Attentional correlates of political ideology.

Within political psychology there is now a vibrant interest toward the differences between conservatives and liberals, such as differences in personality profiles, cognitive styles, musical and artistic preferences (Jost et al., 2003 for a review). More relevant here, recent studies found differences in the reaction to negative stimuli: conservatives (vs. liberals) display more intense physiological reactions (e.g., skin conductance) to threatening information (Oxley et al., 2008). Moreover, they usually display avoidant strategies while exploring new stimuli and thus they are more likely to remember negative (vs. positive) information (Shook & Fazio, 2009). The main aim of the current work was twofold. Indeed, in Study 1, 2 and 3 we investigated the basic cognitive processes accountable for the described differences. More specifically, our aim was to disambiguate whether the differences are only based on intentional processes or involve automatic processes. We argued that these differences are due to attentional processes and, more specifically, to an automatic selective attention of conservatives toward negative (vs. positive) stimuli. In Study 1 we tested this hypothesis through an Emotional Stroop Task (Pratto & John, 1991): participants (N = 45) were presented on a computer screen with negative and positive words, and they were asked to indicate the colour ink of the word while ignoring the meaning. Results indicated that conservatives (vs. liberals) were slower in response to negative (vs. positive) words because their automatic attention was selectively attracted by those negative stimuli. The same pattern emerged from Study 2 (N = 35) with faces expressing either positive (i.e., happiness) and negative (i.e., disgust) emotions. Conservatives were faster in indicating the colour of a dot within pictures with positive vs. negative emotions. Study 3 (N = 22) basically replicated previous findings with a Dot-Probe procedure (Trawalter et al., 2008). Indeed, conservatives were faster in detecting the spatial location of a target which suddenly appeared where a negative vs. positive image had been previously shown. Faster responses in this task indicate that the attention was already oriented toward the stimulus that masked the probe, and thus in this case indicate that conservatives’ attention is grabbed by negative images. Moreover, the aforementioned findings remain significant even controlling for potential relevant variables (i.e., need for closure and need for cognition). Finally, Study 4 (N = 234) was basically aimed at investigating one likely everyday consequence of these attentional asymmetries. More specifically, we investigated the consequences for attitude formation toward novel groups. Participants were presented with (infrequent) negative and (frequent) positive actions performed by members of a numerical majority or minority group. As in the classical illusory correlation paradigm (Hamilton & Gifford, 1976), even if the ratio between positive and negative actions was the same within each group, a correlation was perceived between the minority group and the less frequent behaviours. In general, participants developed more negative opinions toward the minority group and this effect was stronger for conservatives for whom negative information was expected to be more salient. In conclusion, the present work indicates that conservatives and liberals show different basic attentional processes, with conservatives prioritizing negative information. Moreover, we showed that these differences may have important implications, such as the development of more negative attitudes toward minorities. References Hamilton, D. L., & Gifford, R. K. (1976). Illusory correlation in intergroup perception: A cognitive basis of stereotypic judgments. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 12, 392-407. Jost, J. T., Glaser, J., Kruglanski, A. W., & Sulloway, F. J. (2003). Political conservatism as motivated social cognition. Psychological Bulletin, 129, 339-375. Oxley et al., (2008). Political attitudes vary with physiological traits. Science, 321, 1667-1670. Pratto, F., & John, O. P. (1991). Automatic vigilance: The attention-grabbing power of negative social information. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 61, 380-391. Shook, N. J., & Fazio, R. H. (2009). Political ideology, exploration of novel stimuli, and attitude formation. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45, 995-998. Trawalter, S., Todd, A., Baird, A. A., & Richeson, J. A. (2008). Attending to threat: Race-based patterns of selective attention. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 44, 1322-1327.