Liberals and conservatives can show similarities in negativity bias (original) (raw)
Related papers
The ideological-conflict hypothesis: Intolerance among both liberals and conservatives
The ideological-conflict hypothesis: Intolerance among both liberals and conservatives, 2014
Decades of research in social and political psychology have demonstrated that political conservatives appear more intolerant toward a variety of groups than do political liberals. Recent work from our three independent labs has challenged this conventional wisdom by suggesting that some of the psychological underpinnings of intolerance are not exclusive to people on either end of the political spectrum. These studies have demonstrated that liberals and conservatives express similar levels of intolerance toward ideologically dissimilar and threatening groups. We suggest directions for future research and discuss the psychological and political implications of our conclusions.
Differences in negativity bias underlie variations in political ideology
Disputes between those holding differing political views are ubiquitous and deep-seated, and they often follow common, recognizable lines. The supporters of tradition and stability, sometimes referred to as conservatives, do battle with the supporters of innovation and reform, sometimes referred to as liberals. Understanding the correlates of those distinct political orientations is probably a prerequisite for managing political disputes, which are a source of social conflict that can lead to frustration and even bloodshed. A rapidly growing body of empirical evidence documents a multitude of ways in which liberals and conservatives differ from each other in purviews of life with little direct connection to politics, from tastes in art to desire for closure and from disgust sensitivity to the tendency to pursue new information, but the central theme of the differences is a matter of debate. In this article, we argue that one organizing element of the many differences between liberals and conservatives is the nature of their physiological and psychological responses to features of the environment that are negative. Compared with liberals, conservatives tend to register greater physiological responses to such stimuli and also to devote more psychological resources to them. Operating from this point of departure, we suggest approaches for refining understanding of the broad relationship between political views and response to the negative. We conclude with a discussion of normative implications, stressing that identifying differences across ideological groups is not tantamount to declaring one ideology superior to another.
Threat causes liberals to think like conservatives
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2009
In Study 1, politically liberal college students' in-group favoritism increased after a system-injustice threat, becoming as pronounced as that of conservatives. Studies 2 and 3 conceptually replicated these results with low preference for consistency . Preference for consistency: The development of a valid measure and the discovery of surprising behavioral implications. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69, 318-328.] as a dispositional measure of liberalism. In Study 2, following a mortality salience threat, dispositionally liberal students showed as much conviction in their attitudes toward capital punishment and abortion as dispositional conservatives did. In Study 3, after a mortality salience threat, liberal students became as staunchly unsupportive of homosexuals as conservatives were. The findings that political and dispositional liberals become more politically and psychologically conservative after threats provide convergent experimental support for the [Jost, J. T., Glaser, J., . Political conservatism as motivated social cognition. Psychological Bulletin, 129 339-375.] contention that conservatism is a basic form of motivated social cognition.
Is negativity bias intuitive for liberals and conservatives?
Current Psychology
Previous research suggests that conservatives (right-wingers) tend to show more negativity bias than liberals (left-wingers) in several tasks. However, the majority of these studies are based on correlational findings and do not provide information on the cognitive underpinnings of this tendency. The current research investigated whether intuition promotes negativity bias and mitigates the ideological asymmetry in this domain in three underrepresented, non-western samples (Turkey). In line with the previous literature, we defined negativity bias as the tendency to interpret ambiguous faces as threatening. The results of the lab experiment revealed that negativity bias increases under high-cognitive load overall. In addition, this effect was moderated by the participants' political orientation (Experiment 1). In other words, when their cognitive resources were depleted, liberals became more like conservatives in terms of negativity bias. However, we failed to conceptually replicate this effect using time-limit manipulations in two online preregistered experiments during the COVID-19 pandemic, where the baseline negativity bias is thought to be already at peak. Thus, the findings provide no strong evidence for the idea that intuition promotes negativity bias and that liberals use cognitive effort to avoid this perceptual bias.
Fear Among the Extremes: How Political Ideology Predicts Negative Emotions and Outgroup Derogation
Personality & social psychology bulletin, 2015
The "rigidity of the right" hypothesis predicts that particularly the political right experiences fear and derogates outgroups. We propose that above and beyond that, the political extremes (at both sides of the spectrum) are more likely to display these responses than political moderates. Results of a large-scale sample reveal the predicted quadratic term on socio-economic fear. Moreover, although the political right is more likely to derogate the specific category of immigrants, we find a quadratic effect on derogation of a broad range of societal categories. Both extremes also experience stronger negative emotions about politics than politically moderate respondents. Finally, the quadratic effects on derogation of societal groups and negative political emotions were mediated by socio-economic fear, particularly among left- and right-wing extremists. It is concluded that negative emotions and outgroup derogation flourish among the extremes.
