As the lights within the lecture corridor slowly brighten, political neuroscientist Leor Zmigrod braces herself for the onslaught of questions from an viewers brimming with rising fingers—and one clenched fist. “Is it a query? An exclamation? An emblem of solidarity or defiance?” Zmigrod writes on the finish of her new e book, The Ideological Mind: The Radical Science of Versatile Pondering. “Earlier than I can level the roving microphone in its route, the proprietor of the fist begins to talk.”

“I wrote concerning the ideological phantoms within the human mind lengthy earlier than these unusual neuroimaging applied sciences had been invented,” the viewers member says. “It’s no shock, in fact, however I’m glad to find these phantoms are actual.”

The change is definitely an imagined one—the speaker, Karl Marx. Within the e book’s epilogue, Zmigrod defends her analysis towards the skeptical remarks of historic luminaries corresponding to Charles Darwin and Hannah Arendt. In her fictitious response to Marx, she clarifies why it’s worthwhile to grasp the influence ideologies have on the human mind and physique—and underscores to the grumpy German thinker that her work enhances his insights quite than supplants them. 

To Marx’s query, “What does your ‘new methodology’ genuinely present?” Zmigrod solutions: “That we will bypass self-reports of ideological oppression and that, as a substitute of relying solely on the instruments of historical past, economics, demographics, and ethnography, we will examine unconscious processes which might be inconspicuous to the observer’s bare eye or the believer’s storytelling tongue.”

I used to be keen to listen to Zmigrod clarify this in richer element. In our latest dialog over a video name—Zmigrod spoke to me from her residence in England—she described her analysis with verve. In 2016, she was among the many first wave of scientists to start out investigating the neurobiological origins of ideological considering, which was the topic of her Ph.D. thesis at Cambridge College.

“It felt like these strategies weren’t being utilized in one of the simplest ways to grasp our politics, and what makes individuals gravitate towards ideologies within the first place,” she says. “After which there have been all these very politically charged elections in 2016: each in Europe with Brexit, and in america, with Donald Trump. It led to a extremely thrilling and fascinating path.”

We began with the fundamentals: What makes the human mind so susceptible to ideology.

What makes ideology, as you write, the “mind’s scrumptious reply to the issue of prediction and communication?”

Our brains are these amazingly predictive organs attempting to continually clarify the world, as a result of that’s our strategy to survive. We’ve to have a dependable mannequin of actuality in order that we will know what to anticipate—for instance, when there’s going to be a confrontation with somebody we’re in a relationship with. Ideologies give us the solutions for all these predictions. We don’t have to do this job ourselves, as a result of ideologies say, “Right here’s how the world works, how social relationships work. Listed below are guidelines of conduct and thought.” We will depend on a compelling story and logical system that many different persons are shopping for into, even when it’s fallacious. Ideologies are extremely seductive as a result of they offer us a neighborhood of people that we will belong to, and share data with. However that doesn’t imply they’re good for us. As a result of though that’s all very alluring, analysis means that ideologies will also be very injurious to our capability for elastic, free, and genuine thought. 

Possibly being immersed in a world that’s targeted on unfavorable emotions can truly change the mind.

Are all of us ideological thinkers to some extent?

Sure, we will take into consideration this as a spectrum. Some persons are extremely ideological and dogmatic in the way in which they view the world, view others, and consider themselves. They’ve this very inflexible adherence to a doctrine, this embrace of a totalizing clarification of the world. And importantly, a part of that’s being very immune to credible proof. They may nonetheless course of it, may nonetheless bear in mind it, however they are going to reject it. This additionally includes having a really fastened identification and adhering to strict identification classes for who belongs and who doesn’t. That leads to a powerful favoritism towards different individuals who consider the identical factor. A really ideological individual will completely affiliate with individuals who consider within the ideology and the trigger, and reject anybody who doesn’t. And that rejection can take the type of hostility, prejudice, discrimination, and in essentially the most excessive type, a willingness to endorse violence towards that outgroup, or towards harmless individuals who mirror or symbolize that group. And throughout that spectrum we go all the way in which to somebody being very non-ideological, very versatile and open to plurality, to proof, to debate. 

