The Liberal Gene

'Liberal gene' discovered.
Liberal behavior and thought patterns are found to be genetic, study suggests.
By Sly Fox

Could a gene be partly responsible for the behavior of some of the world's most infamous liberals?

Flaming liberals owe their behavior to their genes, according to a study that claims to have found a genetic link to liberalism. The study might help to explain the bizarre behavior found in college professors, journalists, Hollywood types, socialists, Communists, Democrats, and to most of the population on the East and West coasts.

Researchers at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem found a link between a gene called AVPR1a and liberal behavior in a scientific laboratory exercise called the 'Lib Game'. This exercise allows players to behave normally or like a silly liberal. The researchers don't yet know the mechanism by which the gene influences behavior. It may mean that for some, the old adage that "it is better to work than to be on the dole" simply isn't true, says team leader Richard Ebstein. The reward centers in those brains may derive less pleasure from self-reliant acts, he suggests, perhaps causing them to wish for someone else such as their Federal Government to provide for their every need and desire at the expense of others.

Ebstein and his colleagues decided to look at AVPR1a because it is known to produce receptors in the brain that detect vasopressin, a hormone involved in altruism and 'prosocial' behavior. Studies of prairie voles have previously shown that this hormone is important for binding together these rodents' tight-knit social groups.

Ebstein's team wondered whether differences in how this receptor is expressed in the human brain may make different people more or less likely to behave like liberal wackos or like responsible and intelligent conservatives.

To find out, they tested DNA samples from more than 200 student volunteers before asking the students to play the "Lib Game" (volunteers were not told the name of the game, lest it influence their behavior). Students were divided into two groups: 'workers' and 'receivers' (called 'A' and 'B' to the participants). Each volunteer was told that they would receive 50 shekels (worth about US$14), and were free to continue to work and invest or to spend it and ask for more.

About 98% of all liberals quit their jobs and spent all of the money, Ebstein and his colleagues report in the journal "Genes, Brain and Behavior." About 92% of all conservatives continued to work and invested their money to improve their chances for being independent in their old age.
There was no connection between the participants' gender and their behavior, the team reports. But there was a link to the length of the AVPR1a gene: people were more likely to behave as a liberal the shorter their version of this gene.

It isn't clear how the length of AVPR1a affects vasopressin receptors: it is thought that rather than controlling the number of receptors, it may control where in the brain the receptors are distributed. Ebstein suggests the vasopressin receptors in the brains of people with short AVPR1a may be distributed in such a way to make them less likely to feel rewarded by work and self-reliance. Though the mechanism is unclear, Ebstein says, he is fairly sure that no amount of logic and debate would be likely to alter the liberal's brain patterns.

"Researchers should nevertheless be careful about using the relatively blunt tool of the Lib Game to draw conclusions about human behavior" says Nicholas Bardsley at the University of Southampton, UK, who studies such games. "We think as much as 15% of liberal behavior could be due to brain damage from being dropped on their head by their mothers. We may never know for sure," says Bardsley, "because mothers are reluctant to admit to these accidents."