Conservatives and progressives have different brain structures

17 October 2024

When it comes to political leanings, I’m probably centre/left. But I have a number of family and acquaintances who definitely lean more to the right.

Of course, everyone is different, but certain of the mannerisms of the more conservative people I know are particularly distinct. To me, these seemed to go beyond regular personal preference. An inclination towards adhering to convention, and a dislike of uncertainty, to cite a few, seem quite apparent to me. And this well before discussing voting intentions.

Now some recent University College London research, published by Current Biology, seems to confirm what I’ve long suspect: there are differences in the brain structures of politically left leaning and right leaning people:

We speculate that the association of gray matter volume of the amygdala and anterior cingulate cortex with political attitudes that we observed may reflect emotional and cognitive traits of individuals that influence their inclination to certain political orientations. For example, our findings are consistent with the proposal that political orientation is associated with psychological processes for managing fear and uncertainty. The amygdala has many functions, including fear processing. Individuals with a large amygdala are more sensitive to fear, which, taken together with our findings, might suggest the testable hypothesis that individuals with larger amygdala are more inclined to integrate conservative views into their belief system. Similarly, it is striking that conservatives are more sensitive to disgust, and the insula is involved in the feeling of disgust. On the other hand, our finding of an association between anterior cingulate cortex volume and political attitudes may be linked with tolerance to uncertainty.

If medical terms baffle you, as they do me, read Sydney Morning Herald writer Angus Dalton’s analysis of the Current Biology report.