How do you examine ideology within the mind?

My method has been to take a look at each ideology and any ideology—the left and the proper, nationalism and faith, and each different sort of ideology. However there are some psychological and neurobiological processes which might be associated to simply how extraordinarily individuals undertake ideologies, no matter their missions. There are additionally some issues which might be depending on the particular ideology itself. There’s a complete physique of analysis exhibiting psychological and even neurobiological variations between conservatives and liberals within the U.S., for instance. So in that sense, we see that totally different ideologies may both result in or entice totally different sorts of minds. 

What are a few of these neurobiological variations you’ve seen between American conservatives and liberals?

One of many experiments that’s been replicated a number of occasions reveals that individuals who maintain right-wing beliefs are inclined to have a bigger amygdala, an space of the mind that controls our emotional processing of menace, disgust, concern—these sorts of unfavorable feelings. That space is enlarged in individuals who maintain extra conventional views, who are inclined to consider that social dominance hierarchies are pure and good, that financial inequalities are high-quality. Why would a conservative have a mind that’s structured in that manner? Is it that, in the event that they already had a bigger amygdala, that made them extra drawn to ideologies that handled concern and menace and disgust, which many conservative ideologies attempt to grapple with and counter? Or possibly being immersed in a world that’s very targeted on these unfavorable emotions can truly change the mind. 

That makes me consider a line in your e book—you write that the “ideologue believing in hierarchies is viscerally numb.”  

That’s proper. I used to be discussing a 2020 examine, the place researchers checked out individuals’s unconscious reactions to injustice—specifically their responses to people who find themselves affected by unequal social and financial constructions. The researchers offered members with movies of people that have skilled homelessness speaking about that adversity. Additionally they gave them a management video the place they’re simply watching espresso beans being processed. And what they discovered is that ideology actually situations the response. For individuals who consider that financial and social hierarchies are fallacious and that we shouldn’t justify however as a substitute appropriate them, you see that, once they’re watching the movies of homeless individuals discussing their plight, their our bodies react strongly. Their coronary heart charge accelerates once we measure their pores and skin conductance response, one other measure of physiological arousal, particularly relative to watching espresso beans. 

However in a extremely chilling manner, when members who consider that inequalities are high-quality, pure, good, inevitable, watched the video of the homeless individuals discussing their plight, their our bodies didn’t react. There have been no physiological variations once they watch the homelessness video versus once they watch the espresso beans, which actually reveals you ways deeply into our physiological reactions ideologies go, how we change into numb to injustice and problem. Believing in these ideologies passionately stops you from participating with others on a human degree. 

The thoughts of an ideological individual is a lot extra subtle than thoughtlessness.

The thinker Hannah Arendt touched on that time, you be aware in your e book, saying it’s one among “her most astute intuitions”—that ideologies intention on the “transformation of human nature itself.” 

Arendt was massively prophetic, and the occasions we’re residing in now present how astute her considering was. She had the sense that ideologies don’t simply attempt to change the social world—they attempt to change our nature. However she didn’t have neuroscience or psychology on the time, so she couldn’t understand how deeply into our psychology and biology we see ideologies trickle. What she got here up with was the concept an individual who’s brainwashed, who turns into a part of an ideological system, is in some ways senseless or inconsiderate. She talked about this when she analyzed the trial of Adolf Eichmann, this high-ranking Nazi official who helped architect the Holocaust. She talked about this very famously, the banality of evil, and mentioned he had this exceptional incapacity to suppose—it was sheer thoughtlessness that guided him. 

Was Arendt fallacious about that?

