Neural bases of motivated reasoning: an FMRI study of emotional constraints on partisan political judgment in the 2004 U.S. Presidential election.

Full Abstract

Research on political judgment and decision-making has converged with decades of research in clinical and social psychology suggesting the ubiquity of emotion-biased motivated reasoning. Motivated reasoning is a form of implicit emotion regulation in which the brain converges on judgments that minimize negative and maximize positive affect states associated with threat to or attainment of motives. To what extent motivated reasoning engages neural circuits involved in "cold" reasoning and conscious emotion regulation (e.g., suppression) is, however, unknown. We used functional neuroimaging to study the neural responses of 30 committed partisans during the U.S. Presidential election of 2004. We presented subjects with reasoning tasks involving judgments about information threatening to their own candidate, the opposing candidate, or neutral control targets. Motivated reasoning was associated with activations of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, posterior cingulate cortex, insular cortex, and lateral orbital cortex. As predicted, motivated reasoning was not associated with neural activity in regions previously linked to cold reasoning tasks and conscious (explicit) emotion regulation. The findings provide the first neuroimaging evidence for phenomena variously described as motivated reasoning, implicit emotion regulation, and psychological defense. They suggest that motivated reasoning is qualitatively distinct from reasoning when people do not have a strong emotional stake in the conclusions reached.

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Author information

Author/s: Westen, Drew (D); Blagov, Pavel S (PS); Harenski, Keith (K); Kilts, Clint (C); Hamann, Stephan (S);

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA. dwesten(-atsign-)emory.edu

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Comparative Study; Journal Article

Journal: Journal of cognitive neuroscience (J Cogn Neurosci), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2006-Nov; vol 18 (issue 11) : pp 1947-58

Dates: Created 2006/10/30; Completed 2006/12/12;

PMID: 17069484, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 12/26/2008)

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Acoustic Stimulation - methods
Adult
Brain - blood supply; physiology
Brain Mapping
Conflict (Psychology)
Emotions
Female
Humans

Image Processing, Computer-Assisted - methods
Judgment
Magnetic Resonance Imaging - methods
Male
Middle Aged
Oxygen - blood
Politics
United States

Associated Chemicals: Oxygen (7782-44-7)

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