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Open the following article and read 5 of the peer-reviewed studies.  After you read the study, find the corresponding number to the right (use the scroll bar at the bottom to see all 20) and write a reflection about what you read, i.e. something you found interesting, how it relates to a real-world example, etc.  

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Open the following article and read 5 of the peer-reviewed studies.  After you read the study, find the corresponding number to the right (use the scroll bar at the bottom to see all 20) and write a reflection about what you read, i.e. something you found interesting, how it relates to a real-world example, etc.  

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Make sure you add your name to top of the post.

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20 peer-reviewed studies show liberals and conservatives physiologically different

In the 20 peer-reviewed scientific studies summarized below, researchers found that liberals and conservatives have different brain structures, different physiological responses to stimuli, and activate different neural mechanisms when confronted with similar situations. Each entry below cites the source document. The studies are arranged from most recent to oldest. We included all the peer-reviewed studies on this subject that we could find. If you know about others, please contact us with details.

1. Brain responses to a disgusting image are sufficient to make accurate predictions about an individual's political ideology.

2. Neurocognitive responses to conflict differ among the children of liberals, moderates, and conservatives.

"Given recent evidence that political ideology is associated with neural responses to cognitive conflict in adults, we tested the exploratory hypothesis that children's neurocognitive responses to conflict may also differ depending on their parents' ideology.

We assessed relations between parental political ideology and children's neurocognitive responses to conflict...

Because previous research documents heightened liberal-conservative differences in threat-relevant contexts, each trial of the task was preceded by an angry face (threat-relevant) or comparison face (happy or neutral).

An effect of parental ideology on the conflict-related N2 [a measure of electrical activity of the brain surface] emerged in the threat condition, such that the N2 was larger among children of liberals compared with children of moderates and conservatives. These findings suggest that individual differences in neurocognitive responses to conflict, heightened in the context of threat, may reflect a more general pattern of individual differences that, in adults, relates to political ideology."

Tracy A. Dennis, David M. Amodio, and Laura J. O'Toole, "Associations between Parental Ideology and Neural Sensitivity to Cognitive Conflict in Children," Social Neuroscience, Oct. 16, 2014

15. Genetics influence political attitudes during early adulthood and beyond.

"The present research attempts to characterize how the transmission of political orientations develops over the life course... [G]enetic influences on political attitudes are absent prior to young adulthood. During childhood and adolescence, individual differences in political attitudes are accounted for by a variety of environmental influences... However, at the point of early adulthood (in the early 20s), for those who left their parental home, there is evidence of a sizeable genetic influence on political attitudes which remains stable throughout adult life."

Peter K. Hatemi, Carolyn L. Funk, Sarah E. Medland, Hermine M. Maes, Judy L. Silberg, Nicholas G. Martin, and Lindon J. Eaves, "Genetic and Environmental Transmission of Political Attitudes Over a Life Time ," The Journal of Politics, July 21, 2009

16. Conservatives learn better from negative stimuli than from positive stimuli and are more risk avoidant than liberals.

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Differences in Conservative and Liberal Brains

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In the 20 peer-reviewed scientific studies summarized below, researchers found that liberals and conservatives have different brain structures, different physiological responses to stimuli, and activate different neural mechanisms when confronted with similar situations. Each entry below cites the source document. The studies are arranged from most recent to oldest.

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There should not be comments added below as these are the directions.  Thank you!

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There should not be comments added below as these are the directions.  Thank you!

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This is interesting because I knew children could be influenced by their parents in politics, but I did not know there was an actual relation in the brain to political ideology.

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Its interesting that children of liberals are more likely to have a response to threatening imagery

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The study is about how a child's parent's ideology can effect how the child's brain reacts to conflict.

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Maggie K
Conservatives use system 1 processing.

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This study can be flawed because the participants could have damaged Prefrontal Cortex which can lead to impaired cognitive processes.

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This is interesting because the article says by how you look and think about an image can generate neural responses that correspond with the persons political views.

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I found this interesting because I did not know that brain responses could influence peoples' political beliefs.

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i found this really interesting. These two ideologies are very similar but not the same. They want what is best for their community but they just have different ways to complete their goals. And the two ideas seem to show a positive viewpoint.

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I thought it was interested that conservatives and liberals actually have different brain makeups and activity when experiencing the same situations.

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Maggie K
threats to purity transcend behaviors and moral acts and has an active affect of physical cleanliness.

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This is so interesting that something as simple as holding or avoiding eye contact can be linked to one political orientation or another. The connection to individualism makes sense.

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this was interesting to me because i am liberal and I tend to have more nightmares and I tend to be incredibly restless, but I always remember my dreams.

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This seems logical because someone who has a stronger reaction to change/something they aren't use to would be more likely to oppose changing traditions.

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This is interesting and relates to real life, because a 'typical' conservative wants to keep the old ways, showing a resistance to change similar to responsiveness to a negative environment

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I think it makes perfect sense that conservatives are less wiling to take risks because they are the ones who hate change the most.

