There are some pretty clear ideological differences between Democrats and Republicans, as we've noticed on this campus and beyond. But here's a look into the biological differences behind it all - check out the results of a recent study at the University of California:
"Republicans used their right amygdala, the part of the
brain associated with the body’s fight-or-flight system, when making
risk-taking decisions; Democrats tended to show greater activity in
their left insula, an area associated with self and social awareness."
Obviously the assumptions that can be drawn from this study are very general. Does either using your fight-or-flight system or your area associated self/social awareness result in making the "best decision"? There are so many stereotypes that could be "justified" using the loose associations presented here...anyway, I will leave such discussion to the writers of Penn Political Review.
At the end of the day, how you interpret which thought process is favorable depends on your own values, background, etc. Choosing which way of thinking is "better" probably also depends on the situation.
Either way, I thought this was an interesting example of your brain function reflecting how you have (or someone else has) conditioned your brain to think, and that there are tangible ways of measuring these differences.
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