I feel that’s simply fully not true, that to characterize it as thoughtlessness or mindlessness is a fallacious and nearly harmful manner to take a look at it. As a result of the thoughts of an ideological individual is a lot extra subtle than that—and harmful due to that. We actually want to take a look at how rational and emotional processes get twisted and distorted by ideologies to grasp what an ideological thinker is like. All of the analysis strongly means that “mindlessness” is a really lazy strategy to describe it, and really deceptive, as a result of it means the individual’s not accountable. They’re below siege, below the affect of another person. To be swept up into that affect is a really complicated cognitive course of that some brains gravitate to extra simply than others. So I strongly counter that concept. Possibly the brand new explanations or metaphors aren’t as attractive as thoughtlessness and mindlessness, however they’re extra true. And I feel they assist information us in a greater route for understanding who’s ideological, and what that does to them.

What metaphor do you employ to grasp ideological considering?

Properly, metaphors are each lovely and will be problematic, as a result of they scale back a really complicated story into a picture. So, I’m cautious, however I discovered it helpful to consider how individuals spiral into extremism. We’re all otherwise prone, and once we’re triggered, an individual who could be very immune to ideological narratives, who truly could be very rooted in considering fastidiously, critically, flexibly about proof and concerning the world—they are going to want a really robust push and really fixed strain to spiral into an excessive embrace of an ideology. However an individual who’s already in danger, who possibly thinks extra rigidly concerning the world, who’s possibly extra impulsive of their on a regular basis emotional habits, who has sure neurobiological sensitivities—when that individual is pushed or triggered slightly, they are going to spiral in a lot quicker.

Which components make individuals resilient to considering ideologically?

The people who find themselves essentially the most inventive, versatile, and most capable of stability proof are the people who find themselves most immune to ideological options, ideological narratives, and ideological identities. Creativity and cognitive flexibility are actually highly effective resilience components towards considering in ideologically closed and authoritarian methods.

What about intelligence?

We do measure intelligence, and importantly, even after controlling for intelligence, all these patterns stay. So intelligence just isn’t the driving issue. It’s very uniquely flexibility that’s predicting individuals’s resistance to ideologies and predicting their mental humility. Individuals who select to depart a spiritual ideology are usually essentially the most cognitively versatile individuals, and individuals who grew up secular and later selected to enter a spiritual ideology are usually essentially the most cognitively inflexible. There’s nonetheless plenty of questions on that technique of conversion and deconversion, however these are simply preliminary clues.

How do essentially the most cognitively versatile individuals are inclined to determine on the political spectrum?

Probably the most cognitively versatile individuals are usually extra impartial, extra reasonable leaning. And if we think about a spectrum from the very excessive left to the very excessive proper, we see that essentially the most cognitively versatile persons are usually within the center-left and are the least prone to latch onto pre-established group identities. 

Is flexibility a steady psychological trait?

If there’s a continuum of flexibility, and we’re all on that spectrum, all of us shift alongside that spectrum very clearly in occasions of stress. When our our bodies are pressured—whether or not that’s as a result of we’re supposed to present a presentation in entrance of an enormous viewers, or bodily pressured, which we will induce within the lab by asking individuals to place their hand in a bucket of ice water—what we see is that individuals’s psychological flexibility diminishes considerably. Our ideas slender. We rigidify. We preserve our assets quite than go and discover the world. Flexibility is one thing that may improve and reduce momentarily and over our lifespan, which is why it’s this steady exhausting work to stick with it. I name it a Sisyphean job.

Step one to turning into extra open-minded may be to interrogate your habits and your routines.

Have you ever studied the idea of cognitive flexibility within the mind?

In a big examine that I ran with hundreds of members, we wished to take a look at the genetics of rigidity, and what we homed in on was a neurotransmitter that everyone knows and love—dopamine. We all know that dopamine governs our senses of reward, of delight, nevertheless it does that as a result of it governs our studying. And there’s been plenty of analysis suggesting that our capability to adapt is rooted within the functioning of dopamine. So we checked out whether or not individuals with genetic variations that affected how dopamine is distributed of their mind, whether or not these genes might predict individuals’s cognitive rigidity or flexibility. We discovered that they did. When individuals have much less baseline dopamine of their prefrontal cortex, and a larger focus of dopamine of their striatum, the midbrain space that governs studying and reward, that’s a specific genetic profile that places individuals in danger for inflexible considering. We discovered that individuals with different combos of those genes usually tended to be rather more versatile.

