Study discovers Conservatives see things in "Black and White"
author: Kathleen Maclay
Hitler, Mussolini, and former President Ronald Reagan were
individuals, but all were right-wing conservatives because they preached

return to an idealized past and condoned inequality in some form.
Researchers help define what makes a political conservative
Kathleen Maclay, July 22, 2003

BERKELEY - Politically conservative agendas may range from
supporting the Vietnam War to upholding traditional moral and religious
values to opposing welfare. But are there consistent underlying
motivations?

Four researchers who culled through 50 years of research literature
about the psychology of conservatism report that at the core of political
conservatism is the resistance to change and a tolerance for inequality,
and that some of the common psychological factors linked to political
conservatism include:

- Fear and aggression
- Dogmatism and intolerance of ambiguity
- Uncertainty avoidance
- Need for cognitive closure

Terror management
"From our perspective, these psychological factors are capable of
contributing to the adoption of conservative ideological contents, either
independently or in combination," the researchers wrote in an article,
"Political Conservatism as Motivated Social Cognition," recently

in the American Psychological Association's Psychological Bulletin.

Assistant Professor Jack Glaser of the University of California,
Berkeley's Goldman School of Public Policy and Visiting Professor Frank
Sulloway of UC Berkeley joined lead author, Associate Professor John Jost
of Stanford University's Graduate School of Business, and Professor Arie
Kruglanski of the University of Maryland at College Park, to analyze the
literature on conservatism.

The psychologists sought patterns among 88 samples, involving

participants, taken from journal articles, books and conference papers.
The material originating from 12 countries included speeches and
interviews given by politicians, opinions and verdicts rendered by

as well as experimental, field and survey studies.

Ten meta-analytic calculations performed on the material - which
included various types of literature and approaches from different
countries and groups - yielded consistent, common threads, Glaser said.

The avoidance of uncertainty, for example, as well as the striving
for certainty, are particularly tied to one key dimension of conservative
thought - the resistance to change or hanging onto the status quo, they
said.

The terror management feature of conservatism can be seen in
post-Sept. 11 America, where many people appear to shun and even punish
outsiders and those who threaten the status of cherished world views,

wrote.

Concerns with fear and threat, likewise, can be linked to a second
key dimension of conservatism - an endorsement of inequality, a view
reflected in the Indian caste system, South African apartheid and the
conservative, segregationist politics of the late Sen. Strom Thurmond
(R-South S.C.).

Disparate conservatives share a resistance to change and acceptance
of inequality, the authors said. Hitler, Mussolini, and former President
Ronald Reagan were individuals, but all were right-wing conservatives
because they preached a return to an idealized past and condoned
inequality in some form. Talk host Rush Limbaugh can be described the

way.

This research marks the first synthesis of a vast amount of
information about conservatism, and the result is an "elegant and

explanation" for political conservatism under the rubric of motivated
social cognition, said Sulloway. That entails the tendency of people's
attitudinal preferences on policy matters to be explained by individual
needs based on personality, social interests or existential needs.

The researchers' analytical methods allowed them to determine the
effects for each class of factors and revealed "more pluralistic and
nuanced understanding of the source of conservatism," Sulloway said.

While most people resist change, Glaser said, liberals appear to
have a higher tolerance for change than conservatives do.

As for conservatives' penchant for accepting inequality, he said,
one contemporary example is liberals' general endorsement of extending
rights and liberties to disadvantaged minorities such as gays and
lesbians, compared to conservatives' opposing position.

The researchers said that conservative ideologies, like virtually
all belief systems, develop in part because they satisfy some
psychological needs, but that "does not mean that conservatism is
pathological or that conservative beliefs are necessarily false,
irrational, or unprincipled."

They also stressed that their findings are not judgmental.

"In many cases, including mass politics, 'liberal' traits may be
liabilities, and being intolerant of ambiguity, high on the need for
closure, or low in cognitive complexity might be associated with such
generally valued characteristics as personal commitment and unwavering
loyalty," the researchers wrote.

This intolerance of ambiguity can lead people to cling to the
familiar, to arrive at premature conclusions, and to impose simplistic
cliches and stereotypes, the researchers advised.

The latest debate about the possibility that the Bush

ignored intelligence information that discounted reports of Iraq buying
nuclear material from Africa may be linked to the conservative

for ambiguity and or need for closure, said Glaser.

"For a variety of psychological reasons, then, right-wing populism
may have more consistent appeal than left-wing populism, especially in
times of potential crisis and instability," he said.

Glaser acknowledged that the team's exclusive assessment of the
psychological motivations of political conservatism might be viewed as a
partisan exercise. However, he said, there is a host of information
available about conservatism, but not about liberalism.

The researchers conceded cases of left-wing ideologues, such as
Stalin, Khrushchev or Castro, who, once in power, steadfastly resisted
change, allegedly in the name of egalitarianism.

Yet, they noted that some of these figures might be considered
politically conservative in the context of the systems that they

The researchers noted that Stalin, for example, was concerned about
defending and preserving the existing Soviet system.

Although they concluded that conservatives are less "integratively
complex" than others are, Glaser said, "it doesn't mean that they're
simple-minded."

Conservatives don't feel the need to jump through complex,
intellectual hoops in order to understand or justify some of their
positions, he said. "They are more comfortable seeing and stating things
in black and white in ways that would make liberals squirm," Glaser said.

He pointed as an example to a 2001 trip to Italy, where President
George W. Bush was asked to explain himself. The Republican president

assembled world leaders, "I know what I believe and I believe what I
believe is right." And in 2002, Bush told a British reporter, "Look, my
job isn't to nuance."

See:
http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2003/07/22_politics.shtml

http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2003/07/268673.shtml

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