I stumbled across a fantastic article by John Mauldin. Mauldin is a financial advisor, but in this article he delves into the subject of Psycology.
"Last week, I heard a very disquieting commentary on National Public Radio by Dr. Drew Westen of Emory University. Westen is a well respected psychologist, but he was commenting upon how our feelings can predict our political decision irrespective of the facts. ... For example, during the disputed election of 2000, we could predict whether people would believe that manual or machine counts are more accurate just by knowing their feelings towards the two parties and the two candidates. ...they're not just weighing the facts. Without knowing it, they're also weighing what they would feel if they came to one conclusion or another, and they often come to the conclusion that would make them feel better, no matter what the facts are. ... In fact, the evidence barely mattered. 84% of the time, we could predict whether people believed the evidence was sufficient... based on just three things... Adding the evidence into the equation allowed us to increase the prediction from 84% to 85%."
"We believe what we want to believe because to do otherwise would upset our world. The potential emotional stress of a contrary opinion is too much for us to deal with, so we go along with the (personally) least stressful emotional choice."
Without a shadow of a doubt I believe this to be true. I have seen it happen in other people and have sometimes wondered it in myself. Likely we all need to be a bit more open to the facts presented to us, and be open to the fact that tho we might not like something and yet it could still be the truth.