Republican Brains Differ From Democrats' In New FMRI Study
Follow the link, read the article, & share your opinion of it on the blog by Monday, February 25.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/20/republican-democrat-brain-politics-fmri-study_n_2717731.html?utm_hp_ref=politics&ir=Politics
I find the study itself to be particularly interesting, but the results do not shock me. Being Republican or Democrat is no long just a political ideology. Actually, I bet that if you asked people what the difference between Republicans and Democrats was based on the original platforms, they would have a hard time giving you an answer. Nowadays, your political party is part of your personality. Certain kinds of people join certain parties because of the way that the party behaves and this includes the rationale that the party usually uses to make decisions. This is why I am not surprised by the results. Nowadays, the way that our culture has evolved, you join a party because of the mentality of the party which, as proved, correlates with your own personality.
ReplyDeleteI think this article is really interesting. It makes me look at other factors that can affect your political party decision besides things like family influence. Today, I notice young adults typically choose to elect whoever their parents support, but I wander how many go with their brain instead. I never would have guessed that the amygdala, a part of the mind associated with fear, plays a role in your political beliefs, but to what extent is fear linked to politics? My favorite part of the article was when it mentioned the fact that knowing the structure of one's regions actually makes it easier to predict their political decision than knowing someone's parents' political affiliation. Although this article is very interesting, I wonder how accurate the study actually is.
ReplyDeleteI thought this article was pretty cool. To me the most interesting line in the entire article is when the author wrote, "The researchers were able to predict a person's political party by looking at their brain function 82.9 percent of the time." I think this is incredible because even if we chose a party based on where we were located and what our parents believed, our brain really is making decisions for us. It really just depends if we choose to side with our brain or not. And the fact that these tests are so accurate is really astonishing. - Jake Walton
ReplyDeleteInteresting article, and interesting to see that difference between the amygdalas. Looks like it also has an impact on theory of mind, showing that democrats have more of a capacity for empathy. Interesting correlations between risk-taking and liberal/conservative ideologies. I am not surprised to see that finding, though. Seems as though there is sort of an innate difference between political lines of that sort-they run very deep-everything from conservatives being more squeamish to liberals being less bothered by threats.
ReplyDeleteI think this article was really interesting. The different parts of the brain make sense in accordance with the political party, but I had never thought about the fact that the brains of people with different political beliefs would actually have different functions. I understand that obviously different political parties' different opinions mean they think and comprehend topics differently, but I never connected that to the actual parts of the brain working differently.
ReplyDeleteI have never thought for long until now about how our brains might differ based on whether we are a Republican or a Democrat! It's amazing to see what types of research Psychologists are doing today, everything ranging from politics to psychiatric disorders. In this specific article, it's interesting that different values led to differences in the brain, studying that through gambling games. The fact that researchers can predict a person's political party 82.9% of the time by looking at their brain functions is amazing to me.
ReplyDeleteI believe it makes complete sense that the republicans and democrats brains differ. Both parties have very different views which is why their brains are different. I think its amazing how we have the technology to figure things like this out. Its interesting to see the differences between peoples brains. Knowing that your own person views shape the brain is pretty cool.
ReplyDeleteThis article was very interesting. I never thought that political opinions could be determined biologically. It makes me think about just how pre-determined our opinions really are. The concept makes a lot of sense, it is like whether you are a left or right brained thinker. I thought the coin experiment was clever in determining the level of risk you are willing to take.
ReplyDeleteThe article proved to be very insightful. I doubt, however, that we will ever be able to determine who is for what political party by their brain activity perfectly. Everyone's brain is different and everyone thinks differently so 100% is hard to come by. But 82.9% is a pretty high rate of accuracy and I believe if we associate these facts with past presidents' decisions then we can tell that it is pretty accurate for ourselves. I found it fascinating and easy to read and relate to based on my knowledge about the parts of the brain, except for the part about the insula, which I have not heard of before.
ReplyDeleteI thought that this article was very interesting. It makes sense that different parts of the brain are associated with different political parties. I can see that many people follow their parent's views instead of following what they really believe and that is shown in this article. This article shows that there is actually a technological way to see what your view is, which is really cool.
ReplyDeleteThe findings in this article are intriguing. It's pretty cool to know that there are scientific studies that prove that Republicans and Democrats have different views and the different viewpoints are not necessarily based on culture, geographic location, and other outside influences, rather, how different regions and parts of the brain function. However, I do wonder if one was to change their political views, would the way the brain functions change as well? Or, is it even possible to change your political views considering the findings in the article? Also, I wonder if the statistics (the 82.9%) would change if the sample was large and more representative of the larger population.
ReplyDeleteI always had a feeling that democrats had different brains than republicans because each hold very different views when it comes to running a country. Republicans are more conservative while democrats are more liberal, so there clearly has to be a difference in their brains. I found it interesting that with todays technology, researchers can predict a person's political party by looking at their brain function 83% of the time. It makes sense though. Voters who share similar views and personality with the candidate they choose for president, are most likely to have the same brain functions.
ReplyDeleteThis is nothing I didnt know already democrats obviously have similar thinking patterns and brain activity as each other, this is why they are in the same party. This goes for republicans to. I dont think the video is saying they to groups have different brains but instead in one group the brain activity may be a little higher in one area compared to the other group and vice versus.
ReplyDeleteThis is somewhat interesting. It is only a part of things though because it doesn't really determine how one will vote all to much. The information given, the parents voting, or what's popular is more of a determining factor in the choice of the people who voted. Also they did not get that many people to test this and they never said if they got them from different states, which is a big factor in politics. I believe this might be an example of just correlation.
ReplyDelete-Bates Jones
Well of course it'd be different in an fMRI. fMRIs study brain activity. It's not surprising that people with similar beliefs/interests have similar brain activity. It's also not surprising that people with different beliefs/interests have different brain activity.
ReplyDeleteI thought it was interesting to read about the different parts of the brain that reacted differently. I also wonder what an independent mind would look like under an fMRI, or an anarchist, a Libertarian, or someone from the Green party. It'd also be interesting to take different political parties from different countries and compare them as well.
This article shows the technological view behind politics and why we chose who we choose for President. From the article, I feel like my emotions and thoughts do follow the way I would vote. I don't feel like this is the exact reason why we vote how we do, but there is some background information on why we do vote a certain way.
ReplyDeleteI found this study to be pretty fascinating. I think it's interesting that by "comparing democrat and republican participants turned up differences in two brain regions: the right amygdala and the left posterior insula", meaning that people's beliefs develop as a result of how their brains are structured. I don't necessarily believe that the most liberal democrats are who they are because of the brain they were born with, but that some other factors do affect their beliefs. I think the statistical evidence that scientists can predict party affiliations simply by looking at someone's brain is also curious.
ReplyDeleteI found this article to be very interesting. This study shows how not only are political parties thinking differently, but they are now seen to have different brains. At first I thought there was no way these brains could be different but after reading the article, I realized that it could be true. Although the brains are different, I do not think that is something they are born with, I think it is something they learn to agree with or disagree with. The fact that these different brains show why we are republican or democratic is a crazy idea to me but this article has proven this to be somewhat realistic.
ReplyDeleteReading this article is cool because it is related to the topics we study in class. The fact that the brain's structures and activity in an fMRI can show the different political orient to fascinating to me. Before reading this, I always felt like childhood and how we were raised determined how people's believes were determined. This article suggests that there is more to it then just this and it goes into the actual brain structure itself.
ReplyDelete