It's not politics -- it's brain chemistry!

John Dean's book "Worse Than Watergate" goes into the very real mental differences between the "conservative" mind and the "liberal" mind in some detail. But it's no simple dichotomy - the brain is way too complicated an organ that it can be segregated neatly into two bins, even if the bins are broadly categorized. Nonetheless, the important point is that how we see the world is in large measure confined to how our brains are hardwired, and I don't doubt for a second that the general good health of a society depends very much on ALL the important differentiations of mind being present: if we were either to become ALL conservative or ALL liberal we would be very much the lesser for it.

Mark Baird
Alameda CA

 

It will eventually be determined that the "Republican revolution" resulted from mild childhood brain damage caused by the widespread use of leaded gasoline.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(airportkid @ Sep 10 2007, 02:50 PM) [snapback]510269[/snapback]</div>

Conservatives would disagree with you on that.

 

wow. i'm behind on my reading. in my defense, i only scan nature neurosci for articles related to my own research area.

i'll have to check it out when i have a few minutes at work tomorrow.

 

To me it seemed they were generalising way beyond what was warranted by their data. The task was a simple letter detection task (M vs W) and had nothing to do with preference of variety, much less political judgements.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(samiam @ Sep 10 2007, 08:10 PM) [snapback]510363[/snapback]</div>

"The responders who indicated they were liberals had higher accuracy scores. In addition, their brains showed stronger electrical activity when the "W" showed up, which researchers say indicates more neurons were firing."
It seems to only prove that Liberals have a higher aptitude.

 

Homo Politicus

"The brain neurons of liberals and conservatives fire differently when confronted with tough choices, suggesting that some political divides may be hard-wired, according a study released Sunday."

"Conservatives tend to crave order and structure in their lives, and are more consistent in the way they make decisions. Liberals, by contrast, show a higher tolerance for ambiguity and complexity, and adapt more easily to unexpected circumstances."

"A group of 43 right-handed subjects were asked to perform a series of computer tests designed to evaluate their unrehearsed response to cues urging them to break a well-established routine.

"People often drive home from work on the same route, day after day, such that it becomes habitual and doesn't involve much thinking," Amodio explained by way of comparison in an e-mail.

"But occasionally there is road work, or perhaps an animal crosses the road, and you need to break out of your habitual response in order to deal with this new information."

Using electroencephalographs, which measure neuronal impulses, the researchers examined activity in a part of the brain -- the anterior cingulate cortex -- that is strongly linked with the self-regulatory process of conflict monitoring.

The match-up was unmistakable: respondents who had described themselves as liberals showed "significantly greater conflict-related neural activity" when the hypothetical situation called for an unscheduled break in routine.

Conservatives, however, were less flexible, refusing to deviate from old habits "despite signals that this ... should be changed.""

What is interesting is that most Librarians are liberals, but they live with structure, order and consistency.

 

I would say this only supports something we've seen on this board: The conservative "good or evil?" view of the world, responded almost every time by a liberal who says "sorry, but the world isn't black and white as you seem to see it..."

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Godiva @ Sep 10 2007, 08:06 PM) [snapback]510410[/snapback]</div>

It's the books. If you are afraid of ideas, you won't become a librarian and surround yourself with them. Worse yet, if you actually read them, and expose yourself to ideas, whatever conservativism you may have harbored will be eroded and finally banished.

There are exceptions to this generality, but it explains the preponderance of liberalism among librarians, college professors, and educated people generally.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Sep 11 2007, 08:42 AM) [snapback]510552[/snapback]</div>

And no, liberals don't think they are better than everyone else. Really, they don't. It's true. I saw it on TV.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Rae Vynn @ Sep 10 2007, 02:14 PM) [snapback]510247[/snapback]</div>

Now if they could just tolerate different view points better they wouldn't be so hard to put up with!

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Wildkow @ Sep 11 2007, 11:45 AM) [snapback]510635[/snapback]</div>

Why should they when they are smarter than everyone else? Obviously they are right and everyone else is wrong, cause everyone else is dumber than they are.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Godiva @ Sep 10 2007, 08:06 PM) [snapback]510410[/snapback]</div>

BaHahhaHAhAhHA! Folk’s it's a simple lane change or a rather mundane route alteration! For a conservative it requires a small bit of brain power to accomplish. However, according to this researcher this causes significant conflict within a liberal so much so that neural activity must increase by a significant factor to solve this rather obvious conundrum? I know for a fact that it only takes liberals 1/3 of their brain power to make a lane change and just a wee bit less than half to make a route alteration. As long as there is not more than one! I love scientist they manipulate data like lawyers manipulate words.

Wildkow [attachmentid=11359]

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(mojo @ Sep 10 2007, 09:21 PM) [snapback]510393[/snapback]</div>

That would be one view. Another could be that when presented with a "W" the liberals' neurons start firing rather excitedly.

 

I have a degree in neuroscience and have done PET scanning research, so I have a few thoughts on this. (Since mosts post thus far lack any insight on the actual subject of Behavioral Neuroscience and are just D vs R cheerleading).

1) 43 subjects is barely significant statistically for diagnosing liberal vs. conservative, which in reality is a bell curve (despite peoples perception than it is an either or stance).
2) "It's not as if people are making a choice to see the world this way or that way. It's how they're built," said Pollock. " -Total overgeneralization. Behavioral patterns are a mix of genetic predisposition and learned behavior, which is impossible to quantify as "built".
3) I would not call Mark Pollack a "scientist". He is "an associated professor of communication".
4) It appears they used the cheesy electrical connectors glued to the head, which are not exactly precise equipment. At least not enough to quantify differences in the Anterior Cingulate Cortex. PET scanning or fMRI is a much better way to map out the differences, whereby statistical comparisons could actually be made.
5)Self proclaimed "liberal" vs. "conservative" labels are nearly meaningless in pychology. The brain is often both for different areas of processing. Not only that, but minute to minute hormonal levels affect the thresholds at which the brain will make decision liberally vs. conservatively. IE: alcohol reduce inhibitions. Pot increases anxiety.

This "study" is meaningless. It may be a first step to more complex studies which could have interest, but they've already overgeneralized their VERY modest findings. (Read: Dummed down for the general public).

To properly analyze this topic, you would need a huge sampling, and based on an L v. C questionaire, only study the two extremes and send home the middle of the bell curve. The remaining subjects, still anonomous, would be fed the situations while in PET scanning. Then a comparison could actually be made of brain functioning facing the various situations. However I doubt it would show anything of interest.

 

http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/vaop/n...ull/nn1979.html

for anyone with a subscription- i'm not sure if non-subscribers can access.

i'd say they need a far higher number of subjects, they cited another study with N=21 which says to me they don't seem to think this matters. to conclude much based on this research is going far, and i'm on the fence as to why this made it to nature neurosci. i can't comment on the software or methods used, since i'm far from a cognitive neuroscientist.

the statistics are ok- though one liberal point on the x axis runs across more than 75% of the scale of the y axis. makes me wonder how relevant that is...

 

My bigger problem with it is the Lib v Cons. generalization without any acknowledgement of the reality of the bell curve. More and more crap in the media seems purposefully designed to wedge people aside into neat little groups that don't exist.

 

they did use a 10-point scale to that effect, though they didn't get many on the fringes.