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Nick Carmody JD, MS Psych Profile picture
@Nick_Carmody
Jun 13, 2021 • 46 tweets • 9 min read • Read on X
An addiction model may actually explain tribalism, confirmation bias, and even conspiracy theories/Qanon. Let’s unpack….

Several years ago I started observing the parallels between addiction and political tribalism as marriages/friendships/families imploded over politics….1/
Specifically, I started noticing the parallels between the effect that addiction has on relationships when those relationships (interventions) threaten the continuation of the addictive behavior/activity.

Basically,….2/
…when confronted with a threat to the addiction, the addict will often cut the loved one out of their life, rather than cut out the addictive behavior.

This has occurred countless times over the last 5 years as people have cut family/friends out of their lives over politics. 3/
For example, I had a daughter tell me that her 80 something year-old mom told her that if Trump and the daughter were both drowning, she (the mother) would save Trump first, and the daughter, second, if at all.

This is one of many stories people have DM’d me looking for help. 4/
Initially, it appeared to be an “addiction” to the outrage, anger, or fear.

But then I came across research explaining dopamine, which is related to the reward center of the brain, in terms of “subjective utility”. This got me thinking about confirmation bias: 5/
That the “addiction” wasn’t to the outrage/anger/fear.

Instead, the addiction was created by repeatedly receiving a dopamine reward every time their subjective beliefs (bias) were confirmed by Rush/Hannity/Tucker.

The anger/fear was the by-product of the addictive process. 6/
But, as I explained on the Lincoln Project podcast, this addictive process may have a second, compounding factor to it because….. 7/
….research has shown neuroanatomical regions associated with physically painful experiences exhibit increased activity when people experience social exclusion or separation (as explained in this thread about Qanon).
8/
.....9/....…..
....10/….
....11/.......
…….12/......

…….13/......

……14.....
As mentioned above, dopamine is related to the “reward system” of the brain, and is involved in the pleasurable experiences related to sex, gambling, etc.

Dopamine is associated with the high experienced with cocaine use/addiction.

15/
Similar to social exclusion/separation…..pain/discomfort avoidance is also a factor in certain addictions:

The “DTs” (delirium tremens) experienced by alcoholics who suddenly quit drinking....and opioid/heroin withdrawal.

"Relapse" provides relief from withdrawal symptoms. 16/
With this as a backdrop, it’s conceivable to conceptualize political tribalism (& perhaps even cultism), through an addiction model where there's a cocaine-like hit on the front end that pulls them in...

....and an opioid-like withdrawal that prevents them from pushing away. 17/
But there’s another important factor at play in this process that not only appears to contribute to tribalism, confirmation bias, but also conspiracy theory susceptibility, radicalization, and Qanon.

That factor: “anticipation”.

18/
Or, as Robert Sapolsky explains in this short video:

The power of “maybe”.

Watch this, and then keep reading:

19/
Now consider how anticipation affects the role dopamine plays in confirmation bias.

In this context, the dopamine hit isn’t experienced by having a correct opinion/belief (their bias being confirmed), the dopamine hit is experienced from the “anticipation” of being “right”. 20/
But all of this really gets interesting when viewed through the lens of dopamine optimization being tied to the 50/50 anticipation-to-reward ratio, because it would seem to have implications for radicalization and extremism:

21/
Since dopamine production/release isn't maximized by correctly anticipating the outcome 100% of the time…

.....in order to experience optimal dopamine production,...

22/
….people would need to constantly seek out new “sources” and new information that would consistently introduce "unanticipated"/unknown details, in order for them to have a heightened dopamine experience......because being 100% correct doesn't produce that.

23/
If someone watched/listened to FOX for years/decades, and had memorized the talking points….they would eventually be able to anticipate future narratives 100% of the time.

This would produce a limited dopamine experience, even though their biases are completely confirmed.

24/
However, when right wing news consumers then turn on OANN, Newsmax, Alex Jones, etc., and hear new fantastical details that are added to the mainstream right-wing narrative, these people's anticipation-to-reward ratio has now been disrupted.

