Abstract. Nam, Jost, and van Bavel (2013) found that conservatives were more likely than liberals to avoid dissonance-arousing situations (viz., writing counter-attitudinal essays in a high-choice situation). A close replication of this original research was unsuccessful, as both liberals and conservatives avoided writing counter-attitudinal essays to similar degrees. We conducted an additional experiment that aimed to conceptually replicate Nam et al. (2013) , and to examine whether people whose ideology is threatened might be more likely to avoid dissonance-arousing situations. Again, liberals and conservatives were equally likely to avoid writing counter-attitudinal essays. Threat had no effect on these decisions. A meta-analysis of Nam et al.'s (2013) two studies, the two studies presently reported, and a third supplemental study provide no evidence for asymmetry in dissonance avoidance.
In: Crawford , J T , Brandt , M J , Inbar , Y , Chambers , J & Motyl , M 2017 , ' Social and economic ideologies differentially predict prejudice across the political spectrum, but social issues are most divisive ' , Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , vol. 112 , no. 3 , pp. 383-412 . https://doi.org/10.1037/pspa0000074
Liberals and conservatives both express prejudice toward ideologically dissimilar others (Brandt et al., 2014). Previous work on ideological prejudice did not take advantage of evidence showing that ideology is multidimensional, with social and economic ideologies representing related but separable belief systems. In 5 studies (total N = 4912), we test 3 competing hypotheses of a multidimensional account of ideological prejudice. The dimension-specific symmetry hypothesis predicts that social and economic ideologies differentially predict prejudice against targets who are perceived to vary on the social and economic political dimensions, respectively. The social primacy hypothesis predicts that such ideological worldview conflict is experienced more strongly along the social than economic dimension. The social-specific asymmetry hypothesis predicts that social conservatives will be more prejudiced than social liberals, with no specific hypotheses for the economic dimension. Using multiple target groups, multiple prejudice measures (e.g., global evaluations, behavior), and multiple social and economic ideology measures (self-placement, issue positions), we found relatively consistent support for the dimension-specific symmetry and social primacy hypotheses, and no support for the social-specific asymmetry hypothesis. These results suggest that worldview conflict and negative intergroup attitudes and behaviors are dimension-specific, but that the social dimension appears to inspire more political conflict than the economic dimension.
Employing a dual process motivational (DPM) model perspective, we found that how political messages are framed influences the differential effects of right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) and social dominance orientation (SDO) on political candidate support in the United States. Study 1 (N = 85) found that RWA and SDO differentially predicted support for right-wing candidates who used cohesion and group status threats to frame same-sex marriage, respectively. Study 2 (N = 89) largely replicated those findings on immigration policy. In Study 3 (N = 128), the hypothesis that RWA and SDO negatively predicted support for left-wing candidates who framed same-sex marriage in terms of individual liberty and social equality, respectively, received partial support. Additional analyses indicated that the effects of RWA on candidate support in these studies were driven by specific theoretically-relevant dimensions of RWA. Together, these results indicate that candidates can enhance their appeal by strategically employing value-based political messages targeting different subsets of their constituency. ; peerReviewed ; publishedVersion
Employing a dual process motivational (DPM) model perspective, we found that how political messages are framed influences the differential effects of right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) and social dominance orientation (SDO) on political candidate support in the United States. Study 1 (N = 85) found that RWA and SDO differentially predicted support for right-wing candidates who used cohesion and group status threats to frame same-sex marriage, respectively. Study 2 (N = 89) largely replicated those findings on immigration policy. In Study 3 (N = 128), the hypothesis that RWA and SDO negatively predicted support for left-wing candidates who framed same-sex marriage in terms of individual liberty and social equality, respectively, received partial support. Additional analyses indicated that the effects of RWA on candidate support in these studies were driven by specific theoretically-relevant dimensions of RWA. Together, these results indicate that candidates can enhance their appeal by strategically employing value-based political messages targeting different subsets of their constituency.