Biology and political orientation
A number of studies have found that biology may be linked with political orientation.[1]
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[edit]Brain studies
[edit]Structural differences
A 2011 study by cognitive neuroscientist Ryota Kanai's group at University College London published in Current Biology, found a correlation between differences in political views and differences in brain structures in a convenience sample of students from University College London.[2] The researchers performed MRI scans on the brains of 90 volunteer students who had indicated their political orientation on a five-point scale ranging from 'very liberal' to 'very conservative'.[2][3] Students who reported more 'conservative' political views tended to have larger amygdalae,[2] a structure in the temporal lobes that performs a primary role in the processing and memory of emotions. On the other hand, more 'liberal' students tended to have a larger volume of grey matter in the anterior cingulate cortex,[2] a structure of the brain associated with monitoring uncertainty and handling conflicting information.[2][3] The authors concluded that, "Although our data do not determine whether these regions play a causal role in the formation of political attitudes, they converge with previous work to suggest a possible link between brain structure and psychological mechanisms that mediate political attitudes."[2] In an interview with LiveScience, Ryota Kanai said, "It's very unlikely that actual political orientation is directly encoded in these brain regions", and that, "more work is needed to determine how these brain structures mediate the formation of political attitude."[1][3][4][5]
[edit]Functional differences
A study by scientists at New York University and the University of California, Los Angeles, found differences in how self-described liberal and conservative research participants responded to changes in patterns.[6] Participants were asked to tap a keyboard when the letter "M" appeared on a computer monitor and to refrain from tapping when they saw a "W." The letter "M" appeared four times more frequently than "W," conditioning participants to press the keyboard on almost every trial. Liberal participants made fewer mistakes than conservatives when they saw the rare "W," indicating to the researchers that these participants were better able to accept changes or conflicts in established patterns. The participants were also wired to an electroencephalograph that recorded activity in their anterior cingulate cortex, the part of the brain that detects conflicts between a habitual tendency and a more appropriate response. Liberals were significantly more likely than conservatives to show activity in the brain circuits that deal with conflicts during the experiment, and this correlated with their greater accuracy in the test. The lead author of the study, David Amodio, warned against concluding that a particular political orientation is superior. "The tendency of conservatives to block distracting information could be a good thing depending on the situation," he said.[7][8]
In an fMRI study published in "Social Neuroscience," three different patterns of brain activation were found to correlate with individualism, conservatism, and radicalism.[9] In general, fMRI responses in several portions of the brain have been linked to viewing of the faces of well-known politicians.[10] Others[who?] believe that determining political affiliation from fMRI data is overreaching.[11]
[edit]Genetic studies
[edit]Heritability
Heritability compares differences in genetic factors in individuals to the total variance of observable characteristics ("phenotypes") in a population, to determine the heritability coefficient. Factors including genetics, environment and random chance can all contribute to the variation in individuals' phenotypes.[12]
The use of twin studies assumes the elimination of non-genetic differences by finding the statistical differences between monozygotic (identical) twins, which have almost the same genes, and dizygotic (fraternal) twins.[13] The similarity of the environment in which twins are reared has been questioned.[14][15]
A 2005 twin study study examined the attitudes regarding 28 different political issues such as capitalism, unions, X-rated movies, abortion, school prayer, divorce, property taxes, and the draft. Twins were asked if they agreed or disagreed or were uncertain about each issue. Genetic factors accounted for 53% of the variance of an overall score. However, self-identification as Republican and Democrat had a much lower heritability of 14%.[16][17]
Jost et al. wrote in a 2011 review that "Many studies involving quite diverse samples and methods suggest that political and religious views reflect a reasonably strong genetic basis, but this does not mean that ideological proclivities are unaffected by personal experiences or environmental factors."[1]
[edit]Gene associations studies
"A Genome-Wide Analysis of Liberal and Conservative Political Attitudes" by Peter K. Hatemi et al. traces DNA research involving 13,000 subjects. The study identifies several genes potentially connected with political ideology.[18]
[edit]Physiology
Persons with right-wing views had greater skin conductance response, indicating greater sympathetic nervous system response, to threatening images than those with left-wing views in one study. There was no difference for positive or neutral images. Holding right-wing views was also associated with a stronger startle reflex as measured by strength of eyeblink in response to unexpected noise.[1]
[edit]Evolutionary psychology
From an evolutionary psychology perspective, conflicts regarding redistribution of wealth may have been a recurrent issue in the ancestral environment. Humans may therefore have developed psychological mechanisms for judging their chance of succeeding in such conflicts which will affect their political views. For males, physical strength may have been an important factor in deciding the outcome of such conflicts. Therefore, a prediction is that males having high physical strength and low socioeconomic stratum (SES) will support redistribution while males having both high SES and high physical strength will oppose redistribution. Cross-cultural research found this to be the case. For females, their physical strength had no influence on their political views which was as expected since females rarely have physical strength above that of the average male.[19] A study on political attitudes among Hollywood actors found that, while the actors were generally leftist, male actors with great physical strength were more likely to support the Republican stance on foreign issues and foreign military interventions.[20]
[edit]See also
[edit]References
1. ^ a b c d Jost, John T.; Amodio, David M. (13 November 2011). "Political ideology as motivated social cognition: Behavioral and neuroscientific evidence". Motivation and Emotion 36 (1): 55–64. doi:10.1007/s11031-011-9260-7.
