Glaucon

Peering inside the brain with MRI scans, researchers at University College London found that self-described conservative students had a larger amygdala than liberals. The amygdala is an almond-shaped structure deep in the brain that is active during states of fear and anxiety. Liberals had more gray matter at least in the anterior cingulate cortex, a region of the brain that helps people cope with complexity.

There is a big unknown underlying these findings. Supposing that the size of one's amygdala really does increase the likelihood of being a conservative. Is the size of the amygdala determined at birth, or does it perhaps increase with frightening childhood experiences, such as authoritarian parenting and corporal punishment?

Most societies are divided into a party that wants change (the more liberal party) and one that is afraid of change (the conservatives). The liberal party is generally more intellectual and the conservative party is more anti-intellectual.

The conservative party is big on national defense and magnifies our perception of threat, whether of foreign aggressors, immigrants, terrorists, or invading ideologies like C*******m. To a conservative, the world really is a frightening place.

UncleJesse Loc: Hazzard Co, GA

It just means they are more passionate about the things that trigger fear than those with a regular size amygdala. The bigger amygdala motivates them to take actions to "what-if" scenarios while regular size amygdala's have no motivation, see the "what-if" as another one of many risks to manage or ignore. It's not an obsessive compulsive disorder or living in fear.

But observers have noticed the far right is a lot more passionate than the far left and have often wondered if there is something physical or chemical going on. I think OPP is an excellent outlet for the bigger amygdala.

LAwrence

What a bunch of hogwash. I am a conservative in that I want to preserve those things I believe are good, but I am a liberal in wanting to change what I believe is bad. Sorry that is probably to general in terms. To go on, I am a believer in Jesus Christ as my Saviour and know through hi s word that he is in complete control of world events. I love him and I know he loves me. "Perfect love casteth out all fear".

Patty

But wait who was so filled with fear that they had to spy on every person in the worlds cell phones, send the IRS to harass people who disagree with them, monitor everyones email, go after those scary Little Sisters of the Poor, EO laws that allow unlimited incarceration of people without trials, use drones to k**l thousands of innocent women and children and laugh about it, try to dismantle law abiding citizens second amendment rights, monitor journalist and their families homes, told our military to not respond to cries for help when a consulate was under attack, strip search all the Marines before the inaugural march to make sure they had no live rounds, win an e******n with promises that they wouldn't have to work, cover up every aspect of their previous life, are so afraid of two steal beams that cross each other and whine till they are removed from a public monument, block veterans from visiting their own WWII monument and allow Muslims to gather on the same grounds. I could go on and on but I think I have made my point.
Look how scary these bunch of criminals are.

cesspool jones Loc: atlanta

are you high?????????

Glaucon

You seem to have everything figured out to your satisfaction. I am happy for you.

Glaucon

Patty,

I was citing research, not challenging your biases. You have the freedom to h**e whomever you choose and distort information to meet your needs. Go with my blessings.

Duckie

There are other reasons that this portion of the brain is larger and not all of them bad. For example, this gland in castrated men is 30 percent smaller. It is not only associated with pleasure of sexual activity but is also associated with long term memory, or the activity referred to as memory consolidation which happens prior to an activity becoming "learned." Consensus of data shows the amygdala has a substantial role in mental states, and is related to many psychological disorders. In a 2003 study, subjects with Borderline Personality Disorder showed significantly greater left amygdala activity than normal control subjects. Some borderline patients even had difficulties classifying neutral faces or saw them as threatening. In 2006, researchers observed hyperactivity in the amygdala when patients were shown threatening faces or confronted with frightening situations. Patients with more severe social phobia showed a correlation with increased response in the amygdala. Similarly, depressed patients showed exaggerated left amygdala activity when interpreting emotions for all faces, and especially for fearful faces. Interestingly, this hyperactivity was normalized when patients went on antidepressants. By contrast, the amygdala has been observed to relate differently in people with Bipolar Disorder. A 2003 study found that adult and adolescent bipolar patients tended to have considerably smaller amygdala volumes and somewhat smaller hippocampal volumes. Many studies have focused on the connections between the amygdala and autism.

