The mouth doesn't speak for the brain
A new study by Princeton University psychology researchers Lasana Harris and Susan Fiske shows that when viewing photographs of social out-groups, people respond to them with disgust, not a feeling of fellow humanity.
The researchers made this observation by noting the activity in the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). This module is activated when a person thinks about a person. The brain activity showed that pictures of out-group members did not elicit this person-related activity.
Thus, a person may consciously see members of social out-groups as people, while the brain is treating these people as less than human.
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Nothing remarkable here. The MPFC is evidently part of what the Thinkerer calls the Empath. We have long known that people make a strong distinction between in-group and out-group. What we see in this study is a demonstration of the neurological basis of this distinction. It is probably related to the mirror neuron system that supports imitation.
The study also points out the potential difference between what the mouth is saying and what the brain is doing. Verbal instruction can tell people what the should think. They will learn to say what they know the should say. Different modules. Different jobs. No deep repression here. Just that one part of the brain doesn’t know what another part is doing. Happens all the time. Just like it does to Microsoft.
By the way, there is nothing in this study to suggest that the definition of in-group and out-group are unchangeable. Methods for getting people to redefine in-group have long been known. No doubt, future studies will investigate the effect of such methods on the relevant brain activity.
The researchers made this observation by noting the activity in the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). This module is activated when a person thinks about a person. The brain activity showed that pictures of out-group members did not elicit this person-related activity.
Thus, a person may consciously see members of social out-groups as people, while the brain is treating these people as less than human.
------------
Nothing remarkable here. The MPFC is evidently part of what the Thinkerer calls the Empath. We have long known that people make a strong distinction between in-group and out-group. What we see in this study is a demonstration of the neurological basis of this distinction. It is probably related to the mirror neuron system that supports imitation.
The study also points out the potential difference between what the mouth is saying and what the brain is doing. Verbal instruction can tell people what the should think. They will learn to say what they know the should say. Different modules. Different jobs. No deep repression here. Just that one part of the brain doesn’t know what another part is doing. Happens all the time. Just like it does to Microsoft.
By the way, there is nothing in this study to suggest that the definition of in-group and out-group are unchangeable. Methods for getting people to redefine in-group have long been known. No doubt, future studies will investigate the effect of such methods on the relevant brain activity.
posted by Selby Evans at 12:57 PM
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