LOS ANGELES, April 20 (UPI) -- California scientists are using MRI machines to study how political commercials affect the brains of viewers, the New York Times reported Tuesday.
Neuroscientists from the University of California, Los Angeles, measured what part of the brain is activated when Democratic voters watch Sept. 11, 2001, images in a Bush campaign commercial.
They found such images activate different parts of the brain in Republican voters than they do in Democracts.
"These new tools could help us someday be less reliant on cliches and unproven adages," said Tom Freedman, a strategist in the 1996 Clinton campaign and now a sponsor of the research. "They'll help put a bit more science in political science."
Marco Iacoboni, an associate professor at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute who directs a laboratory at the Ahmanson Lovelace Brain Mapping Center, says he is not yet able to explain why supporters of the two parties respond differently to the images.
"In the past decade we've built up all this knowledge of how the brain works," Iacoboni said, "and now it's exciting that we can finally start applying it to social issues."
