Dems and Reps at age 3?

I was rather astounded by this research.The article is on page two of this link I recommend reading the whole thing.

Let me be the first to say that the research is only confirming the obvious.

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Disclaimer:

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Occasionally, owing to the deficiency of the English language, I have used he/him/his meaning he or she/him or her/his or her in order to avoid awkwardness of style.

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He, him, and his are not intended as exclusively masculine pronouns. They may refer to either sex or to both sexes!

In order for this research to actually mean anything, one would have to define conservative or liberal.Is a person who believes in less federal power but more fiscal responsibility a conservative or a liberal?Is a person who believes drugs and prostitution should be legalized but also believes in strict enforcement of crimes against person or property a conservative or a liberal?Indeed isn't even the thread title a bit oversimplistic? Are all conservatives Republican and all liberals Democrat?Is a Libertarian liberal because they don't believe in victimless crimes or a conservative because they don't believe in welfare.Is a Green a conservative because they believe in conserving the environment for the use of their descendants or a liberal because they believe the solution must be at the federal level?Today people argue that even gender is not an either-or proposition, in at least some cases with merit. Should I seriously consider an article that makes all the flavors of political opinion an either-or proposition?

http://seedmagazine.com/news/2006/04/predicting_politics.php

i think people figure out pretty early whether they care about other people or not.

Interesting, but I would like to see the tradition and authority that these kids were raised with.Wouldn't an insecure child from a liberal household tradition take more comfort in what he/she knows best? Would the leaders they recognize as 'authorities' be such based on what they have grown up with?

That's a good question.I don't know if the researchers included such considerations or not.The thing is, though, three year olds don't really get the whole idea of tradition, I don't think.Remember, the general finding was as it is stated in the OP. There are of course going to be factors that modify individual's views between 3 and 23, but the interesting thing is that the correlation is there, despite all the factors that could be modified in 20 years.

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i think people figure out pretty early whether they care about other people or not.

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It has a lot to do with being self-centered.Insecurity leads to selfishness.

i think that all depends on what you mean by insecurity. i'm horribly insecure.

It's still a matter of imposing a two-dimensional model on a multi-dimensional reality.From the same article: Without access to the original article containing details on the research (I tried), it is difficult for me to comment on it's methodology, but I still have difficulty with the idea of jamming everyone into two absolute categories. I think the research would have been more informative if the number of categories had been expanded to better accommodate the diversity of political opinion that exists. Had that been done, I think the results would be far more revealing as to any childhood political predispositions.Also, I would like to add that today in the US for the first time, registered independents outnumber either republicans or democrats. Maybe I am not alone in questioning these ready-made labels.

So what are you saying? That the correlation doesn't actually exist? The results are invalid?Angla, all scientific studies simplify the questions they ask. No scientific study considers every single possible variable that may affect the outcome. If they tried to do this, we would never learn anything about anything.All scientific studies are imperfect, incomplete snapshots of a specific phenomenon (or several phenomena). It is through the accumulation of numerous studies over time that point to the same outcome that a consensus agreement about the explanation for that phenomena is reached.

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but I still have difficulty with the idea of jamming everyone into two absolute categories.

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That's why, as I quoted in my last post, at least one of their methods to determine their subject's political leanings was a scale, not an either-or measure.The study's political categories accurately reflect the social, economic, and moral differences between the major groups as they existed in the late 1980's. They are largely true today, as well.If you want to look at individual case studies so that all the subtle nuances of each person's worldview will be independently considered, that's fine, but you can't do science that way.

First, I haven't seen the value of any correlation coefficients so I don't know to what degree any correlation exists.Second, I believe from what I have read so far the results have limited validity. There are well-designed studies and there are not so well-designed studies. I am concerned that this study has some researcher bias.From page 3 of the article in the OP:

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Even with impeccable methodology, bias may creep into the choice of which phenomena to study. "There is a bias among social scientists," admits Glaser. "They look for the variables that are unflattering. There probably are other nice personality traits associated with conservatism, but they haven't shown up in the research because it's not as well studied."

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There is a third way, which would be to determine where opinions cluster into definable groups. A study which uses a two-dimensional scale to lump fiscal conservatives, semi-libertarians, neocons, and evangelicals under the umbrella term conservative is not as useful as one that distinguishes between such groups.Here are a few other small problems I have with this study.1. It acts as a propaganda instrument against independent and third-party movements by implying one must either be a conservative/republican or liberal/democrat or be in some mushy middle.2. By being from 1989, it does not take into account any clusters of political beliefs that may have developed since that time, which somewhat limits it's applicability to the current situation.3. It may hurt the cause of the Democratic Party in the next election by turning off fiscal conservatives and quasi-libertarians through implying they have negative behavioral characteristics. Since the neocon view of government is for huge intrusive scale, limited personal freedom, and reckless spending, the values of the two above mentioned groups are not being well represented by the Republican Party at present.To conclude, I am not mainly saying the study is 'right' or 'wrong,' I'm just saying it could have been better designed.

This online book - not terribly long - reports on research that meshes with that in the OP.
http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/Well worth the read, and it deals with the numerical measures, too.

This afternoon I finally made it through all 261 pages, and yes it is well worth the read. It fits in with some research I have been doing that I would like to add to your other topic.The study in the OP in this thread is mentioned in the footnote on page 76 so there is a bit of 'mesh.' However on page 41 there is some discussion concerning the use of the term conservative to mean authoritarian, namely that it is shorthand and the meaning has changed over time.I think terms such as conservative or liberal are not as definitive as the term used in the article, namely RWA - Right Wing Authoritarian. I also think I would easily win any bet that the correlation between the behavioral characteristics mentioned in the OP is far stronger with authoritarianism than conservatism because the term authoritarianism is not as fuzzy.

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1. It acts as a propaganda instrument against independent and third-party movements by implying one must either be a conservative/republican or liberal/democrat or be in some mushy middle.

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No, it doesn't.It is a scientific study. If the results are used that way by others, it is in no way an invalidation of the results any more than if people use results of gender difference studies to justify sexism.

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2. By being from 1989, it does not take into account any clusters of political beliefs that may have developed since that time, which somewhat limits it's applicability to the current situation.

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So? Studies of any magnitude and extending over decades will always lag behind current conditions. Does that mean the results are invalid?

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3. It may hurt the cause of the Democratic Party in the next election by turning off fiscal conservatives and quasi-libertarians through implying they have negative behavioral characteristics.

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So what, we should bury the results because you don't like the political ramifications?Jesus!I can't believe I'm reading this.

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To conclude, I am not mainly saying the study is 'right' or 'wrong,' I'm just saying it could have been better designed.

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I think, angla, that your political agenda is getting in the way of your scientific thinking.