And as Sapolsky demonstrated,…

25/
…..this disruption will cause dopamine spikes, which are optimized when people are not able to correctly predict or “anticipate” 50% of what they are being told.

26/
This creates an incentive structure where they are “rewarded” by continually seeking out more extreme, more radical, and more delusional information and narratives in order to continually maintain the optimum 50/50 anticipation-to-reward ratio.

27/
This process basically mirrors "tolerance" as seen in other forms of addiction, except that rather than building a tolerance to increased levels of an addictive substance, the individual builds a tolerance to the known (dis)information.

28/
And instead of having to increase the ingestion of an addictive substance to chase the “high”….. they need to continually increase the amount of new, un-anticipatable (dis)information.

29/
This results in people perpetually seeking out more delusional, more fantastical, and more conspiratorial information because, eventually, anything remotely factual has already been heard, and therefore can be “anticipated”.

30/
With this as a backdrop, it's easy to see how dynamic plays into Qanon and conspiracies theories.

As Sapolsky said, “’maybe’, is addictive like nothing else out there”.

“Maybe”, is the essence of conspiracy theories:

“Maybe, X is happening/occurring”

31/
The “anticipation” and the 50/50 optimization of dopamine production may explain why people aren't deterred when predictions, and the expectations created by those predictions, do not come true in cult situations or with Qanon.

Based on this model….

32/
..…the delusional, non-occurring predictions may actually reinforce belief in the conspiracy/cult because it supplies the necessary 50% miss rate needed for optimum dopamine production….

33/
....with the other 50% of perceived “accurately anticipated” events being the result of delusional subjective interpretations of events that create “false positive” confirmations:

34/
Other relevant threads, including whether Qanon is morphing into a religion: 35/
A thread involving dopamine and Toxplasmosis: 36/
A thread analyzing dopamine and Covid denial:
37/
Thread analyzing the manipulation of neuropsychological fear responses: 38/
....39/.....
Article form of the original thread. No paywall: 40/ patreon.com/posts/52459012
Thread on the "Fire Hose of Lies" disinformation campaign: 41/
This is a really interesting TedTalk on addiction. Applying it to the political climate, and viewing it through the lens of demonization/tribalism.....The obvious challenge we face as a country?........42/ ted.com/talks/johann_h…
...How to re-establish connection & strengthen "bonding"....when the incentive structure for many in the media, especially people like Tucker Carlson, is to create an emotional response that not only sabotages those bonds with fellow Americans, but also with family members? 43/
....44/....
Follow up thread analyzing a study that found parallels between addiction and white supremacy:
Follow up/related thread addressing dopamine-related illnesses such as Parkinson's/Schizophrenia, and the effect of exposing people with altered states of perception...either due to illness/disorder, or "self-medication"... to Qanon/conspiracy theories:

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More from @Nick_Carmody

Nick Carmody JD, MS Psych Profile picture
Nov 6
After watching the first three days of the Republican National Convention I wrote this thread.

Later that night, I was on @donlemon and discussed the effect the surrogates (Rogan, etc) would have on young men.

Soon after, I was on the Muckrake podcast reiterating my observation of the evolution/"maturation" of the MAGA movement.

And over the last several months, I've been analyzing and criticizing @jordanbpeterson's psychological analysis and endorsement of Trump.

1/x.com/Nick_Carmody/s…Image
.....2/.... Image
In April, a multidisciplinary report was released addressing young men. The report opened with by quoting me.....which is relevant to Trump's election victory:

3/ Image
Read 13 tweets
Nick Carmody JD, MS Psych Profile picture
Nov 2
It's really difficult to pause, and reflect when we are consumed with fear and anxiety. Contemplating our "shadow" in the Carl Jungian sense is a higher level of consciousness....it requires us to engage our prefrontal cortex.

Fear and anxiety keep the amygdala engaged in overdrive.....which hijacks the prefrontal cortex.

The more scared and anxious we are, the more self-preservational we become.

