The Ideology of No

[:1]The Ideology of No

New research into how liberals and conservatives think differently.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/ar...SA_WR_20110810


Quote:




Long before Barack Obama chose �Yes We Can� as his 2008 campaign slogan, Republicans had been dubbed the Party of No. The label is popular among liberals as an insult for the GOP, but it�s also been embraced by conservatives as a proud self-description: for some on the right, the Party of No conjures the adults in the room saving future generations from an orgiastic spending spree, in the spirit of William F. Buckley�s proclamation that conservatism �stands athwart history, yelling Stop.�

(...)

Most strikingly, both studies showed that this negativity dominance was especially true for conservative students. In other words, those on the political right showed more of a �bad is stronger than good� bias than those on the left. Surprisingly, the political difference wasn�t to be found in the negative images, which had a strong effect on everyone across the board. If you can wrap your mind around psych study jujitsu for a moment: the differences stemmed from participants� responses to the positive images, which carried more weight with liberal students. For example, if viewing two hypothetical television ads�one featuring an impoverished village in shambles after a failed food distribution program, and one showing clean, happy children after a successful well installation�liberals may be more likely to be convinced of the potential success of future aid programs.




Discuss.|||Someone should check the validity of their findings..

This last paragraph summarizes the findings better though:


Quote:




But like many of the findings about ideology, this finding can be spun different ways: if you want to flatter the left, you can say it shows them as less biased, less cynical, and more open to a positive worldview. If you want to flatter the right, you can say this shows conservatives as more cautious, less pie-in-the-sky, and even more sensible (if you think negative information should have more of an impact). Like the Party of No label, the Psychology of No could be an insult or a compliment, depending on which side of the political spectrum you’re on.




Anyway, we should just call them the party of haters.

As a side now, I'd very much hate any Chinese cutesy character regardless of ponies or garbage.|||Bollicks, imo. Like studies give me a "reading too much into" vibe.|||rofl on hating cutesy characters regardless of ponies and garbage.

I wouldn't call them the party of haters, because I don't think you can paint an accurate picture of a whole 50% (more or less) of Americans, especially not as haters. More cautious, that I can accept. Maybe some correlations with religiousness etc. But not haters...

Besides, no and yes depends on how you frame the question.

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I find studies on political parties pretty lacking generally, but hey, they're fun.|||I don't think 50% of Americans are Republicans.

I also don't think they're a party of "No": I mean, they say yes anytime people offer them more money or to screw the lower and middle class! *Rimshot*

Kind of relevant article about how Tea Partiers are out of their mind and how the Republican party should not really be considered the party of Lincoln anymore.|||Quote:




This finding fits with previous studies showing conservatives (relative to liberals) to be more responsive to threats, more resistant to change, and more likely to see the world as a dangerous place – all of which involve some form of negative attitudes, be they about the past, present, or future.




Also, other studies show that those more conservative inclined are less tolerant of ambiguity, preferring a more black and white view of the world.


Quote:




Like much research on ideological differences, these findings are likely to inspire as much controversy as wonder, with liberals hailing the discovery of a new conservative bias, and conservatives dismissing the research itself as biased.




While I think individuals aren't so easily pegged into nice tidy category, we all have some shared characteristics. I'd like to see more research into this. If the Republicans don't cut all funding from scientific research that is.|||At least this study can be seen as either good or bad, it really depends...

Ambiguity tolerance I think is really important though if you need to be able to process complex situations. Agreed that republicans leaders don't seem good at it.|||Our brains for better or worse are really good at organizing things. We're always trying to put something into some kind of box in order to contextualize the world. The problem is that the world by and large isn't all that organized. Ramming that square peg into a round hole doesn't always work.

I read somewhere that people whom are fairly conservative in nature tend to have strong authoritative fathers. I have no idea if this is true or not. So I can't back up this claim.|||Quote:








I read somewhere that people whom are fairly conservative in nature tend to have strong authoritative fathers. I have no idea if this is true or not. So I can't back up this claim.




That may correlate with more traditional values and family structures, which is likely to happen more in conservative families, but I wouldn't say that it's a cause of conservatism in itself.|||Left and right ideology is just to mask the presence of cyber ghosts who don't want the spotlight on them.

Pay attention people. It's the cyber ghosts that you should be worried about.