<p>Browsing a technical news site this morning, I found a link to a LA Times article on an experiment sighting differences in the way Liberals and Conservatives process information. Based on a joint study between scientists at NYU and UCLA, liberals tolerate ambiguity and conflict better than conservatives because of how their brains work. The article is based on a study published in the current issue of Nature Neuroscience using college students who completed a survey to determine their political orientation. </p>
<p>There’s a correlation/causation issue there. Not to mention an issue of direction. Even assuming that there is a causal relationship (which one can’t really do from the study), one can’t tell whether people are predisposed to become liberal or conservative based on brain wiring, or whether neural connections made over time, and thus development of these cognitive skills, are influenced by political beliefs.</p>
<p>Oh, for heaven’s sake, this is too ridiculous for words. Did you expect a study conducted at UCLA and NYU to find anything favorable to conservatives? Or that the LA Times (by the way, your link requires a log-in) would provide an objective point of view? How do you account for former liberals who see the light and move to the right? Somehow they become “less able to tolerate ambiguity?” </p>
<p>Is it possible that conservatives are such a rare commodity on campus these days that the college experience may change aspects of their behavior?</p>
<p>CGM - I think she means that faculty is virtually 100% liberal.</p>
<p>If conservatives don’t “tolerate ambiguity and conflict” as well as liberals, I don’t see that as necessarily a bad thing. Would seeking clarity and conflict resolution be the opposite? If so, those are virtues imo.</p>
<p>that is not what she said…and if she is referring to a different viewpoint than the one a person was surrounded with growing up and then those students, gee, change…does that mean they are then questioning what they were taught in most likely a narrow life point of view</p>
<p>Here’s what I meant to convey. I believe the premise of the study is influenced by the political viewpoints of those conducting it. Secondly, I raised the possibility that the correlation may be due to the ratio of liberal to conservatives at the colleges where the study was conducted – I feel confident in saying that the majority of students at UCLA and NYU are probably liberal.</p>
<p>Personal opinion – conservatives are made, not born. Life’s events, in my experience, may lead one to a more pragmatic, conservative viewpoint. People grow out of liberalism, imo.</p>
<p>THere was a study several years ago about convicts and their “conservative” and narrow views of life, and how those views were part of the source of their activities…</p>
<p>and if you think conservatives make decisions based on fact, how many conservative decisions and polictical stances are based on bibical stories, hardly fact at all</p>
<p>The article actually quotes the lead author as saying specifically that the results DO NOT mean that liberal thought is “better” than conservative thought, and that the traits shown by conservatives could be preferable in certain contexts. I don’t think the study, or the article, is necessarily biased against conservatives.</p>
<p>However, I have a LOT of problems with the study. Aside from the ones that I mentioned in my previous comment, there’s too many uncontrolled variables! As far as I know, and someone please correct me if I’m wrong, they didn’t even control for gender, which could be a major conflating variable! And as someone who’s taken classes and done research in neuroimaging, a lot of neuroimaging methodology is sketchy, sketchy, sketchy.</p>
<p>I wish there could be political threads here without people making ad hominem attacks and ridiculous generalizations. Wasn’t there just recently a thread that criticized a few STUDENT posters for being rude?</p>
<p>I’ve read that most people go through transitions in their lives along these lines: children = conservative; young adults = liberal; parents = conservative; elderly = liberal.</p>
<p>sjmom: And your proof of the political leanings of the study’s leaders biasing it is what? That you disagree with the outcome and think that their leanings had to have affected it?</p>
[quote]
Then he cites a 2001 survey by the UCLA Higher Education Research Institute which yielded fairly similar results: 5.3 percent of faculty members were classified as ''far left," 42.3 percent as ''liberal," 34.3 percent as ''middle of the road," 17.7 percent as ''conservative," and 0.3 percent as ''far right." ''Yep," concedes B</p>
<p>No, that shows that professors are overwhelmingly liberal. It fails to show a causal link between their political leanings and any specific bias to the study.</p>
<p>I have discussed this with conservative frineds of mine in the past. Maybe it’s that they’re less defensive than some of the CC posters, but after giving the matter some thought they agreed that they preferred simple, yes/no, black/white analyses over less clear-cut, ambiguous consideration of issues, and felt that that tendency in fact was associated with their conservative viewpoint. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, just a different one. Sometimes it’s best to cut through the noise, pick a position, and act on it. In situations such as von Clauswitz was referring to in his quote: “It is even better to act quickly and err than to hesitate until the time of action is past” the less layered approach of a conservative might be superior; in other situations a lack of willingness to acknowledge ambiguity, uncertainty, and conflicting viewpoints is undesireable.</p>
<p>But I will say that the basic premise of the study is something I’ve noted and commented on for many years.
Well, I really don’t see how a subset of your friends is indicative of an entire group of people. The study in the OP seems to me to be more on the lines of “You (fill in the blank) are stupid, and we’re not.”</p>
<p>The fact that 75% of college professors are self-described liberals seems to have some bearing on this kind of study. How do they decide what to study? Clearly, they have a hypothesis “Conservatives have less-evolved cognitive skills” or something along those lines. They devise a study to prove that notion. Hence, it DOES seem pretty obvious to me. Or maybe I’m just quick on the uptake, Kluge.</p>
<p>Um, Sjmom, did it not occur to you that your analysis of this matter is a little lacking in tolerance for ambiguity and complexity of the issue?
Are you willing to consider that your take on the matter is somewhat black vs. white? The gist of your argument: “Most professors are liberal, therefore any study from a college which I view as unflattering to conservatives is a product of academic bias” is a little simplistic. (It’s actually a variety of ad hominem argument, which is to say, a logical fallacy)</p>
<p>All I’m saying is that the conclusion in fact is not inconsistent with my own observations. You may find those conclusions to be unflattering to people with your political philosophy, but just repeating “Liberal professors! Liberal professors!” over and over again isn’t really much of an argument.</p>