Are you for or against abortion, gay marriage, the Iraq war.....?
According to John Alford, a political scientist at Rice University in Houston, Texas, our political opinions may be partly determined by our genes.
"Trying to persuade someone not to be liberal is like trying to persuade someone not to have brown eyes," says Alford.
Alford has found that identical twins tend to have similar political views. (EARTHDAILY Are political leanings all in the genes?)
"Trying to persuade someone not to be liberal is like trying to persuade someone not to have brown eyes," says Alford.
Alford has found that identical twins tend to have similar political views. (EARTHDAILY Are political leanings all in the genes?)
John Jost, a psychologist at New York University, looked for a coonection between personality traits and political orientation (American Psychologist, vol 61, p 651 EARTHDAILY Are political leanings all in the genes?). He found evidence that:
People who are dogmatic tend to be conservative.
People who enjoy lots of new experiences tended to be liberal.
People who prefer simple and unambiguous paintings, poems and songs, tend to be conservative.
People who do not see things in black and white, people who understand complexity and ambiguity, tend to be liberals.
Many psychologists describe personality in terms of conscientiousness, openness, extroversion, agreeableness and neuroticism.
People with high openness scores tend to be liberal.
Ira Carmen, of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, has studied a gene involved in regulating levels of the neurotransmitter dopamine. (EARTHDAILY Are political leanings all in the genes?)
High levels of dopamine can cause obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Carmen speculates that high levels of dopamine might be linked to the need to impose order on the world.
Some conservatives might have high levels of dopamine.
Some scientists suggest that conservatives may very often be dogmatic, routine-loving people and that liberals are usually free-spirited and open minded individuals.
However, we should not assume that all conservatives are the same and that all liberals are the same.
Hans Eysenck, in his book Sense and Nonsense in Psychology (1956), had a two-axis system to explain political attitudes.
According to Eysenck, there was a radical versus conservative axis and a tough versus tender axis.
A conservative could be either tough or tender. A radical could be either tough or tender.
Hitler could be seen as a tough conservative. Mao could be seen as a tough radical.
Tough-minded conservatives would support militarism and harsh punishments.
Tough-minded radicals might support easier divorce laws and fewer restrictions on birth control and abortion.
Tender-minded conservatives would tend to oppose imperialism and easy abortion.
Tender-minded radicals would tend to support racial equality and peaceful solutions to conflicts.
When it comes to politicians one could perhaps divide them into the following groups:
1. Fascist mafia (tough minded conservative)
2. Totalitarian socialist mafia (tough minded radical)
3. Fundamentalist fascist mafia (tough minded conservative)
4. Mainstream militarist mafia (tough minded liberal)
5. Unelectable
