« On ne change pas » chante Céline.
Elle aurait raison, du moins en ce qui a trait à nos choix de candidats quand vient le temps des élections. Dans le magazine Salon aujourd’hui, un neurologue explique:
[…] Our ability to assess political candidates is particularly questionable when we have any strong feeling about them. An oft-quoted fMRI study by Emory psychologist Drew Westen illustrates how little conscious reason is involved in political decision-making.
Westen asked staunch party members from both sides to evaluate negative (defamatory) information about their 2004 presidential choice. Areas of the brain (prefrontal cortex) normally engaged during reasoning failed to show increased activation. Instead, the limbic system — the center for emotional processing — lit up dramatically. According to Westen, both Republicans and Democrats « reached totally biased conclusions by ignoring information that could not rationally be discounted » (cognitive dissonance).
In other words, we are as bad at judging ourselves as we are at judging others. […]
Ideally, I would like to put the candidates through a series of tests similar to those given to the Cornell undergraduates. The candidates would be given questions, including a variety of « thought experiments » for which they could not be prepared in advance. Then we could see their thought processes in action. We would have a better idea of how they reasoned and whether they rely on gut feelings and instincts. We could see their ability to step back from their own answers to judge their quality and accuracy.
Ça pourrait remplacer le débat des chefs! (On peut bien rêver…)