1/
Exposure to chronic stress and fear literally rewires our brains to become rewired, and to become disproportionately reactive to stress/anxiety/fear…

....so that we respond to subsequent stress/fear-inducing experiences more intensely and for a longer duration:

2/Image
At the most extreme levels, self-preservation presents in ways that are similar to Cluster B Personality Disorders:

We become consumed with the self (narcissism) to the point of recklessly disregarding others (sociopathy)....it becomes a Darwinian, dog-eat-dog, law of the jungle mentality.

I've written about this previously:
3/
 x.com/Nick_Carmody/s…Image
Read 10 tweets
Nick Carmody JD, MS Psych Profile picture
Oct 28
It's becoming increasingly clear that the greatest danger of a Trump election victory on January 5th may not be Trump…….

.....it’s that JD Vance will be Vice President to a guy who is almost 80 years old, who is obese, and who doesn’t believe in exercise

This interview with Tapper displays Vance’s dishonesty, bad faith, and his considerable gaslighting skill.

This interview displays how difficult it is to have a rational, logical, internally consistent conversation with someone who as intelligent, and as skilled in gaslighting as Vance.

In this interview, Vance obscures and distracts from the focus on Trump’s personality disorders and lack of character by dismissively framing the people warning about Trump as being war-lusting "disgruntled" employees who are only speaking out because they have "an axe to grind".

Tapper:
4 star Marine Corp General/DHS secretary/Chief of Staff John Kelly’s,
4 star Marine Corp General/Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis;
3 star General/National Security Adviser H.R McMaster
Trump appointed Chairman of Joint Chief of Staffs Mark Milley;
Vice President Mike Pence;
John Bolton
Secretary of Defense John Esper

Vance: “Are you going to listen to every Trump administration official?”

One of the manipulative tactics of gaslighting manipulators is to frame the other party to the argument as being at fault, or ridiculous, for bringing up serious issues and/or egregious behaviors.

Here, for example, Vance implies that the problem isn’t that an unprecedented number of highly accomplished people are warning about Trump’s psychological unfitness…..it’s that:

1) Tapper is *ridiculous* because he is listing/listening to “every Trump administration official”

…and….

2) ….all of these unprecedented warnings from highly accomplished officials about Trump being psychologically unfit from actually exposes a flaw in Kamala Harris: that she won’t fire anyone…..and that all of these people are disgruntled because Trump fired them. Basically, Vance is saying that all of these people warning about Trump's unfitness is a sign of Trump's leadership, as evidenced by his propensity to fire people.

Not only is Vance gaslighting with his pivot away from their warnings, but he’s lying. When Tapper goes down the list pointing out that Trump actually did not fire them....which undermines Vance’s entire argument…..Vance doubles down on his false narrative/lies:
“He fired a lot of those people, Jake, and he did so because they weren’t doing their job.”

Vance then

Vance tries to gaslight and distract from John Kelly’s warnings about Trump's unfitness when he claims that John Kelly’s “fundamental disagreement” with Trump is because Trump would not accede to his warmongering:
“Why does John Kelly not support Trump? It’s about policy not personality”.

Tapper rebuts Vance's gaslighting by pointing out that Kelly said he agrees with Trump on almost all policies. Tapper also points out that Kelly lost a son in Afghanistan and never stated whether he supported the wars he and his son fought in.

Vance gaslights again: “Is your argument that a person who lost a son means they can’t be wrong about public policy?.....then why bring that up”

Tapper points out that Kelly never took a public position on whether Kelly agreed with the wars.

Vance supports his gaslighting narrative/claim, not with evidence, but with "feels" and *second hand conversations* (see below) when he says: “….because I KNOW John Kelly’s worldview…and I know the people who have attacked Donald Trump the most vociferously on foreign policy they’ll say well he’s a dictator, and what they really mean is that Donald Trump won’t listen to the leadership of the military when they want Trump to start ridiculous conflicts”.

