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Your brain on politics
I know that by posting this im just begging for a torrent of tl;dr posts, but i thought it was interesting so im posting it here instead of in pdd which nobody visits anymore anyway.
Anyway
Your Brain on Politics: The Cognitive Neuroscience of Liberals and Conservatives
by Chris Mooney
This is an invited guest post by Andrea Kuszewski, a Behavior Therapist and Consultant for children on the autism spectrum based in Florida, and a researcher and manager with VORTEX: Integrative Science Improving Societies, based in Bogotá, Colombia. She blogs at The Rogue Neuron and tweets as @AndreaKuszewski.
Can neuroscience provide evidence for a liberal and conservative thinking style?
It may seem like a stretch to say that one could predict whether you lean left or right by looking at a brain scan—no questions asked, no opinions voiced—purely based on your neuroanatomy. However, this might not be too far from reality—at least insofar as predicting thinking style, which has been shown to be somewhat distinct based on party association.
Does brain structure determine your beliefs, or do your beliefs change your brain structure? What about those who switch parties at some point? How do they fit in to this model? We’ll be discussing all of this. It’s a complicated issue with lots of variables in play, so we’re going to take a pretty deep look into this topic from all angles, so we can draw the most accurate conclusions.
Please keep in mind from the beginning that this is not an endorsement of any one political party. This is science—we’ll just be discussing the data. Ready?
Let’s begin…
Read the rest at the source link, since its properly formatted and easier to read.
Source & references
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