This is Your Brain on Politics
Fascinating. This was published last November. Highlights include:
- When we showed subjects the words “Democrat,” “Republican” and “independent,” they exhibited high levels of activity in the part of the brain called the amygdala, indicating anxiety. The two areas in the brain associated with anxiety and disgust — the amygdala and the insula — were especially active when men viewed “Republican.”
But all three labels also elicited some activity in the brain area associated with reward, the ventral striatum, as well as other regions related to desire and feeling connected. There was only one exception: men showed little response, positive or negative, when viewing “independent.”
- Voters who rated Mrs. Clinton unfavorably on their questionnaire appeared not entirely comfortable with their assessment. When viewing images of her, these voters exhibited significant activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, an emotional center of the brain that is aroused when a person feels compelled to act in two different ways but must choose one.
- We found indications that Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Giuliani represent two sides of the same coin: Men show little interest in Mrs. Clinton initially but after watching her video they react positively. Women respond to her strongly at first, but their interest wanes after they watch her video.
With Mr. Giuliani, the reactions are reversed. Men respond strongly to his initial still photos, but this fades after they see his video. Women grow more engaged after watching his video.
- After viewing all the candidate videos, our male subjects, when viewing still photos of the Democrats, showed significantly higher activity in the medial orbital prefrontal cortex, an area that is activated by rewarding stimuli, than they did while looking at pictures of the Republicans.
- When looking at pictures of Mr. Edwards, subjects who had rated him low on the thermometer scale showed activity in the insula, an area associated with disgust and other negative feelings.
- Videos of John McCain and Barack Obama indicated a notable lack of any powerful reactions, positive or negative
September 03, 2008, 1:46pm
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