Intro; Acknowledgements; Also by Brian M. Hughes; Contents; 1 Brexit as Psychodrama; The Psychologising of Brexit; Empire 2.0; From Self-Regard to Self-Loathing; From Self-Loathing to Self-Abuse; A Scientific Psychology of Brexit; Psychodrama Under the Microscope; The Problem of Improbability; The Problem of Easily Remembered Examples; The Problem of Counterexamples; The Problem of Simpler Explanations; The Real Psychology of Brexit; 2 Reasoning Through Brexit; I. Decisions, Decisions; That Is the Question; The Age of Ill-Reason; Brexit Means ... ; This Message Will Self-Destruct ...

It's (Not) the Economy, StupidSilver-Medal Anxiety; Complex Numbers; II. A Brain Made for Taking Shortcuts; Rules of Thumb: Free-Flowing Memories; Rules of Thumb: Anchors Ahoy!; Rules of Thumb: Give It to Me Exactly ... ; Rules of Thumb: What's Mine Is, Well, Mine; Peer Pressure: Nothing to Lose but Your Sense of Perspective; Peer Pressure: Truthiness; Problems of Rose-Tinted Glasses: Everything Is Awesome; Problems of Rose-Tinted Glasses: Everything Is Under Control; Problems of Rose-Tinted Glasses: It's Not Me, It's You; People and Their Feelings; 3 The Brexit People

I. One Size Does Not Fit AllKnow Your Audience; Personality Goes a Long Way; Enough of Experts; Take Me to Your Leader; II. Groups Matter; The Hive Mind; Echo, Echo; Poles Apart; Deal or No Deal: Parliamentarians as Prisoners; Identify Yourself; The Point of It All; 4 Brexit Anxiety; I. On Brexit as a Cause of Mental Illness; Land of No Hope and Glory; Our Survey Says; Need More Data; Drug Machine; Economic Instability Is Bad for Mental Health; II. On Mental Illness as a Cause of Brexit; The Insanity Offence; The Pathologising of Politics, and the Politicising of Pathology; The New Normal

A Case Study in How to Cause Stress5 Learning from Brexit; I. Brexit Perspectives; Respect for Authority; None but the Righteous; Beware the Illusion of Perspective; Return to Psychodrama; Not just Britain; The Irish Question(s); 'Why Haven't They Left Yet?'; II. Ten Lessons from the Psychology of Brexit; Lesson 1: Ignore the Psychodrama, but Learn from History; Lesson 2: Mental Autonomy Is a Tempting and Consoling Bias-People Are More Influenced by Situational Factors and Consensus Than They Realise; Lesson 3: The 'Will of the People' Has Poor Construct Validity

Lesson 4: People Make Partisan Decisions, but Systematically Overestimate Their Own Logic and SoundnessLesson 5: Everything Is Social; Lesson 6: Groups Descend Quickly into Vicious Cycles of Polarisation; Lesson 7: When Game Theory Ensures that Everybody Loses, Stop Playing; Lesson 8: A Conscientious Administration Will Prepare for Mental Health Consequences; Lesson 9: A Conscientious Administration Will Go to Effort to Reduce Situational Risk Factors; Lesson 10: Brexit Is Psychological, Not Political; References; Index