Brain function is hard to study but there is progress being made. Many recent books have collected the evidence about the differing roles of the right and left brain and we exploit this in our own book.
Brain plasticity is also an exploding field and the two areas of research converge on this political revelation:The Surprising Brain Differences Between Democrats and Republicans
The two new studies described here are likely connected: It is hard not to infer that fear of outsiders or those different from you—along with greater fear dispositions in general—may be related to the role of amygdala, a brain structure that has been dubbed the "heart and soul of the fear system." The amygdala has been repeatedly implicated in politics. Indeed, Schreiber's research builds on prior brain studies: In a group of University College of London students, for instance, conservatives showed more gray matter in the right amygdala.
As for the plasticity:
Schreiber thinks the current research suggests not only that having a particular brain influences your political views, but also that having a particular political view influences and changes your brain. The causal arrow seems likely to run in both directions—which would make sense in light of what we know about the plasticity of the brain. Simply by living our lives, we change our brains. Our political affiliations, and the lifestyles that go along with them, probably condition many such changes.
This may sound too simplistic yet we have heard similar results before. Read on below and I'll remind you.
Every time I mention George Lakoff here I get a bunch of haters pretending to make rational arguments about why they are correct to hate him. To me he is a very good scientist and if you look at his documentation of his results you have to agree.
Lakoff has been on the right track for a long time and it is a shame that this study seems to ignore him. Lakoff has told us that the progressive mind and the conservative mind are distinctly different. Others have also backed this up.
What is interesting about this study is the focus on fear. nothing in our brains could be more primitive than fear. It has to be a central factor in our make up and had to be selected for because of its survival value.
It seems very plausible that fear manipulation is the key to most right wing success at controlling people. Lakoff has pointed out again and again the effort made by conservatives over over four decades to learn to exploit this form of control.
As the article says:
"It's not that conservative people are more fearful, it's that fearful people are more conservative"
It is hard to watch the American political theater and not have some degree of belief in the soundness these findings. The gun lobby, war mongering, xenophobia, stances against equality, many more all point to this being true. The other component is the difference in the way the conservative mind deals with causality. Lakoff has pointed out that they reduce everything to simple direct causes. A causes B. Progressives, on the other hand, recognize the complexity of causality and seldom fall into that pattern.
The sad part of this is that it reinforces the idea that spewing facts and figures and expecting reason to prevail is next to useless. Lakoff has made this assertion and this study backs him up. So did the 2014 elections for that matter.
I have my own bias based on my understanding of both neuroscience and systems theory but it is not very popular. I am convinced that we will not achieve our goals through the electoral process. Certainly we will not win over conservatives. They have done a very good job of using fear and other methods to solidify their hold on people.
I think we need need to wonder if Global Warming will begin to make them change their attitudes if it begins to make them fearful? Will income inequality change them if it induces fears of collapse? I am just wondering if we need to scare them real good? Certainly what we have been doing doesn't work that well.
I wonder how much of this FDR knew when he told us we have nothing to fear but fear itself?