Scientific American: Neuroscience and Psychology Suggest No Surprise Victory for Trump This Time

[SheltieLover]

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/neuroscience-and-psychology-suggest-no-surprise-victory-for-trump-this-time/

His inflammatory appeals are less likely to activate the same decision-making circuits as in 2016

Will we be surprised again this November the way Americans were on Nov. 9, 2016 when they awoke to learn that reality TV star Donald Trump had been elected president? That outcome defied prognosticators and polls, and even Trump’s own expectation. “Oh, this is gonna be embarrassing,” Trump later recalled he had said at the time, anticipating defeat.


Another surprise victory is unlikely to happen again if this election is looked at from the same perspective of neuroscience that I used to account for the surprising outcome in 2016. Briefly, that article explained how our brain provides two different mechanisms of decision-making; one is conscious and deliberative, and the other is automatic, driven by emotion and especially by fear. Trump’s strategy does not target the neural circuitry of reason in the cerebral cortex; it provokes the limbic system. In the 2016 election, undecided voters were influenced by the brain’s fear-driven impulses—more simply, gut instinct—once they arrived inside the voting booth, even though they were unable to explain their decision to pre-election pollsters in a carefully reasoned manner.

In 2020, Trump continues to use the same strategy of appealing to the brain’s threat-detection circuitry and emotion-based decision process to attract votes and vilify opponents.

More at link.

[kimbutgar]

1. I always say MF45 supporters never developed the prefrontal cortex of their brain

The empathy and reasoning part is not there in these people. It is all at the brain stem fight or flight level with those folks. I’ve seen it in people I know who are MF45 supporters.

[SheltieLover]

4. Indeed different brain structure

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3092984/#:~:text=Substantial%20differences%20exist%20in%20the,on%20psychological%20measures%20%5B1%5D.&text=We%20found%20that%20greater%20liberalism,volume%20of%20the%20right%20amygdala.

[kimbutgar]

5. Thank you for this!

I’m bookmarking.

I had a child development teacher at my local junior college. She was really into teaching to understanding brain development and education. As I get older I see it all the time interacting with adults and children.

[SheltieLover]

7. Me too!

Their enlarged, overactive amygdalas account for all the histrionics.

If you google nih brain differences liberal vs conservative you will find quite a bit.

[Poiuyt]

2. I'm becoming less nervous as the days go by

[YessirAtsaFact]

3. Me to, to a certain degree

The polls are showing Biden holding a steady lead.

Reinforcing that are the early voting results that are available. Not only are a massive number of people voting early, man of them are Democrats and POC.

See the link below for party breakdown, where available:

[link:https://electproject.github.io/Early-Vote-2020G/index.html|

[dgauss]

6. Trump, the limbic system president.

Time for the cerebral cortex to run things again.

[SheltieLover]

8. I concur!