At Yale, we conducted an experiment to turn conservatives into liberals.

[elleng]

The results say a lot about our political divisions. November 22, 2017

John Bargh is a professor of social psychology at Yale University and the author of “Before You Know It: The Unconscious Reasons We Do What We Do”

*Conservatives, it turns out, react more strongly to physical threat than liberals do. In fact, their greater concern with physical safety seems to be determined early in life: In one University of California study, the more fear a 4-year-old showed in a laboratory situation, the more conservative his or her political attitudes were found to be 20 years later. Brain imaging studies have even shown that the fear center of the brain, the amygdala, is actually larger in conservatives than in liberals. And many other laboratory studies have found that when adult liberals experienced physical threat, their political and social attitudes became more conservative (temporarily, of course). But no one had ever turned conservatives into liberals.

Until we did.

In a new study to appear in a forthcoming issue of the European Journal of Social Psychology, my colleagues Jaime Napier, Julie Huang and Andy Vonasch and I asked 300 U.S. residents in an online survey their opinions on several contemporary issues such as gay rights, abortion, feminism and immigration, as well as social change in general. The group was two-thirds female, about three-quarters white, with an average age of 35. Thirty-percent of the participants self-identified as Republican, and the rest as Democrat.

But before they answered the survey questions, we had them engage in an intense imagination exercise. They were asked to close their eyes and richly imagine being visited by a genie who granted them a superpower. For half of our participants, this superpower was to be able to fly, under one’s own power. For the other half, it was to be completely physically safe, invulnerable to any harm.

If they had just imagined being able to fly, their responses to the social attitude survey showed the usual clear difference between Republicans and Democrats — the former endorsed more conservative positions on social issues and were also more resistant to social change in general. . .

This is why it makes sense that liberal politicians intuitively portray danger as manageable — recall FDR’s famous Great Depression era reassurance of “nothing to fear but fear itself,” echoed decades later in Barack Obama’s final State of the Union address — and why President Trump and other Republican politicians are instead likely to emphasize the dangers of terrorism and immigration, relying on fear as a motivator to gain votes.

In fact, anti-immigration attitudes are also linked directly to the underlying basic drive for physical safety. For centuries, arch-conservative leaders have often referred to scapegoated minority groups as “germs” or “bacteria” that seek to invade and destroy their country from within. President Trump is an acknowledged germaphobe, and he has a penchant for describing people — not only immigrants but political opponents and former Miss Universe contestants — as “disgusting.”

“Immigrants are like viruses” is a powerful metaphor,'>>>

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/inspired-life/wp/2017/11/22/at-yale-we-conducted-an-experiment-to-turn-conservatives-into-liberals-the-results-say-a-lot-about-our-political-divisions/?

[intrepidity]

1. More

But if they had instead just imagined being completely physically safe, the Republicans became significantly more liberal — their positions on social attitudes were much more like the Democratic respondents. And on the issue of social change in general, the Republicans’ attitudes were now indistinguishable from the Democrats. Imagining being completely safe from physical harm had done what no experiment had done before — it had turned conservatives into liberals.

In both instances, we had manipulated a deeper underlying reason for political attitudes, the strength of the basic motivation of safety and survival. The boiling water of our social and political attitudes, it seems, can be turned up or down by changing how physically safe we feel.

[elleng]

3. Thank you.

[electric_blue68]

17. Ahhh, TY. That's fascinatng!

[diane in sf]

2. The meat of the article:

“…But if they had instead just imagined being completely physically safe, the Republicans became significantly more liberal — their positions on social attitudes were much more like the Democratic respondents. And on the issue of social change in general, the Republicans’ attitudes were now indistinguishable from the Democrats. Imagining being completely safe from physical harm had done what no experiment had done before — it had turned conservatives into liberals….

…All of us believe that our social and political attitudes are based on good reasons and reflect our important values. But we also need to recognize how much they can be influenced subconsciously by our most basic, powerful motivations for safety and survival. Politicians on both sides of the aisle know this already and attempt to manipulate our votes and party allegiances by appealing to these potent feelings of fear and of safety….”

[stopdiggin]

4. thanks. interesting. and useful. -(nt)-

[elleng]

5. 'Politicians on both sides of the aisle know this already and attempt to manipulate our votes

and party allegiances by appealing to these potent feelings of fear and of safety….”'

[electric_blue68]

18. TY

[Skittles]

6. the GOP thrives on fear and ignorance

it's what keeps them going

[Qutzupalotl]

7. Dennis Miller became a RWer after 9/11

because he says it scared the shit out of him.

Fox News has figured out that keeping people in a state of fear makes them Republican. So they pump out propaganda to keep people afraid: the caravan, runaway inflation and debt, the war on Christmas, elections are illegitimate, foreigners are bringing disease … they have an endless supply of material to work with and hype until they generate fear and outrage. It’s their whole business model.

[electric_blue68]

19. I wondered what happened to him.

[BigmanPigman]

8. Do they need to develop a new booster to combat

this new variant or will the old stuff still work with new strains?

[Crowman2009]

9. I've got an idea, send them to a warzone.

That will change their minds really quick. Learned that in Iraq, or course I was already wavering away from the GOPer crowd before my deployment.

[quakerboy]

10. does it go the other way?

If you have a liberal imagine danger, do they become more conservative?


Also, not connected to anything, I wonder why is crime has suddenly skyrocketed while simultaneously the police are suddenly out in force telling traumatized folks at crime scenes that they have been defunded and cant do anything about crime with all these darn liberal politicians running cities.

[Kablooie]

11. The article says yes.

Liberals do become more conservative immediately after encountering a serious threat.
It seems that for both the change is only temporary.

[NJCher]

12. Re 2nd sentence

That is a principle of persuasion; the person always returns to their former state. The reassurance will need to be ongoing.

Certainly not impossible.

[BComplex]

15. That's why it's important to emphasize peace and diplomacy.

And, of course, educate children in schools from the evils of rampant gun ownership and the costs to society of going to war.

[Scrivener7]

13. It seemes to go both ways, though. The GQP keeps its members in a state of terror, but it also

seems to put the image of the white, happy, prosperous family in front of their members often too. So there is the threat, and there is the thing that is threatened, the false premise of what the desirable life is without the threat.

Of course we would never copy their messages. But we must learn how to use their mechanics to counteract their false messages with true ones. They have shown us how to do it. We need to do it!

[cbabe]

14. I don't get it. If fear makes conservatives, then

the most fearful or under active threat would be most conservative.

Blacks, women, Tribes, etc.?

[intrepidity]

20. That's a good question

I'd like to read some thoughts on this.

I suppose it could be a matter of persistent real threat vs occasional or perceived threat, that living with constant real threat results in brain changes that mitigate the effect discussed in the experiment. Hope they follow-up their studies along those lines.

[andym]

16. This mostly makes sense but what about Covid?

Based on the idea that vaccines are considered protective-- why wouldn't conservatives embrace them more heartily than even liberals?

Actually there is an answer, the conservative propagandists convinced fellow conservatives first that Covid wasn't a threat (Trump called it a hoax at first)-- so no fear there, and then convinced them that the vaccines were more dangerous than the virus. If they did get the virus they could easily beat if using a magic potion such as "hydroxychloroquine" or "ivermectin." And why is that? Because of Trump and his initial belief that if the virus was taken seriously, he would not be re-elected. He led his followers against their natural inclination to protect themselves.