Blue, Red, and White Matter

Recently I attended a presentation given by Dane Wendell, a doctoral candidate of Loyola University Chicago. While his expected Ph.D. will be in political science, his research is in the new but quickly growing field of political neuroscience. His presentation focused on one major question, “For all of the variety of human experiences out there, why do political attitudes cluster into distinct poles?” (Wendell). It is an interesting question because humans have the ability to form individual personalized ideals but yet politics are incredibly two sided. Wendell plans to answer this question by looking at different neurological characteristics of people who identify themselves as either conservative or liberal.

           

Credit: Lyndie Chiou

Wendell presented research led by Dr. Douglas Oxley that helped to explain some of the biological differences of liberals and conservatives. Oxley found that people who were identified as conservatives reacted more strongly to threatening or disgusting images than liberals. Oxley also found that conservatives were more prone to being startled when a random, loud, stimulus was heard. Wendell brought up many interesting correlations between the results found in Oxley’s study and the core beliefs of political groups. For example, conservatives focus strongly on protection of both the individual and the country and thus support gun ownership, border control, and military power more than liberals. By reacting strongly to threatening images and stimuli, conservatives seem to be subconsciously protecting themselves from a possible hazard. These findings correlate with other research in the field of political neuroscience.

           

Credit: SodaHead.com

An article published in ScienceDaily titled, “This is Your Brain on Politics: Neuroscience Reveals Brain Differences Between Republicans and Democrats”, describes the research of Roger Newman-Norlund, an assistant professor at the University of South Carolina. Newman’s study used Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) to look at major areas involved in the mirror neuron system. The mirror neuron system is unique and includes “…a network linked to a host of social and emotional abilities” (ScienceDaily). Newman’s research found higher activity in brain areas that are involved in “broad social connectedness” in the brain of Democrats than in the Republican brain.  These findings suggest that Republicans are focused more on the needs of their family and country, while Democrats are focused on the needs of their friends and the world as a whole (ScienceDaily). This research provides further explanations to why Republicans (commonly identified as conservatives) are strongly focused on the needs and protection of the country. It also may provide biological evidence explaining why conservatives focus on the role of the individual, while Democrats or liberals focus on the role of the society. The great success of researchers like Newman is only going to make the field of political neuroscience more popular.

I believe that researchers like Wendell and Newman are making a great decision by entering such a young, but rapidly growing field.  ScienceDaily predicts that this field will be increasingly important in the future for running effective political campaigns and ensuring a max amount of voters. This success in this field is allowing us to understand the method to people’s political madness.

Works Cited

University of South Carolina. “This is your brain on politics: Neuroscience reveals brain differences between Republicans Democrats.” ScienceDaily, 1 Nov. 2012. Web. 6 Dec. 2013.