Researchers help define what makes a political conservative
You realize, of course, that this is going to bring up the question of deprogramming. WILL parents try to have their children deprogrammed to keep them from being gay or Conservative? Is it genetic or a lifestyle choice?
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 published in the American Psychological Association's Psychological Bulletin.
Is it the fear of change? The fear that someone, somewhere may be having fun? An unexplainable, irrational fear of Liberals? Or just a lack of sex? I guess some answers are still beyond the grasp of Science.
