BEHAVIOR, POLITICS AND SEVERAL PERSPECTIVES FROM NEUROSCIENCES

SILVIU-PETRU GRECU

Abstract


Several directions from natural sciences interfere with political research. Political behaviour and political cognition are tested through neuroimaging techniques. If we agree that political science is a science of political behaviour, all these epistemological and methodological directions will change the traditional manner of explaining society and politics. Political attitudes and behaviour are measured directly through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) for identifying correlations between brain activity and political cognition. Thus, we can focus on two kinds of behaviours: polarized values and ideology (with a high level of neural activity in medial prefrontal cortex) and political novices (with a very low level of neural activity in prefrontal cortex). Political cognition is a hybrid cognitive model based on several rational elements and emotional responses. All these emotional responses reflect the necessity of understanding political behaviour using an interdisciplinary approach between political sciences, psychology and other disciplines from the field of clinical studies.

Keywords


Political Sciences, political behaviour, Political Psychology, “hot cognition”, Neurosciences

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