Test 2: Political Psychology Lectures and Readings Flashcards
What is the average turn out for electoral votes in NZ?
70%
What is the average turn out for electoral votes in Australia?
90%
What is the average electoral turn out for the USA?
50-54%
Why is the turnout for Australia electoral votes so high?
A) because they made it illegal not to vote
B) because they require legal documentation to support why they can not vote
In the cartoon of depicting an australian women dressed like Elizabeth the first upon a throne with “beady eyes that always follow him”. What political event is it depicting?
Juliet Gillard an Australian premiere who back stabbed the current prime minister Kevin Rudd out of office despite Australia having 15 consecutive years of growth.
Rural areas tend to be more ____ than ____.
Conservative than Liberal.
Electoral timing is made in reference to…
Wins in sports games because they increase votes by 5% to the incumbent I.e. the current prime minister.
“Is voting an act of affirmation or fo choice?”
Harrop and Miller, 1987
Research by Harrop and Miller identify two main approaches to voting behaviors:
A) Expressive
Voting is used to express something about
ourselves, our beliefs our identity.
B) Instrumental
Votes are made rationally by weighing up the
pros and cons of each alternative (political
party) to choose the best alternative for you.
Are votes purely motivated by expression or instrumentally?
》No it’s not purely black and white.
》There is overlap between these two
approaches to voting.
》The distinction between the two voting
approaches is not based on their function but
in their expression.
What are the three stages of political psychological research?
(McGuire, 1993)
》40s/50s political personality (leaders and
masses)
》60s/70s political attitudes and voting
》80s/90s political ideology (=content and
process of political systems!!)
40s/50s political personality era was based on ____ theories and ____ methods.
Theories:
Environmental determinism I.e. psychoanalysis, behaviorism and Marxism. (All unique camps of psychology approaches but they overlap in the sense that they focus on environmental factors determine voting behaviour)
I.e. behaviorism what environmental factors at the time of important desicions were present and influenced political leaders behaviour.
I.e. Fruedian what environmental factors present during childhood lead to a political leader developing their beliefs and path into political power and influence their behavior.
I.e. Marxism which looks at socioeconomic status leading to social disorder and conflict.
Methods: Content analysis (examining text and communication tools for patterns and themes in talk and language) I.e. interviews and reports with politicians.
60s and 70s political attitudes and voting uses ___ theories and ___ methods.
Theories: Rational Actor ( I.e. subjective utility maximization and cognition-affect-action)
Methods:
Questionnaires in survey research or participant observations. (Linked to the shift from singular case studies to agratte data, multiple generalizable grouped data and societies demand for utility from psychological research).
Finding:
That people vote as they are socially, you vote in accordance with the social groups in which you belong e.g. religion, union, family etc.
80s and 90s studied political ideology using ___ theories and ____ methods.
Theories: Information processing ( cognitive, heuristics and decision theories) looks at how we make political desicions... it requires effort, and is unlikely that we have the resources required to make fully rational decisions so it moves to examine what heuristics we use to maximize the efficiency of our vote.
Methods:
Experimental manipulation I.e. bringing voting into the laboratory.
E.g. how word choices on how one can describe the same social group differently and influence voting behaviors.
》Poor vs welfare dependent
》Terrorists vs freedom fighters
Words hold different connotations and envike different affective responses that influence voting behaviors.
What is the 3 polyside affair?
McGuire’s 1993 depicts the 3 eras of political psychological research.
What is the end of the ideology era?
The belief that voting behaviors are not influenced by an individual’s principled belief system.
What is the end of the ideology era?
The belief that voting behaviors are not influenced by an individual’s principled belief system.
What is the current political psychology era?
The end of the end of ideology era.
Recent research indicates that people do engage in voting behaviors based on a principled belief system.
If we plot the history of research against the McGuires 1993 eras we spot a progression in research models. What are the 4 stages?
A) Sociological Models
B) Michigan Models
C) Symbolic Politics (SP)
D) Rational Choice Theroy (RCT)
What is the sociological model? 40s and 50s
A model of political voting behaviours that emphasises:
》primary group membership and social position
I.e. using survey methods they found that
if you were Christian you were more likely to
vote for a political leader who holds the same
religious views as us.
》votes tend to be enduring
I.e. that since votes are based on an
individual’s group membership and in turn their
identity which are enduring their subsequent
political affiliations will also be enduring.
》Instrumental/Expressive
I.e its instrumental in the sense that votes
are made to benefit our in group and they are
expressive in the sense that it displays our in
group identity.
What is the Michigan Model? 60s and 70s
Where psychological constructs become a large part of political science and also had the foster successful prediction of who would win the electoral vote.
How? Instead of simply asking people leading up to the election which candidate they would vote for they asked participants if they viewed themselves as being Republican, Democrate, independent or other.
Highlighting that all though they may not like the candadite specifically people would still select them If the political party to which they belonged matched their political beliefs, ideology and social identity.
Thus, votes are made with relative consistency. I.e. homecoming instictint- you dont always vote in line with your party identity but in the following election you are overwhelmingly more likely to vote for your party identity.
Emphasises:
》psychological group membership
》identification is enduring because it is tied to
our identity development
》expressive
What two models make up the 80s and 90s political ideological research?
