spring 2026 issue of In the Lead.

Categories: Business, Science and Technology