The Self-Validating Role of Political Ideology on Political Attitudes

Recently there has been a resurgence of interest in the influence of ideology on the formation and maintenance of political attitudes. Much of this work has examined ideology as an individual difference that influences evaluations of political issues; these studies instead examined how one's ideology explicitly serves to polarize political opinions. Using the self-validation perspective as a theoretical backdrop, two studies examine the role of political ideology in validating thoughts about a political issue. In Study 1, considering one's political ideology after writing about one's attitude toward abortion increased thought confidence and attitude extremity related to abortion. Study 2 utilized a more subtle manipulation of ideology salience and found that political ideology validated thoughts about abortion, but not the issue of changing the legal drinking age (an issue less related to political ideology). These studies suggest that political ideology plays a role in attitude extremity and certainty toward ideology-relevant issues.

Download Full-text

Concern about salient pathogen threats increases sensitivity to disgust

10.31234/osf.io/uvd9k ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Shelby Boggs ◽

Benjamin Ruisch ◽

Russell Fazio

Keyword(s):

Individual Difference ◽

Political Ideology ◽

Strong Support ◽

Societal Implications ◽

Intergroup Attitudes ◽

Right Wing ◽

Disgust Sensitivity ◽

Local Ecology

Individuals vary substantially in their sensitivity to disgust—differences that have implications for intergroup attitudes, political ideology, and beyond. However, the source of this variability in disgust sensitivity remains a subject of debate. In this work, we test the hypothesis that sensitivity to disgust is "calibrated" by an individual's concern about disease threats in their local ecology. Leveraging the COVID-19 pandemic, we obtain strong support for this hypothesis, finding that disgust sensitivity increased following the COVID-19 outbreak and that the degree of this increase was moderated by an individual's subjective concern about contracting the disease. This work fills a longstanding theoretical gap regarding the sources of variability in disgust sensitivity, while challenging the view that disgust sensitivity is an immutable individual difference. Given the role of disgust in motivating intergroup prejudice and right-wing ideologies, we anticipate that these increases in disgust sensitivity are likely to have important downstream societal implications.

Download Full-text

The “chicken-and-egg” development of political opinions

Politics and the Life Sciences ◽

10.1017/pls.2017.1 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 36 (1) ◽

pp. 1-13 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Peter Beattie

Keyword(s):

Environmental Factors ◽

Brain Structure ◽

Political Ideology ◽

Role Play ◽

Twin Studies ◽

Complex Interplay ◽

Political Issue ◽

Neurological Research ◽

Genetic And Environmental Factors ◽

Political Opinions

Twin studies have revealed political ideology to be partially heritable. Neurological research has shown that ideological differences are reflected in brain structure and response, suggesting a direct genotype-phenotype link. Social and informational environments, however, also demonstrably affect brain structure and response. This leads to a “chicken-and-egg” question: do genes produce brains with ideological predispositions, causing the preferential absorption of consonant information and thereby forming an ideology, or do social and informational environments do most of the heavy lifting, with genetic evidence the spurious artifact of outdated methodology? Or are both inextricably intertwined contributors? This article investigates the relative contributions of genetic and environmental factors to ideological development using a role-play experiment investigating the development of opinions on a novel political issue. The results support the view that the process is bidirectional, suggesting that, like most traits, political ideology is produced by the complex interplay of genetic and (social/informational) environmental influences.

Download Full-text

The self-control consequences of political ideology

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ◽

10.1073/pnas.1503530112 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 112 (27) ◽

pp. 8250-8253 ◽

Cited By ~ 20

Author(s):

Joshua J. Clarkson ◽

John R. Chambers ◽

Edward R. Hirt ◽

Ashley S. Otto ◽

Frank R. Kardes ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Political Ideology ◽

The Self ◽

Self Control ◽

Task Persistence ◽

Critical Difference ◽

Attention Regulation ◽

Political Conservatism ◽

Insight Into ◽

And Task

Evidence from three studies reveals a critical difference in self-control as a function of political ideology. Specifically, greater endorsement of political conservatism (versus liberalism) was associated with greater attention regulation and task persistence. Moreover, this relationship is shown to stem from varying beliefs in freewill; specifically, the association between political ideology and self-control is mediated by differences in the extent to which belief in freewill is endorsed, is independent of task performance or motivation, and is reversed when freewill is perceived to impede (rather than enhance) self-control. Collectively, these findings offer insight into the self-control consequences of political ideology by detailing conditions under which conservatives and liberals are better suited to engage in self-control and outlining the role of freewill beliefs in determining these conditions.

Download Full-text

Objective Conditions Count, Political Beliefs Decide: The Conditional Effects of Self-Interest and Ideology on Redistribution Preferences

Political Studies ◽

10.1177/0032321721993652 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 003232172199365

Author(s):

Klaus Armingeon ◽

David Weisstanner

Keyword(s):

Political Ideology ◽

European Social Survey ◽

The Self ◽

Social Survey ◽

Political Beliefs ◽

Conditional Effects ◽

Self Interest ◽

Left And Right ◽

The Difference

How can we explain variation in demand for redistribution among cross-pressured voters? We argue that redistributive preferences reflect an interaction between material self-interest and political ideology. The self-interest argument predicts growing opposition to redistribution as income increases, while the argument of ideologically driven preferences suggests that left-leaning citizens are more supportive of redistribution than right-leaning citizens. Focusing on cross-pressured voters, we expect that the difference in redistribution preferences between left- and right-leaning citizens is smaller at the bottom of the income hierarchy than at the top. Among the group of left-leaning citizens, the role of material self-interest is expected to be smaller than among right-leaning citizens. We provide evidence in line with our argument analysing data from the European Social Survey in 25 European democracies between 2008 and 2018.

Download Full-text