Like baboons, our elected leaders are literally addicted to power

Political power has a similar effect on the brain to coc aine - and it's not surprising that our political leaders are hooked on it.

Power changes the brain triggering increased testosterone in both men and women.

Testosterone and one of its by-products called 3-androstanediol, are addictive, largely because they increase dopamine in a part of the brain’s reward system called the nucleus accumbens.

Cocaine has its effects through this system also, and by hijacking our brain’s reward system, it can give short-term extreme pleasure but leads to long-term addiction, with all that that entails.

Unfettered power has almost identical effects.

Submissiveness and dominance have their effects on the same reward circuits of the brain as power and coc aine. Baboons low down in the dominance hierarchy have lower levels of dopamine in key brain areas, but if they get ‘promoted’ to a higher position, then dopamine rises accordingly.

This makes them more aggressive and sexually active, and in humans similar changes happen when people are given power.

But too much power - and hence too much dopamine - can disrupt normal cognition and emotion, leading to gross errors of judgment and imperviousness to risk, not to mention huge egocentricity and lack of empathy for others.

The Telegraph

So power produces testosterone which increases dopamine which is addictive.

But too much dopamine causes major errors of judgment and excessive risk taking, as well as huge egos and a lack of empathy for others.

So there is a brain chemical basis for why politicians are arrogant a**holes who are always right?