Political psychology is an area of social and personality psychology which is growing in interesting ways. As is evident by previous episodes, I am extremely interested in the topic of ideology. One of the reasons for this interest is that these ideology often play a huge role in identity, as well as in conflict that can occur. I have had a seemingly endless array of conversations related to some of the problems that come from being a part of a complex a diverse community consisting in multiple, and sometime conflicting, political, social, and religious ideologies. Thus I believe that scientific explorations of the topics are extremely needed and valuable. Thus, in this episode we will be continuing our exploration of this area by looking at an interaction between ideology and personality.

There is an idea about the development of ideology, which involves this rational decision making process where we take in all of the differing evidence and then construct the position that we have.  However there is much psychological research that demonstrates that many non-political means can play large roles in the political orientations of differing individuals. One of these area has been that of personality, and one question that has come out of this is why individuals who are more open to new experiences happen to be more liberal, and individuals who are more conscientious happen to be more conservative. One of the guesses was that the amount and degree of exposure to differing content will play a role in these relationships.

In this episode, I have the opportunity to speak with Xiaowen Xu about her article that explores this topic and question. Her article is titled “Does Cultural Exposure Partially Explain the Association Between Personality and Political Orientation?" The abstract for the article can be found below. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, please feel free to share them in the comment section, or you can send me your thought by going to methodologyforpsychology.com/contact. Thank you for listening.
Abstract

"Differences in political orientation are partly rooted in personality, with liberalism predicted by Openness to Experience and conservatism by Conscientiousness. Since Openness is positively associated with intellectual and creative activities, these may help shape political orientation. We examined whether exposure to cultural activities and historical knowledge mediates the relationship between personality and political orientation. Specifically, we examined the mediational role of print exposure (Study 1), film exposure (Study 2), and knowledge of American history (Study 3). Studies 1 and 2 found that print and film exposure mediated the relationships Openness to Experience and Conscientiousness have with political orientation. In Study 3, knowledge of American history mediated the relationship between Openness and political orientation, but not the association between Conscientiousness and political orientation. Exposure to culture, and a corollary of this exposure in the form of acquiring knowledge, can therefore partially explain the associations between personality and political orientation."