You don’t just think about politics, you physically feel it in your body. Democrats reported stronger bodily sensations for negative political emotions compared to Republicans. For political anger, anxiety, depression, and disgust, Democrats showed much higher physical activation.
You don’t just think about politics, you physically feel it in your body
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Usually when I read political news I feel anxious and dizzy
So is this supporting the stereotype of the “bleeding-heart liberal^(1)”?
(^1 using the USA definition of “liberal”)
Because politics helps define your feelings of safety in the world.
Only those without empathy wouldn’t be physically affected by severe political change.
We didn’t evolve to politely discuss and debate policies that will leave tens of millions oppressed or suffering or bankrupt from predatory debt or forced to decide between slave wages and the street, as if the “sick people without insurance should die faster” crowd is just as legitimate as the “everyone deserves healthcare” crowd. We evolved to work together to solve problems and, if necessary, to eliminate obstacles to that problem-solving.
It’s the powerlessness that has everyone feeling so much anger, anxiety, depression, and disgust. Want to change things on a large scale? We can’t, apparently, so we just stew in those emotions until it wrecks your health.
Makes sense.
While I‘m not from the U.S., I have also found that people more to the left of the political spectrum are much more sensitive to the political views of their friends and partners and react much more strongly to someone having different political ideas.
It’s not politics anymore. It’s morality. When you see blatant criminals, corruption, and pedophiles celebrated and defended by the other side simply for being on the team, there’s an anger at the injustice.
Because they’re watching a fascist take over of a previously functional democracy?
That’s the feeling of your rights and freedoms being taken away while criminals openly commit crime in front of your eyes.
Data was collected in July 2025, I expect this to be a pendulum. In years with a Republican president Democrats feel stronger negative emotions and with a Democrat president it might be Republicans feeling it more intensely
I had heard conservatives tended to have stronger disgust responses than liberals.
So how much of this study can be attributed to the current political environment, rather than political alignment? Because I’m disgusted right now, and everybody should be.
How come almost every post on this sub is social science? Reddit used to be full of annoying STEMlords who were smugly contemptuous of psychology, sociology, etc. and now it’s swung to the polar opposite direction
I’m heartbroken by the disintegration of my beautiful country.
America’s history was marred by violence and imperialism from the very start, but our people are kind and open-hearted. Hardworking, defiant of authority, devoted to freedom. Explorers and protectors of an immense and thriving landscape.
A handful of money-grubbing, power-hungry fools have ruined it for us all. Maybe forever.
America is supposed to be a haven for the masses to be free. It isn’t anymore, and maybe it never was, but I mourn the loss of my belief in that ideal.
Is this a left vs. right thing or an opposition party vs. governing party thing?
Liberals feel much more strongly for strangers and people they don’t know.
Conservatives feel most strongly for their very closest family and friends, and themselves.
Watching others get badly hurt, for absolutely no need, it hurts to watch, man.
I just get those same physical reactions when dealing with the dumbest people alive that are convinced they are the smartest. So, the republican party and their moron followers.
Makes sense. When I was voting Republican (18, raised in a very conservative Catholic environment) I was glad I didn’t have to worry about all of these things Democrats talked about because I was convinced they were lying, exaggerating, or that God would take care of it. I now see political news as having very real consequences that will affect me and others. Not only that, I no longer think there’s an omnipotent force that will correct things for the better; I now recognize that these problems are in fact ours to deal with.
For many, politics isn’t just a debate over theoretical issues. It shouldn’t take a lot of study and reasoning to make the connection between learning about events and having a sympathetic reaction. In the past two decades in the United States, politically related violence has risen and frequently been associated with Republicans: having a physical fear response in Democrats doesn’t seem unreasonable. Particularly since the Democratic Party has been courting marginalized communities in their politics: having a sympathetic social connection with people who are facing restrictions and violence is implicit.
One side wants to give us incremental change and to keep up with the world.
The other wants iron foster control over our bodies, our minds and thought and our opinion. They want literally everything from us and at the same time, they want to take everything from us. They want our money but they don’t want to maintain the country.
It’s not complicated math.
I am disgusted by the society I live in
It’s not politics I have a physiological response over, it’s consequences to humans/humanity. I also have positive response to policy/politics/law when it is for the betterment
One time after reading a particularly vile thing that Trump said, I actually did vomit. I was shocked how visceral he made me feel.
It’s called having empathy
The scariest thing about conservatism IMO is that it appears genetic. If a brain is wired a certain way, narcissistic or otherwise, it seems like it’s a given that the person will be conservative. Luckily not the majority of people, still way too many.
Ignorance is… Well, conservatism.