A) Symbolic Politics
When people are not engaging in rational
decision making they make decisions based
on gut feelings, based on the symbolic
meaning that political party choice express.
Emphasises:
》affect
》symbols
》votes are stable as it reflects enduring
predispositions
》highly expressive
In contrast,
Rational Choice Theory
》cost benefit analysis
》instrumental
What is the Motivated Social Cognition model (MSC)
Is an integrative model that argues people engaging in a matching process where they adopt political ideology which meets their psychological needs. Epistemic motivations (dogmatism-intolerance of ambiguity, uncertainty avoidance and need for structure, closure and order) Existnetial motives (self-esteem, loss prevention and terror management) and ideological motives (rationalization of self interests, group based dominance and systems justification).
What are the two core dimensions of political conservatism?
- Resistance to change:
- Endorsement of
inequality:
*these can be triggered by
situational and
dispositional psychological
variables
Which psychological variables are strongly correlated with political conservatism? (5)
- Dogmatism
- Intolerance of Ambiguity
- Openness to experience
- Mortality Salience
- Systems Instability
What psychological variables were moderately correlated with political conservatism? (4)
- Uncertainty Avoidance
- Integrative Complexity
- Need for Closure,
Structure and Order - Fear, Anger and Threat
What psychological variables were weakly correlated with political conservatism?
- Pessimism, Content and
Disgust
2.Threat to Self-Esteem
What are two types of motivations that underly beliefs?
(A) Driectional
Reflect a desire to reach
one conclusion.
e.g. the self is worthy
or the economy will get
better
(B) Non-Directional
Reflects a desire to arrive
at a belief that is
independent of its
context and non-specific
closure.
*the same motives can underly different beliefs (LW vs. RW) and the same belief systems can have different underlying motivations.
Two key influences that determine belief formation?
(A) Informative
Beliefs are used as
evidence, to rationalise
and preserve our belief
systems.
(B) Motivational
Belief formation is
motivated by a need to
avoid, threat, uncertainty,
maintain security and
prevent negative
outcomes.
*these two underlying influences that drive belief formation do not determine the validity or accuracy of the belief.
Two limitations of traditional research on political conservatism:
(A) Research is hindered by
their failure to clearly
distinguish between
psychological and
ideological variables.
> Although they are
distinct they are also
closely interrelated
constructs.
(B) Treating political
conservatism as being
purely dispositional, and
thereby disregarding
that situational influence
the adoption of
conservative political
ideology.Is the social cognitive motivational model of political conservatism a cold cognition or hot cognition model?
The SCM model is a “hot cognitive” model. Argues that ideological beliefs are formulated to satisfy our epistemic needs, a desire to see the world in a particular way. (informative and motivational)
A “cold cognitive” models are like most traditional research on political conservatism which focuses on informative and not motivational influences that effect belief formation. i.e. personality theories disregard situational influences.
Name three models that are distinctively different from the social cognitive motivational model?
(A) Stable individual
differences e.g.
personality theories
(B) Pure Instrumental or Self-
interest models e.g.
conservatism is adopted
by the elites of society to
maintain privilege and
power.
(C) Theories of modelling,
imitation or
reinforcement e.g.
adopting the political
beliefs of your parents,
friends or peers.What is the conservative paradox?
Rare cases where the two cores aspects of political conservatism: endorsement of inequality and resistance to change are NEGATIVELY correlated!
e.g. Hitller and Stalin. Who advocate social change in an attempt to decrease egalitarianism (belief that everyone should have equal rights).
***traditionally, being resistant to change inadvertently supports maintaining inequality due to society being traditionally hierarchal.
SCM model is not a ___ cognitive model which…
of “cold cognitive” approaches to attitudes and social judgment, which discount motivational constructs as explanations, favoring instead information-processing limitations and mechanisms as determinants of social judgments
Abstract of scm
Analyzing political conservatism as motivated social cognition integrates theories of personality (au- thoritarianism, dogmatism–intolerance of ambiguity), epistemic and existential needs (for closure, regulatory focus, terror management), and ideological rationalization (social dominance, system justifi- cation). A meta-analysis (88 samples, 12 countries, 22,818 cases) confirms that several psychological variables predict political conservatism: death anxiety (weighted mean r .50); system instability (.47); dogmatism–intolerance of ambiguity (.34); openness to experience (–.32); uncertainty tolerance (–.27); needs for order, structure, and closure (.26); integrative complexity (–.20); fear of threat and loss (.18); and self-esteem (–.09). The core ideology of conservatism stresses resistance to change and justification of inequality and is motivated by needs that vary situationally and dispositionally to manage uncertainty and threat.
dogmatism:
accounts for ___
close-mindedness- the tendency to view principles as undeniably true without consideration of evidence or others opinions.
double think- how people can hold contradictory liberal and conservative beliefs.
intolerance of ambiguity
the tendency to perceive ambiguous situations as sources of threat. which in urn causes people to cling to familiarity and jump to premature conclusions.
The dominance submissive embrace of conservatism:
How RWA can point in two directions-
(A) active hostility
a dominant approach
with dealing to societies
scape goats. Aggression -
best captured with SDO
scale.
(B) passively submissive
posture towards authority.
motivated by fear-best
captured with RWA scale.
*more radical RW politicians will be motivated by fear and aggression.