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This is very telling to the different pessimistic vs. optimistic view towards life based on your political opinions

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I found this study very interesting because our thought process in our brain is determined through the activity in our brain. Whatever our brain tells us especially in the left insula area and the right amygdala can have an affect on our thought process. If there is any damage to the prefrontal cortex of the brain, then the brain is most likely telling us to behave in a different way than we are used to.

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I find it interesting that how much effort we put into thinking can affect our ideology.

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I found this interesting because, as a liberal, I never thought that my dreams correlated with my political beliefs. In fact, I do tend to have more bizarre and weird dreams than calm ones.

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I found this interesting because it demonstrated the effect that political ideology has on children and how they react differently to conflict

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I found this article interesting because it seems to provide a very convincing method of correlating people's ideology with their brain function and a good way to predict whether people are conservative or liberal.

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Republicans are more likely to show a threatening expression and lack of emotions compared to liberals. A facial expression can predict a persons political orientation.

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I thought this was interesting because you would think everyone would react to disturbing images the same way, but, conservatives or people who self identify as conservatives would react more strongly.

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This is very interesting to me, but kind of makes sense that the ones more interested/focused in individualism are less likely to shift their attention.

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This is interesting because the study reveals the different inclinations towards hope or despair of people with different political beliefs.

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I found this interesting because it shows that there is brain data that demontsrates the different makeup of conservatives and liberals.

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This makes a lot of sense to me since most conservatives seem to be held back or motivated by fear. They seem to be more aprehensive of the unkown, such as someone of a different race/ethnicity, religion, political affiliation, or sexual orentation/gender. Because they haven't known someone different then them well, they are scared of what they do not know and want to squash it. Whereas liberals tend to be more open in terms of human rights and equality. They are not afraid of accepting the "other".

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I found this very interesting, being a liberal I often have bad dreams, or very strange, and very specific dreams almost every night. Unlike a conservative I often remember every dream I have.

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I dont quite know how to put it into words but I can see how this would make sense.

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It seems very telling how a liberal is more willing to take risks while a conservative is more scared of loosing what they have. This can be found in what both ideologies promote.

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This is interesting and counter to real life, because lots of people who claim to be liberal post negative images and share them constantly on social media

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Maggie K
This could lead conservatives being less likely to take risks for fear of negative input.

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This is a topic I would never think of to be divide in political ideology. The phycological differences between right and leftists are in everyday life

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This was interesting because it shows how conservatives and liberals have a different brain makeup and different parts of the brain are stimulated when each a taking risks

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I found this interesting because it seems like it fits with another study where liberals were more focused on advancing positive outcomes than avoiding negative ones.

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I think it is very interesting that the amount of effort can be traced to conservatism vs liberalism, but it is not entirely surprising. If you look at many liberals, they are putting in a lot of effort to change, while conservatives are content to move slower.

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While I was reading this, I did think about how in a lot of debates, liberals are more contientious and open minded towards ideas, but conservatives tend to shut ideas down they do not like.

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this one was interesting and made sense to me because it makes sense that if someone is more afraid of something like loud noises, then they are going to want to support government defense spending so they don't have to face their fears.

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I though this was interesting because a lot of conservative views are centered around keeping things the same and against change while liberals tend to look toward the future and embrace new ideas.

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I think this makes a lot of sense especially considering most conservatives around me are older. I've talked with my family about this a lot and it's interesting that as you get older you have more to lose in a way so you risk less. But most of the people around my age are much more liberal and we are willing to risk more to help others because we have less to lose.

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this goes hand in hand with number 20. More wild dreams is a strong correlation to creativity and sound sleep has a strong relation to organization and order. it makes so much sense.

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I find this to be interesting because it explains that the effort of peoples' thoughts can lead them to be liberal or conservative.

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This article finds that conservatives are more likely to read a facial expression as threatening. This is interesting because it may mean this side is more likely be overly defensive.

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It is crazy to think that a dream can correlate to a political view. Conservatives sleep better than liberals and are more calm, which is hard for me to believe.

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Often in the united states, conservatives are associated with religion, in that they allow their religious beliefs to steer their political ideologies. Purity and cleanliness are biblical values, so it makes sense that they are valued in a conservative ideology.

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It was interesting reading this because I always think of these things as environmental factors and how you were raised.

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this matches well with number 18. I know some conservative people that talk about how they don't dream that often and that their head hits the pillow and then wake up immediately in 6-8 hours.

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This article reenforces the fact that our political views go so far past the government and social issues, it is effecting are actions even as simple as an attention shift

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This is similar to real life in that conservatives want to preserve the old and 'pure' ways of doing things

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This article was interesting, because all of of my sibling basically have the same political views. The article talked about how when someone leaves their parental home usually that influence stays with them, but my older brother as he moved away after college started to have his own point of views on politics. I think this might possibly be because of the environment he moved to, and how it is very different from Cleveland.

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Interesting to me that they believe that "conservative statements require more complex social judgments"

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It seems very interesting that your genes determine your political leanings. I don't understand how this would explain someone changing their political identity from what most of their family is, however.

