This is a fascinating study on the psychology of politics and ideology and really helps us understand how liberals and conservatives see each other. Unfortunately, the article is long. So, let me highlight the key point of the study and you can decide if you want to read it: Haidt reports on the following experiment: after determining whether someone is liberal or conservative, he then has each person answer the standard battery of questions as if he were the opposite ideology. So, he would ask a liberal to answer the questions as if he were a typical conservative and vice-versa. What he finds is quite striking: The results were clear and consistent. Moderates and conservatives were most accurate in their predictions, whether they were pretending to be liberals or conservatives. Liberals were the least accurate, especially those who describe themselves as very liberal. The biggest errors in the whole study came when liberals answered the Care and Fairness questions while pretending to be conservatives. In other words, moderates and conservatives can understand the liberal worldview and liberals are unable to relate to the conservative worldview, especially when it comes to questions of care and fairness.... In short, Haidts research suggests that many liberals really do believe that conservatives are heartless bastards. Ill repeat the most glaring and obvious intellectual zinger in the study (which I wish I could put in bold italic caps): ****The biggest errors in the whole study came when liberals answered the Care and Fairness questions while pretending to be conservatives. In other words, moderates and conservatives can understand the liberal worldview and liberals are unable to relate to the conservative worldview, especially when it comes to questions of care and fairness.****
Posted on: Sat, 25 Jan 2014 04:48:27 +0000
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