2. ^ a b c d e f R. Kanai et al. (2011-04-05). "Political Orientations Are Correlated with Brain Structure in Young Adults".Curr Biol 21 (8): 677–80. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2011.03.017. PMID 21474316.
4. ^ "Politics on the Brain: Scans Show Whether You Lean Left or Right". LiveScience. Retrieved September 25, 2012.
5. ^ Kattalia, Kathryn (April 8, 2011). "The liberal brain? Scans show liberals and conservatives have different brain structures". New York Daily News. Retrieved September 25, 2012.
6. ^ David M Amodio, John T Jost, Sarah L Master & Cindy M Yee, Neurocognitive correlates of liberalism and conservatism, Nature Neuroscience. Cited by 69 other studies
9. ^ Zamboni G, Gozzi M, Krueger F, Duhamel JR, Sirigu A, Grafman J (2009). Individualism, conservatism, and radicalism as criteria for processing political beliefs: a parametric fMRI study 4 (5). pp. 367–83.doi:10.1080/17470910902860308. PMID 19562629. Zamboni G, Gozzi M, Krueger F, Duhamel JR, Sirigu A, Jordan Grafman. National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA
10. ^ Kristine Knudson et al. (2006-03). "Politics on the Brain: An fMRI Investigation". Soc Neurosci (PubMed preprint (Soc Neurosci)) 1 (1): 25–40. doi:10.1080/17470910600670603. PMC 1828689. PMID 17372621.
11. ^ Aue T, Lavelle LA, Cacioppo JT (July 2009). Great expectations: what can fMRI research tell us about psychological phenomena? 73 (1). pp. 10–6. doi:10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2008.12.017. PMID 19232374.
12. ^ Raj A, van Oudenaarden A. 2008. "Nature, nurture, or chance: stochastic gene expression and its consequences."doi:10.1016/j.cell.2008.09.050 PMID 18957198
13. ^ A twin-pronged attack on complex traits, N. Martin, D. Boomsma and G. Machin. (1997). Nature Genetics, 17, 387-92. 10.1038/ng1297-387
14. ^ Jon Beckwith and Corey A. Morris. Twin Studies of Political Behavior: Untenable Assumptions? Perspectives on Politics (2008), 6 : pp 785-791
15. ^ Handbook of Social Psychology, Volume 1. Susan T. Fiske, Daniel T. Gilbert, Gardner Lindzey. p. 372.
16. ^ Carey, Benedict (June 21, 2005). "Some Politics May Be Etched in the Genes". The New York Times. Retrieved September 25, 2012.
17. ^ Alford, J. R.; Funk, C. L.; Hibbing, J. R. (2005). "Are Political Orientations Genetically Transmitted?". American Political Science Review 99 (2). doi:10.1017/S0003055405051579. edit
18. ^ Genome-Wide Analysis of Liberal and Conservative Political Attitudes Peter K. Hatemi United States Studies Centre, University of Sydney and Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Nathan A. Gillespie Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Lindon J. Eaves Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Brion S. Maher Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Bradley T. Webb Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Andrew C. Heath Washington University St. Louis, Sarah E. Medland Queensland Institute of Medical Research, David C. Smyth Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Harry N. Beeby Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Scott D. Gordon Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Grant W. Montgomery Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Ghu Zhu Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Enda M. Byrne Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Nicholas G. Martin Queensland Institute of Medical Research, The Journal of Politics, Vol. 73, No. 1, January 2011, Pp. 1–15 ISSN 0022-3816 "The under-standing that we cannot yet accurately map how genes influence brain processes and biological mechanisms which in turn interact with our upbringing,s ocial life, personal experience, the weather, diet, etc, to somehow be expressed in part as a Conservative-Liberal orientation, is the exact reason that genome-wide analyses are valuable and necessary for political science.
19. ^ Michael Bang Petersen. The evolutionary psychology of Mass Politics. In Roberts, S. C. (2011). Applied Evolutionary Psychology. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199586073.001.0001.ISBN 9780199586073. edit
20. ^ "Strong men more likely to vote Conservative". The Telegraph. April 11, 2012. Retrieved September 25, 2012.
[edit]Further reading
· Some Politics May Be Etched in the Genes - The New York Times,
· Liberals and conservatives don’t just vote differently. They think differently. - The Washington Post