The self-control consequences of political ideology

Abstract

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 selfcontrol 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. freewill beliefs | self-control | political ideology | individual differences P olitical ideologies loosely represent a shared set of beliefs that define both a specific social order and the means to attain it (1). These ideologies are often categorized into two broad groups-those who endorse traditional values and the status quo (conservatives) and those who endorse egalitarian ideals and progressive change (liberals) (2). Although research demonstrates the various consequences of these distinct ideologies (3), of primary interest to the present research is the unexplored possibility for selfcontrol differences between conservatives and liberals. In particular, we hypothesize that conservatives will demonstrate greater selfcontrol than liberals.This proposition-although untested-is not without indirect support. Kemmelmeier et al. (4) demonstrate that conservative students earn higher grades in college than liberals (controlling for general intellect). The authors interpret this finding as a function of social dominance, arguing that doing well in these disciplines promotes the existing social hierarchy that conservatives seek to maintain. However, a complementary position is that conservatives more strongly embrace the belief that they are responsible for their actions (i.e., freewill beliefs) (5-8). For instance, it could be that conservatives believe they have greater control over their performance and thus expend greater selfcontrol in their academic pursuits.The possibility that conservatives and liberals differ in their freewill beliefs would be consistent with the attributional proclivities of conservatives and liberals. Specifically, conservatives tend to attribute causality to internal or dispositional factors (e.g., personal effort and control), whereas liberals tend to attribute causality to external factors (e.g., systemic or sociocultural forces) (9-13). Given that conservatives are more likely than liberals to make internal attributions for their actions, it follows that conservatives should also more strongly endorse the belief in freewill than should liberals. Indeed, believing outcomes are dete...

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