The Molecule of More: How a Single Chemical in Your Brain Drives Love, Sex, and Creativity―and Will Determine the Fate of the Human Race

by Daniel Z. Lieberman

There’s a good chance that the difficulty the conservatives faced stemmed from differences in their DNA. In fact, political attitudes in general seem to be influenced by genetics. In addition to the American Journal of Political Science article just discussed, other studies support a link between a genetic disposition to a dopaminergic personality and a liberal ideology. Researchers from the University of California, San Diego focused on a gene that codes for one of the dopamine receptors called D4. Like most genes, the D4 gene has a number of variants. Slight variations in genes are called alleles. Each person’s collection of different alleles (along with the environment they grew up in) helps determine their unique personality. One of the variants of the D4 gene is called 7R. People who have the 7R variant tend to be novelty-seeking. They have less tolerance for monotony and pursue whatever is new