Liberals vs. Conservatives:innocent until proven guilty?
If you are uncertain if a criminal is innocent or guilty, is it better to err on the side of innocence or guilt? Given that proof is continuous, not categorical, how much bias toward innocent until proven guilty should one have? A friend of a friend recently asked is this question to a group of [...]
Why do we study the psychology of libertarians?
We recently submitted a paper for publication about libertarian morality, along with co-authors Spassena Koleva, Jesse Graham, Pete Ditto, and Jonathan Haidt. The paper leverages our broad set of measures to tell a story about libertarians, which converges with previously reported findings about liberals and conservatives. Specifically, all ideological groups demonstrate the same patterns whereby [...]
Intrinsic, not Extrinsic Motivation Leads to Greater Reward – 2 Theories
Presented in the context of bringing together consilience from outside of psychology, a friend of mine sent me the below TED video, by Simon Sinek, which I believe has a lot in common with what much of psychology is discovering, specifically that intrinsic gut-level motivations are much more powerful than extrinsic rational motivations. In some ways, much [...]
On the Morality of Torture & Utilitarianism
I personally do not believe in torture, but I have to admit that when I think of it, my mind prototypically thinks of the potential harm that might befall an innocent person caught by an unscrupulous policeman who is all too sure of his moral superiority. What would I do if I knew with 100% [...]
What is more Immorral? Distracted Driving or Smoking Marijuana?
The answer is that it depends on whom you ask. Below is a graph based on yourmorals data where participants were randomly assigned to answer whether they agreed that “XXX is immoral” about one of seven health behaviors.
As you can see, conservatives feel that ingesting all types of substances (cigarettes, alcohol, marijuana, and cocaine) are [...]
Hypermoralism – Morality causes ordinary people to do immoral things.
Some people believe that immoral acts are caused by amoral individuals. However, very few people are truly immoral (~1% of individuals are psychopaths). The idea of the term, hypermoralism, is to popularize the idea that morality can actually cause people to be immoral, rather than prevent them from being immoral (e.g. see this post). It’s [...]
Separating Pro-Peace from Anti-War Attitudes using Moral Psychology Measures
I’m off to SPSP 2010 and will be presenting the below poster at the morality and justice pre-conference. It’s based on a scale I found measuring separate war and peace attitudes (Vander Linden et. al, 2008) at the main political psychology conference 2 years ago. The concept is pretty simple…I found scales that predicted pro-war and [...]
Reading Palin’s “Going Rogue” & expanding the liberal moral imagination (Lederach & Wright)
I bought Sarah Palin’s new book, Going Rogue. As someone interested in moral confabulation, Sarah Palin is an a great case study. She has a very visceral intuitive sense of her own moral opinions (e.g. her opinion on Israeli settlements)…yet she often seems to have no preconceived notion of the source of those opinions. So [...]
Main Themes of This Blog
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- •Hypermoralism – Morality causes ordinary people to do immoral things.
- •What are the psychological differences that make people liberal democrats, conservative republicans, or libertarians?
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Last 30 Posts:
- January 25, 2012
Why doesn’t Ron Paul use the word ‘America’ much? - January 7, 2012
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Should Protect Fair Negotiations (not the poor) - December 11, 2011
The Experiential Economy - November 2, 2011
The Moral Foundations of ThinkProgress, Alternet, Daily Kos, & the NY Times - October 15, 2011
Liberals vs. Conservatives:innocent until proven guilty? - September 11, 2011
Does social psychology try too hard to be perceived as a “science”? - August 31, 2011
Equity trumps Equality in arguments about taxation - July 31, 2011
Hypermoral Debt Ceiling Quotes - July 17, 2011
Libya as a moral war (except for libertarians) - July 10, 2011
Oregon’s Medicaid Experiment vs. Motivated Reasoning - June 18, 2011
Relative vs. Absolute Good Choices for Liberals, Conservatives, and Libertarians - May 23, 2011
Personality profiles of readers vs. non-readers and saving your local bookstore. - May 9, 2011
When Ingroup Love does not equal Outgroup Hate - May 2, 2011
Osama Bin Laden’s Death is a chance to escape Zero-Sum thinking - April 23, 2011
Liberals place more value on being funny than conservatives and libertarians. - April 21, 2011
Jon Kyl’s Moral Confabulation is something we all do. - March 30, 2011
Why should the US lead in Libya? Liberal-Conservative Value Differences. - March 24, 2011
Perceptions of Scarcity & Responsibility inform Budget Negotiations - February 27, 2011
Psychological Correlates of Feelings Toward Labor Unions among Liberals - February 22, 2011
Reagan was a Union Member – Visiting his Library as an exercise in Civil Politics - February 15, 2011
Psychology is generally Continuous, not Categorical - February 11, 2011
Are liberals more neurotic than conservatives? - February 10, 2011
Can liberal academics study conservative ideology? - January 17, 2011
Rush Limbaugh says Civility is the New Censorship - January 11, 2011
You can’t put out a Fire with Gasoline – A Reaction to reactions to the Giffords Shooting - December 29, 2010
Tony Washington’s NFL Story: How wrong is brother-sister incest? - December 18, 2010
Tony Hsieh, liberals, and libertarians prefer buying experiences to materialism – A Review of Delivering Happiness - December 7, 2010
The Case for Honesty as a Moral Foundation - December 2, 2010
The Definition of Moral Hazard and A Review of The Big Short - November 23, 2010
Does conflict avoidance underlie disproportionate liberal support of civility?
Civil Politics Posts
- Tom Edsall's Guide to What Each Side Gets Right January 23, 2012 Jonathan Haidt
- Keystone Pipeline's Unlikely Allies January 21, 2012 Bill Bishop
- Center Aisle Caucus brings bipartisan civility to congress October 26, 2011 Ravi Iyer
- 6 Structural Ideas to turn Partisans into Americans from The Atlantic August 5, 2011 Ravi Iyer
- 95% of Americans want civility in politics & 87% believe it's possible to get there July 21, 2011 Ravi Iyer
Tony Washington’s NFL Story: How wrong is brother-sister incest?
Moral psychology has no answer as to whether brother-sister incest is wrong, but I have given the below dilemma, made famous by Jonathan Haidt, many times in classes to undergraduates. It is particularly useful in that it allows people to experience, rather than just learning about, the social intuitionist approach to moral reasoning.
Julie and Mark [...]