References:
Donegan et al. (2003). Amygdala hyper reactivity in borderline personality disorder: implications for emotional dysregulation.. Biological Psychiatry 54 (11): 1284-1293.
Studying Brain Activity Could Aid Diagnosis Of Social Phobia. Monash University. January 19, 2006.
Sheline et al. (2001). Increased amygdala response to masked emotional faces in depressed subjects resolves with antidepressant treatment: an fMRI study.. Biological Psychiatry 50 (9): 651-658.
Blumberg et al. (2003). Amygdala and hippocampal volumes in adolescents and adults with bipolar disorder. Arch Gen Psychiatry

Duckie

:thumbup: :thumbup:

boofhead

Peering inside the brain with MRI scans, researchers at University College London found that self-described liberal students had no brain, only a shrunken and no-longer operative drool gland. At this time there is no explanation of how these people manage to have even the limited existence in society they seem to have. It was suggested that just like their leaders, they operate only on implanted suggestions and if not regularly updated through programming, will revert to Zombie status, staggering around mumbling "Other people's Money!" and trying to attack people who are actually productive.

jetson

These researchers are just like the g****l w*****g experts. Ponding out lies, thinking we will believe everything they come up with In 1979 Time magazines had a picture on the front cover warning of a coming ice age. In the late fifties we studied reports tha stated by the year 2000, humans would be born without teeth, because the food we ate would all be packed in sq

jetson

These researchers are just like the g****l w*****g experts. Pounding out lies, thinking we will believe everything they come up with In 1979 Time magazines had a picture on the front cover warning of a coming ice age. In the late fifties we studied reports that stated, by the year 2000, humans would be born without teeth, because the food we ate would all be packed in tubes, like tooth paste. Hadn't seen a T-Bone steak in a tube yet. Now that the sedgeway has been invented, they will be saying soon that, we will be born without feet by 2020.

Duckie

You have posted 205 comments on various threads, many of them are excellent and some are exceptional. You appear to be well educated, articulate, and civil. Why would you want to destroy all the positive impressions by posting something so uncharacteristically cynical? Just asking.

bmac32 Loc: West Florida

Nice cherry picking.

Peering inside the brain with MRI scans, researchers at University College London found that self-described conservative students had a larger amygdala than liberals. The amygdala is an almond-shaped structure deep in the brain that is active during states of fear and anxiety. Liberals had more gray matter at least in the anterior cingulate cortex, a region of the brain that helps people cope with complexity.

The results are not that surprising as they fit in with conclusions from other studies. Just a year ago, researchers from Harvard and UCLA San Diego reported finding a "liberal" gene. This gene had a tiny effect, however, and worked only for adolescents having many friends. The results also mesh with psychological studies on conflict monitoring.
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What It Means
There is a big unknown underlying these findings. Supposing that the size of one's amygdala really does increase the likelihood of being a conservative. Is the size of the amygdala determined at birth, or does it perhaps increase with frightening childhood experiences, such as authoritarian parenting and corporal punishment?

Similarly, one might ask whether the gray matter difference is affected by exposure to educational challenge, social diversity, or childhood cognitive enrichment.

The born versus acquired perspective on political attitudes is important to psychologists. After all, if political proclivities are fixed at birth in terms of brain anatomy, there is little hope of change. Most of us would probably like to see a world in which political attitudes were less polarized, and more changeable, but that may be a pipe dream.

Meanwhile, the neuro-scientific fact of two very different political creatures helps clarify much of the political antics of modern democracies.

Most societies are divided into a party that wants change (the more liberal party) and one that is afraid of change (the conservatives). The liberal party is generally more intellectual and the conservative party is more anti-intellectual.

The conservative party is big on national defense and magnifies our perception of threat, whether of foreign aggressors, immigrants, terrorists, or invading ideologies like C*******m. To a conservative, the world really is a frightening place.

Given that their brains are so different, it is hardly surprising that liberals and conservatives should spend so much time talking across each other and never achieving real dialog or consensus.

As scientists we hope that these results are replicated because they shed so much light on political behavior. As citizens, we would prefer if politicians were not divided into such different categories of political animal.

If everyone was born with the same brain potential to acquire either conservative, or liberal, views, then we could be more optimistic about prospects for political communication and consensus-building. If v**ers were of like brain, perhaps they could be of like mind.

Lily

Did you buy the biggest paint brush you could to paint this? AH