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Maggie K
How is this studied? and why does it occur only when leaving your home environment? Sounds just like the time when you meet many people with different beliefs and are in a new life situation

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I thought this was interesting because liberals tend to look towards the future and embrace new ideas so it makes sense that they would be more restless while sleeping.

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I would never have guessed that eye contact could be used to determine someone's political view. This also seems logical.

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I think this makes sense because conservatives are more likely to want to keep things the way they are while liberals want to change things.

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I think this was an odd statement that I still am confused on. When the article mentioned environment I entirely agreed. I think that it is less genetic but more of what you are familiar with and exposed to. Of course there is research to support their claims but I still feel like it is more exposure and environment over genetic. It think also makes sense that after leaving the house political values are consistent with "genetics" because it's hard to change your mind and rewire your brain to view things differently than what you know and assume to be correct.

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i see how this could be true because people tend to change political views when they are younger, if at all, and adults are way less reluctant to changing ideas.

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This is similar to real life in that conservatives want to help but without increasing hurt anywhere, while liberals want to help more whatever the cost. The status quo is more important to conservatives while everything can be sacrificed to help in the eyes of liberals

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This goes along with the idea that the left and right se differently in more than just politics.

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This is interesting because a lot of "pure" or "clean" things are social constructs to opress women, minorities, or the lower class. Pure in ones mind often goes to the word white. The narrative that white is regal and clean (and that European history is the most interesting and put together, that other countries are dirty and unevolved) contributes to a lot of problems in the conservative view of minorities and other countries. If you take virginity for an example, it is a made up thing to keep women from expressing sexuality and taking charge of their bodies. Women are made to seem dirty if they aren't pure and innocent in this way, this is usually to benifit men. It's pretty messed up and can lead to a lot of mental health issues for women. And these things can be pushed by people who use their religion in vain when they really just push capitalist agenda.

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this makes sense to me. As I'm getting older, my interest in politics is solidifying and a lot of what I've learned has come from my surroundings. What I see, personal experiences, and lessons taught to me by my parents, because they are very very political.

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I found this interesting because although the brain is really incredible, I was not expecting it to look at things and react nerually to signal certain views.

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I found this interesting that generally both democrats and republicans have the same reaction to positive situations, but conservatives take negative stimuli more personally. This kind of relates to article 11 about reacting more to a negative scenario.

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This could lead to different reactions toward risks and danger as liberals and conservatives react differently to negative stimuli.

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I think this is very true. Growing up I find that many people are very influenced by their surroundings including family and community. I think most people have the same political orientation when they grow up.

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I found this interesting because it adresses how our opinions are changed due to how deeply we think about a subject.

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I think this makes a lot of sense, because with change comes risk, and liberals are more attune to change and less afraid of the risks than conservatives.

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While looking at this article, I noticed that often times, liberals can look more complexly at an issue than many conservatives can, and this probably has to do with the fact that conservatives are less able to notice social ques.

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this seems true because conservatives in real life tend to want things to stay the same while liberals want new change and equality for all

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This is interesting because it is a take on pessimistic and optimistic and almost saying one side is more pess or opt. It seems like conservatives are more on the pessimestic side.

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I can see your environment affecting your political views but not you genes. That part doesn't make much sense to me.

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Maggie K
This idea feels very distant from political ideology but in many ways the factors leading to your ideology are based on the foundation of your world view even when you are asleep.

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I am surprised that democrats show lower life satisfaction, but I also can understand why. We saw that a liberal is more focussed on harm and fairness while a conservative is more focussed on tradition and purity. Since the world is never fair and safe it is logical that liberals would tend to worry more.

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the notion that eye contact can determine a political ideology is very bizarre yet fascinating. And I think that I'm constantly shifting my attention to things other people are looking at so it makes some sense to me.

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I don't see how the gaze of someone eye can differ which political party they support. But, I do often see someone looking in a certain direction and I follow their gaze to see what it is that they are looking at.

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I found this very suprising, because I would think that because liberals are looking to improve things more quickly, they would be focusing on the negative image and the way to turn it into a positive, not only on the positive image.

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I think that this relates to the pleasant and unpleasant images. Furthermore, this connects to conservatives wanting to stick with tradition and avoid striving for positive change.

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this is why they don't want things to change as much because if it's bad then their brain will feel it more.

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I found this article interesting because I've always heard that children are usually influenced by their parents political beliefs, but didn't know that there was evidence of differences in their brain chemistry.

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I think that this in incredibly believeable because while this is a broad assumption, I feel like liberals generally care for more than just what benefits them and are concerned for social issues which can be a lot to be on your mind all the time. As for conservatives, I think they are less concerned with social issues but more personal issues or economic issues.

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This makes a little sense, I guess I just dont understand how your political views can effect how you dream. Everyone has weird dreams, it doesn't matter your political view.

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This makes sense because conservative focus more on tradition and liberals focus more on fairness.

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I can see how the information in this article would be true. Generally liberals are more concerned with issues beyond themselves and which may cause them to have poorer sleep quality. They may not be able to put issues not directly affecting them out of their mind when they go to bed.

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I found this interesting because it's not something you would think would affect someone's ideology.