Vance is attempting to dismiss numerous extremely accomplished people’s concerns about Trump’s psychological unfitness, and frame it as “policy disagreements”.....from disgruntled fired former employees (even though most resigned).....as being from people who are driven by the inhumanity/profit of war.....and from people who oppose Trump because he is a “dove” who only wants peace and prosperity.

Remember, Trump has rooted for American suffering so he can politically/personally benefit from it (stock market, border security bill, etc.)

After sensing observing that Vance is relying on what “I know” rather than facts, empirical evidence....Tapper says:
“….you’re ascribing worldviews based on gut…there’s no evidence…”

3:30 Vance: “Based on people I’ve talked to in the Trump administration….” (second hand conversations)

Tapper: “Kelly was at DHS and chief of staff, he was not weighing in…[on the wars]”

Question:

When Vance called Trump Hitler, and "cultural heroin"…..was it because Vance opposed Trump’s peace and prosperity-driven public/foreign policy?

1/Image
x.com/atrupar/status…

Tapper quoting Vance: “I guarantee John Kelly talked with Harris's campaign….People close to Kelly and the Harris campaign”.

When Tapper reports that both sides denied speaking to each other.
Vance says, “Oh, I’m highly skeptical of that, Jake…..you know the way these attacks work. You know the way these people are often vetted….”

Tapper: “…so you made it up?

Vance: “No (but Vance’s tone when denying he made it up suggests otherwise)… I said the American media and Dem party apparatus works a certain way, if it comes out that John Kelly never ever spoke with [the Harris campaign]….then I’m happy too…”

Tapper: “I’m telling you that.”

Vance: "You’re telling me that based on second hand conversation with John Kelly…..and it’s interesting, we’ve now spent three minutes talking about John Kelly…..if it is true that he never spoke with anyone in Kamala Harris’ orbit I’m happy to apologize to John Kelly for mis-stating how he delivered this news to the Atlantic Magazine…”

….and then Vance uses the choice of who Kelly spoke to as a means of delegitimizing Kelly's warnings:

“Jeffrey Goldberg who lied the U.S. into the Iraq war, which led to the deaths of millions of innocent Arabs and thousands of innocent Americans…..you don’t go to that guy if you don’t have a particular ideological motive. I think that’s what’s going on, if I’m wrong, I’m happy to say I’m wrong.”

Vance speculates and accuses people of motives that he, “thinks”, what he “knows”, etc.

2/
x.com/atrupar/status…

Vance, once again tries to shift the focus from Trump’s unfitness, to Tapper for asking the questions about it:
“But, this is the thing, Jake, we’ve now spent 5 minutes talking about people in Donald Trump’s staff……”

Tapper: “….who think he’s unfit for office…”

Vance: “….who he fired……oh, they didn’t think he was unfit for office until they had a falling out with him because he fired him….”

Vance continues to lie about

1) Mattis/Kelly/etc., being fired,…

...and...
2) about their level of concern when they agreed to work for Trump: Many of them went to work for Trump precisely BECAUSE they thought he was unfit, needed guardrails, and/or viewed it as a responsibility to the country to help Trump (and the country) have a successful/stable presidency.

Tapper attempts to talk about Trump’s literal statements/quotes about threatening to use the military against Americans.

Vance pathetically claims that Tapper is stating what Trump “allegedly said”, and tries to cling to the defense that Trump never actually said the words, “American citizens”.
This is another gaslighting technique by Vance who wants to get hung up on semantics, and defends Trump saying he would use the military against American citizens.

Vance: “He did not say he would send the military after the American people! Show me the quote where he said that…..He said far Left wing lunatics. He’s talking about people rioting after the election……people who burned down American cities in the summer of 2020…..yes, we should have a federal law enforcement response.”

Tapper points out the Trump said he wants to use the military against the “enemy within”, and that Trump has described the Left, Pelosi, Schiff, etc. as “the enemy within”.
Vance then tries to obfuscate, but then says he agrees with Trump that the military should be used to go after people who riot and burn down cities.

Some thoughts….

