[Introduction] Why do the rulers in history usually make cold decisions and find it difficult to empathize with ordinary people ? This is a fact that everyone has more or less perceptual consciousness, but few provide scientific evidence for it from a neurological perspective.
One thing that people with huge power won't know, that is what it feels like to have only a little power or no power. Every minute, you will be reminded of your place in this world: if you have mental health problems, it will be hard to just get up; if you are always worried about what to eat the next day, you will not be able to smile or show your charm, and how being ignored and ignored will erase your self-awareness.
I often have people who don't understand this, they are more cultured than me, and more privileged than me - those who are so used to having power that they don't realize its existence. I am a black woman in my 50s, I am an neurodiverse 1, and I have multiple mental health diagnoses. As a researcher and cultural thinker, part of my work is working with leaders in the arts, business and politics to help them see something they cannot see: the impact of the power they exert.
But just pointing out this gap will make people feel alert. It may leave you labeled as “angry black women.” In the past, when I started telling people what it was like not to have power and how difficult it was to understand it, they didn’t listen. So I turned to science to understand the impact of power on your physical state in order to provide evidence for what I already know and to let people listen.
I call this study neurology of power . It is about the sociological interpretation of power and the research on the basis of neuroscience. Being in a state of losing power can lead to long-term stress. This stress trains us to keep our bodies alert to it at all times, which damages our productivity and happiness. Correspondingly, those who have never felt this sense of loss of power can enjoy productivity and happiness.
Anyone who has ever taken several deep breaths, forced himself to relax his shoulders or closed his eyes to restore peace knows that the brain and body are in a continuous feedback loop. We feel our thoughts, we think about our feelings.
's research on these ideas prompted me to have a conversation with top scientists around the world. Professor Lisa Feldman Barrett of Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital told me about a process called “body budget,” or “allo-state.” She believes that just like doing financial budgets, our brains track when we consume energy (such as going to run) and when we store energy (such as eating). This is a prediction process where the brain maintains energy regulation by predicting the body’s needs and preparing for it before the needs appear.
Feldman believes that this process is very important to the structure of the brain because its influence extends to the level of our mental state. Our emotions are generated by the brain's calculation of the physiological and metabolic needs of our body. Predicting a dangerous situation that requires us to escape will lead to a physical change and discomfort, which we call anxiety.
This kind of "body budget" has social impact. For example, our ability to empathize with another person is dependent on this. When we meet people we are more familiar with, our brains can more effectively predict their mental state and feelings of inner struggle. This process is difficult for those we are not very familiar with, so our brains are less willing to spend valuable resources on the prediction of this difficult.
Sukhvinder Obhi, professor of social neuroscience at McMaster University in Canada, told me more about why people with power often struggle to empathize with others: The brain predicts based on past experience, and these patterns are self-reinforced. Usually, what those in power learn is the expression pattern of possessing power. People without power have learned the manifestation pattern of losing power.
This study rationalizes my original conjecture. Power gives people who own it a sense of power; but it can also lead them to the opposite of people without power . You may lose your empathy. And power is crucial to happiness.
This lack of empathy has been a commendable trait among leaders in history - cold-blooded and ruthless can make people make difficult decisions without worrying about possible consequences. Since ancient times, you can see this in political leaders of various political factions. Today, it gives people a particularly distinct feeling. It has divided society, weakened trust in powerful institutions, and made the process of policymaking more driven by ideology than human experience.
Alexander the Great, King of Macedonia, was almost always carrying out unprecedented military conquests during his reign
We need a new policy-making mechanism to put the people at the core of the entire process. Policy makers need to start by listening, share power with people who truly understand the nature of power loss, and share power with people who are influenced by the policies they have formulated. We cannot stay in this permanent cycle in which everything is decided by the power. They are hindered by their own privileges.
Many people are uncomfortable with this evidence about the impact of power. I spoke in the expert group, put forward my arguments, and were publicly questioned by many senior scholars, who later apologized in private after taking into account my references in full.
I shouldn't have relied on science to be heard to prove what I already know. A constraint on power decision-making, we need to formulate policies in different ways to offset the impact of power gaps. This is a call to action: We can do things in another way. Let's give it a try.
[Explanation of noun]
1. Neurodiversity
Neurodiversity refers to changes in brain function and behavioral characteristics, such as attention deficit disorder (ADD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD: known as children ADHD in my country), autism, dyslexia and movement disorders. Past research has shown that neurodiversity can naturally enable people with neurodiversity to have outstanding logical thinking and be able to think about problems in a systematic way from a new perspective. Moreover, the characteristics of super cognitive pattern recognition ability, detail concentration, reliability and loyalty are also common in neurodiversity.
This article was translated from the article "I always knew powerful people had blind spots - now neuroscience has proved it" published on November 24, 2022 in The Guardian, with deletion and modification. All views in the article represent the author's personal opinions only.
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