Linking neuroscience to political intolerance and political judgment
Politics and the Life Sciences, 1998
There is substantial evidence that intolerance arises from perceptions of difference. A prevailing view holds that even if intolerance is understandable as a defense mechanism, or as an attitude intended to ward off threatening groups and noxious activities, it often is the result of human irrationality and indulgence of prejudice. This conclusion is supported by studies that seem to demonstrate the apparent irrelevance of the actual level of threat to levels of intolerance. These studies show human actions attendant to diversity are caused by established convictions (i.e., prejudice) rather than by the degree of threat. However, informed by theoretical approaches provided by neuroscientists, we report findings that threat is, indeed, a provocative factor that modifies political tolerance in predictable ways. Previous studies defined threat as probabilistic assessments of the likelihood of bad events. When threat is defined as novelty and normative violations (i.e., as departures from expected, or normal, occurrence), then consistent relationships to intolerance are obtained. ). UNFORTUNATELY, THE INCLINATION of the human species to organize itself in groups did not bring with it a pattern of intergroup relationships governed by evenhandedness, tolerance, or tranquility. Rather, people tend to judge members of other groups quite differently than they judge members of their own group (Brigham and Malpass, 1985; Lanzetta and Englis, 1989; Linville and Jones, 1980). The term ethnocentrism has been coined to categorize this powerful and apparently universal tendency (LeVine and Campbell, 1972). Liberal democracies are regimes dedicated to securing the benefits of individual rather than group identities and prerogatives, as well as to encouraging the universal protection of and active reliance on political rights for all amidst increasingly diverse populations.1 However, if group membership, and differential hostility towards groups most unlike our own, remain enduring features of political and social life, then how will liberal democracies achieve a consensus regarding the importance of protecting the rights of all? Perhaps the most fundamental answer is to inculcate values that will lead people to understand and apply norms of political tolerance (Kautz, 1993; McClosky and Brill, 1983; Stouffer, 1955; Sullivan, Piereson, and Marcus . Political tolerance is of central importance to diverse liberal democracies because it recognizes the sovereignty of the majority while seeking to secure for everyone, even the most despised, the right to engage in public deliberations. While this answer is appealing, it is by itself inadequate. We must also concern ourselves with gaining a better understanding of what makes tolerance so difficult to secure.
2014
Disputes between those holding differing political views are ubiquitous and deep-seated, and they often follow common, recognizable lines. The supporters of tradition and stability, sometimes referred to as conservatives, do battle with the supporters of innovation and reform, sometimes referred to as liberals. Understanding the correlates of those distinct political orientations is probably a prerequisite for managing political disputes, which are a source of social conflict that can lead to frustration and even bloodshed. A rapidly growing body of empirical evidence documents a multitude of ways in which liberals and conservatives differ from each other in purviews of life with little direct connection to politics, from tastes in art to desire for closure and from disgust sensitivity to the tendency to pursue new information, but the central theme of the differences is a matter of debate. In this article, we argue that one organizing element of the many differences between liberals and conservatives is the nature of their physiological and psychological responses to features of the environment that are negative. Compared with liberals, conservatives tend to register greater physiological responses to such stimuli and also to devote more psychological resources to them. Operating from this point of departure, we suggest approaches for refining understanding of the broad relationship between political views and response to the negative. We conclude with a discussion of normative implications, stressing that identifying differences across ideological groups is not tantamount to declaring one ideology superior to another.
Jost et al. (2003) Political conservatism as motivated social cognition
Analyzing political conservatism as motivated social cognition integrates theories of personality (authoritarianism, dogmatism-intolerance of ambiguity), epistemic and existential needs (for closure, regulatory focus, terror management), and ideological rationalization (social dominance, system justification). A meta-analysis (88 samples, 12 countries, 22,818 cases) confirms that several psychological variables predict political conservatism: death anxiety (weighted mean r ϭ .50); system instability (.47); dogmatism-intolerance of ambiguity (.34); openness to experience (-.32); uncertainty tolerance (-.27); needs for order, structure, and closure (.26); integrative complexity (-.20); fear of threat and loss (.18); and self-esteem (-.09). The core ideology of conservatism stresses resistance to change and justification of inequality and is motivated by needs that vary situationally and dispositionally to manage uncertainty and threat.