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Combining social and biological approaches to political behaviors

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 January 2016

Rose McDermott
Rose McDermott*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Brown University, 36 Prospect Street, Providence, RI 02912. rose_mcdermott@brown.edu
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Extract

The current research climate provides an auspicious opportunity to undertake foundational investigations at the intersection of the natural and social sciences to produce transformative work with broad import for society. A great deal of relevant work examining the genetic, neurobiological and neuropsychological bases of social and political behavior has already taken place. But much of this work has been conducted simultaneously in a variety of different fields and disciplines. In addition to needlessly duplicating some research paradigms, thus wasting time and resources, such efforts have often also lacked a coherent core of social and political models and theories to guide such inquiry. With proper coordination and leverage, such efforts can achieve tremendous gains in terms of harnessing the skills, methods, and models of the natural sciences in service of addressing some of the most destructive and endemic social and political problems which plague our planet.

Type
NSF Workshop Report
Information
Politics and the Life Sciences , Volume 30 , Issue 2 , Fall 2011 , pp. 98 - 102
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Politics and the Life Sciences 

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