Does that imply how flexibly we expect is genetically decided?

These genetic contributions are vital and actual, however they’re not deterministic. It doesn’t imply that when you have a specific mixture of genes, you’re doomed to be a dogmatic individual for the remainder of your life. However there’s an elevated threat issue that impacts how individuals take care of data, how versatile or not they are usually on the earth. 

I used to be amazed to learn that you would be able to even faucet into individuals’s ideology by having them make split-second selections. 

It’s fascinating, proper? Once we ask members to make quite simple perceptual judgments about whether or not there’s a purple sq. on the left of the display screen, or a inexperienced circle on the proper facet of the display screen—usually in 400 milliseconds or so—this permits us to grasp how their brains are processing data, how they’re responding to proof, how shortly or cautiously they consider stimuli. You’d by no means suppose that if I gave you a sport the place you reply to issues actually shortly, as quick as you possibly can press a button, that that may give me any indication about your politics or ideologies in any respect—nevertheless it does. We discovered that individuals who are usually extra cautious, the place it’s important to stability pace and accuracy within the sport, are inclined to even be cautious politically. They have an inclination to undertake conservative ideologies that champion the established order, conserving traditions in place. 

We additionally discover that people who find themselves essentially the most dogmatic of their ideological selections—they have a tendency to withstand proof, resist debate, resist altering their opinion—additionally actually battle to combine sensory proof in that span of a millisecond. They’ll battle and take a lot longer to do what we name the evidence-integration course of that occurs within the mind on the order of 100 milliseconds or so. People who find themselves extra dogmatic—who battle with integrating proof in a nuanced, versatile manner—even have these inflexible evidence-integration methods once they’re processing visible data as nicely. 

Why is that vital?

This nonetheless amazes me, though this has been replicated over so many various duties. Principally, it reveals a mirroring between how our brains are integrating or making selections on the extent of a second, and the cognitive fashion with which they method a lot greater, extra time-intensive questions, corresponding to ones about their ideological convictions. It reveals a resonance between very totally different ranges of our consciousness, between how our brains are processing visible data, auditory data—on like a 100-millisecond foundation—and the way they’re forming ideological selections over months and years. It’s cool that probably there are these patterns in how our consciousness pertains to the world, and that exist throughout many various timescales and many various sorts of issues.

What’s one of the simplest ways to change into a extra open-minded individual and make sure you don’t change into an ideologue?

Simply eager to be that sort of human being is already an necessary step ahead. Lots of people suppose it’s truly superb to be ideological—it’s a synonym for being a principled, ethical individual. We stay in a society that basically glorifies habits and the wonderful ethical virtues of routines. This analysis challenges that, as a result of a really routine-, habit-oriented mind-set concerning the world is a really inflexible, conformist mind-set concerning the world. So most likely step one to turning into extra open-minded may be to interrogate your habits and your routines, and to consider the impact that’s having on the way you exist as a human being. 

Our flexibility isn’t one thing that’s simply constrained to 1 area. When you can suppose flexibly concerning the world, about the way you clear up issues, about the way you think about options, about the way you adapt to vary—whether or not that’s in a creative, a social, or a relationship area—all of these flexibilities translate into flexibility within the political and ideological area. Discovering your methods to follow that flexibility, that inventiveness, that considering in any other case, is a extremely highly effective manner to withstand all these pressures to suppose in a extra slender manner. I feel it’s a really fulfilling battle, since you discover a extra genuine, free way of life and considering and regarding individuals on the earth round you.

Lead picture: Jorm Sangsorn / Shutterstock

• Brian Gallagher

  Posted on April 11, 2025

  Brian Gallagher is an affiliate editor at Nautilus. Comply with him on Twitter @bsgallagher.