Researchers are starting to develop fairly reliable questionnaires on political beliefs. While its not my area, the reported psychometics are pretty good. For instance:
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17470910902860308 http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1643954 http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.psych.60.110707.163600 The functional MRI study is pretty interesting. I'm going to have to download the full article: Giovanna Zamboni, Marta Gozzi, Frank Krueger, Jean-René Duhamel, Angela Sirigu & Jordan Grafman Individualism, conservatism, and radicalism as criteria for processing political beliefs: A parametric fMRI study Social Neuroscience, Volume 4, Issue 5, 2009, pages 367-383 Politics is a manifestation of the uniquely human ability to debate, decide, and reach consensus on decisions affecting large groups over long durations of time. Recent neuroimaging studies on politics have focused on the association between brain regions and specific political behaviors by adopting party or ideological affiliation as a criterion to classify either experimental stimuli or subjects. However, it is unlikely that complex political beliefs (i.e., the government should protect freedom of speech) are evaluated only on a liberal-to-conservative criterion. Here we used multidimensional scaling and parametric functional magnetic resonance imaging to identify which criteria/dimensions people use to structure complex political beliefs and which brain regions are concurrently activated. We found that three independent dimensions explained the variability of a set of statements expressing political beliefs and that each dimension was reflected in a distinctive pattern of neural activation: individualism (medial prefrontal cortex and temporoparietal junction), conservatism (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex), and radicalism (ventral striatum and posterior cingulate). The structures we identified are also known to be important in selfother processing, social decision-making in ambivalent situations, and reward prediction. Our results extend current knowledge on the neural correlates of the structure of political beliefs, a fundamental aspect of the human ability to coalesce into social entities. On Thu, Feb 16, 2012 at 7:46 PM, Gruss Gott <grussg...@gmail.com> wrote: > > But what does "conservative" mean? > > If we limit the definition to size and scope of the federal govt then: > > * the tea party is not conservative as they favor a large federal govt wealth > redistribution for retirement healthcare and social security > > * Rick sanatorum is not conservative as he favors a large fed government > presence in your personal s3x life (illegal contraception, abortion, etc) > > * George w bush was not conservative as he grew the fed govt more than any > president since Johnson. > > In other words the definition is meaningless. > > > > On Feb 16, 2012, at 7:56 AM, Sam <sammyc...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> >> Good point. You can educate yourself to be liberal but there's no way >> to become conservative. Yet it happens. Maybe people's brains >> deteriorate, after university, and then they become conservative. >> >> . >> >> >> On Thu, Feb 16, 2012 at 10:45 AM, Eric Roberts >> <ow...@threeravensconsulting.com> wrote: >>> >>> Actually, he does have a point...a conservative getting a higher >>> education....what are the odds of that... >>> >>> Eric >>> >> >> > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:347037 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