1) Virtually all of the people Vance mentioned are “American people/citizens”, so Vance intentionally argued and denied the obvious meanings of Trump’s statements to create conversational/interview chaos….....before finally agreeing with what Trump said.

2) “Left wing lunatics” is subjective. And in Trump’s pathological mind, anyone who opposes or attempts to hold him accountable is a “lunatic”.
How would a Democratic president define “Right Wing lunatics”? How would MAGA react to Harris using the military against MAGA rioters? We already know the answer to that question because MAGA has lionized the January 6th convicts as “political prisoners”.

3) Vance seemingly misspeaks about using the military against “people rioting after the election”, because he does not repeat that when he reiterates people who riot and burn down cities should have the military used against them. Imagine victimhood/martyrdom narratives that the Right would lose their mind over if Biden/Harris used the military on MAGA protestors. The Right is still incensed over the manner with which the Capitol Police defended the Capitol.

@JDVance…..the same pathetic, dishonest, gaslighting coward who relies on what he “thinks”/“knows” when making unsubstantiated “gut” accusations against the Generals/cabinet members speaking out against Trump “based on people [Vance] talked to in the Trump administration” ….

.....suddenly has a problem with an “anonymously sourced story”….meaning unsubstantiated….and “second hand conversations with John Kelly”.

3/
Read 4 tweets
Nick Carmody JD, MS Psych Profile picture
Oct 26
I've written extensively about Peterson's misdiagnosis of Trump....and the (his) emotional/psychological factors that may explain it.

If Peterson came out against Trump, he might single handedly keep him out of office b/c of his immense influence with men…

...and because:

1/ Image
Thread analyzing Peterson's ridiculous confusion by and assessment of "Trump Derangement Syndrome"....by psychoanalyzing Peterson:

2/
Thread analyzing Peterson's ridiculous "psychoanalysis" of Trump:
3/ Image
Read 7 tweets
Nick Carmody JD, MS Psych Profile picture
Oct 22
This is a really interesting conversation. There are multiple things going on:

1) @GreggHurwitz is giving very informative presentation about how our foreign enemies are tearing apart the country….and how to mitigate the polarization/tribalism that foreign (and domestic) enemies are stoking.

2) The subtext of the discussion is one that plays out repeatedly across the country:

An acknowledgment that the country is being torn apart by divisive, “pathological”, “psychopaths” and “narcissists”…..yet people’s personal investment (identity), ego/pride, emotion-driven subjectivity cause them to either...

.....be incapable of seeing their personal, or the collective tribe’s (political leaders/partisan media/constituents), contribution to the problem……

.....or they just simply refuse to do so.

This is happening throughout this discussion.

Let’s unpack…..

1/
youtube.com/watch?v=ZVw2sd…Image
@Gregghurwitz is trying to comprehensively analyze a multidimensional problem that both sides contribute to…..

....and with one or two exceptions, Peterson is insistent on only pointing out the Left’s problems, while completely ignoring that Trump is not only the antithesis of conservative values/culture that Peterson views as the core of human civilization…..

....but that, due to his severe Cluster B Personality Disorders, Trump is also incapable of conducting himself in a way that does not destroy that “core”....that “center”….that is referred to repeatedly in the discussion.

2/
This discussion....and tribalism more generally....feels like the verbal equivalent of color blindness where....

....instead of one party to the conversation not being able to see reds and greens....

.....Peterson does not hear verbal “reds and greens”:

Constructive criticisms of the Right....

....and, more importantly....

....the fundamental cancerous cause of Right Wing toxicity: Trump

3/
Read 56 tweets
Nick Carmody JD, MS Psych Profile picture
Oct 14
The diagnostic criteria for personality disorders are “a pervasive pattern” of behavior that falls outside of a normal range….to the point of drastically deviating from generally acceptable behavior.

@mcuban
1/ Image
The diagnostic criteria for personality disorders are “a pervasive pattern” of behavior that falls outside of a normal range….to the point of drastically deviating from generally acceptable behavior.

2/ @mcuban

....3/...
Read 4 tweets

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