The Generalizability of Personality Effects in Politics

Vitriol, Joseph A.; Larsen, Erik Gahner; Ludeke, Steven G.

doi:10.1002/per.2222

Cited by 34 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 51 publications

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“…Our standardized coefficient is 37 times smaller than the statistically significant and substantive effect (d=. 37) reported by Oxley et al…”

Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 79%

“…We believe that this is an unlikely explanation for our failed replication. In line with recent work in the personality and politics literature 37,38 and replication attempts in social psychology, 23 we find no evidence for a stronger association between threat sensitivity and social conservatism once we constrain our sample to people that more closely resemble those in Oxley et al's sample with respect to age and race (Question 10 -e.g., Supplementary Figure 32 -45) or the distribution of social conservatism (Question 11 -e.g., Supplementary Figure 46). Yet, other unknown differences caused by the different sampling strategies could potentially explain the different findings across the two studies.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 71%

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Conservatives and liberals have similar physiological responses to threats

et al. 2020

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About a decade ago a study documented that conservatives have stronger physiological responses to threatening stimuli than liberals. This work launched a paradigm aimed at uncovering the biological roots of ideology. Despite wide-ranging scientific and popular impact, independent laboratories have not replicated the study. We conducted a preregistered direct replication (N=202) and conceptual replications in the United States (N=352) and the Netherlands (N=81). Our analyses do not support the conclusions of the original study, nor do we find evidence for broader claims regarding the effect of disgust and the existence of a physiological trait. Rather than studying unconscious responses as the "real" predispositions, alignment between conscious and unconscious responses promise deeper insights in the emotional roots of ideology. Main In a study published by Science, Oxley et al. 1 demonstrate that individuals who express conservative political attitudes (e.g., a preference for tradition, clear group boundaries, and hierarchies) have stronger physiological reactions to threatening stimuli than those who express liberal views. One of the authors' explanations for this association is that "political attitudes and varying physiological responses to threat may both derive from neural activity patterns" (p.1669), 1 suggesting a biological basis for the robust, positive correlation between political conservatism and self-reported measures of sensitivity to uncertainty and threat 2-5. Research by others, including the Oxley, et al. research team, demonstrates that conservatives also have stronger physiological responses to disgusting stimuli than liberals do 6, 7. These findings motivated members of the Oxley, et al. research team to further elaborate that conservatism is linked to a more expansive form of "negativity bias" at a physiological level 9. This research helped usher in a new paradigm in psychology and political science that offers a provocative perspective on the biological roots of the centuries-old liberal/conservative divide 8. It implies that psychological traits, such as "threat sensitivity", "disgust sensitivity", and "negativity bias" can be captured in a straightforward and unobtrusive way with physiological reactions, and that these "physiological traits" have a direct and unmediated effect on

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“…Our standardized coefficient is 37 times smaller than the statistically significant and substantive effect (d=. 37) reported by Oxley et al…”

Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 79%

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 71%

Conservatives and liberals have similar physiological responses to threats

et al. 2020

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“…We refer to these constructs as pre-political because while they may reflect beliefs about desirable patterns of social relations and have implications for civic life, they nonetheless lack direct linkages to beliefs about government, elected officials, public affairs, or policy prescriptions (Feldman, 1988). In the same way that political psychologists recognize that personality traits are distinct from political preferences even though it can shape political ideology (Vitriol, Larsen, & Ludeke, 2019), we too view the implications of disease threat for psychological motivations, orientations, and values to be distinct from its implications for partisanship and ideology.…”

Section: Infectious Disease Pre-political Orientations Ideology Andmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exposure and Aversion to Human Transmissible Diseases Predict Conservative Ideological and Partisan Preferences

O’Shea¹,

Vitriol²,

Federico³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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The objective prevalence of and subjective vulnerability to infectious diseases are associated with greater in-group preference, conformity, and traditionalism. However, evidence directly testing the link between infectious diseases and political ideology and partisanship is lacking. Across four studies, including a large sample representative of the U.S. population (N > 12,000), we demonstrate that higher environmental levels of human transmissible diseases and avoidance of germs from human carriers predict conservative ideological and partisan preferences. During the COVID-19 pandemic (N = 848), we replicated this germ aversion finding and determined that these conservative preferences were primarily driven by avoidance of germs from out-groups (foreigners) rather than in-groups (locals). Moreover, socially conservative individuals expressed lower concerns of being susceptible to contracting infectious diseases during the pandemic and worried less about COVID-19. These effects were robust to individual-level and state-level controls. We discuss these findings in light of theory on parasite stress and the behavioral immune system, and with regard to the political implications of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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“…However, the reproducibility and generalizability of results from student samples are debated [ 10 – 12 ] due to their skewed distributions in features such as age and education that might bias the estimation of the relationship between personality and attitudes [ 13 – 15 ; but see [ 15 ]]. Subsequent studies testing the DPM model using more diverse samples have produced inconsistent results ( Table 1 ; our search of literature was restricted to studies that included all relevant measures, namely, the Big Five personality traits, RWA, SDO, and prejudice, and that were published in English).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Personality traits are directly associated with anti-black prejudice in the United States

Lin

Alvarez

2020

PLoS ONE

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Modern psychological theories postulate that individual differences in prejudice are determined by social and ideological attitudes instead of personality. For example, the dual-process motivational (DPM) model argues that personality does not directly associate with prejudice when controlling for the attitudinal variables that capture the authoritarian-conservatism motivation and the dominance motivation. Previous studies testing the DPM model largely relied on convenience samples and/or European samples, and have produced inconsistent results. Here we examined the extent to which anti-black prejudice was associated with the Big Five personality traits and social and ideological attitudes (authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, political party affiliation) in two large probability samples of the general population (N 1 = 3,132; N 2 = 2,483) from the American National Election Studies (ANES). We performed structural equation modeling (SEM) to test the causal assumptions between the latent variables and used survey weights to generate estimates that were representative of the population. Different from prior theories, across both datasets we found that two personality traits, agreeableness and conscientiousness, were directly associated with anti-black prejudice when controlling for authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, and political party affiliation. We also found that a substantial part of the associations between personality traits and anti-black prejudice were mediated through those social and ideological attitudes, which might serve as candidates for prejudice-reduction interventions in the real world.

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The Generalizability of Personality Effects in Politics

Cited by 34 publications

References 51 publications

Conservatives and liberals have similar physiological responses to threats

Conservatives and liberals have similar physiological responses to threats

Exposure and Aversion to Human Transmissible Diseases Predict Conservative Ideological and Partisan Preferences

Personality traits are directly associated with anti-black prejudice in the United States

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