Such is the seemingly polarized state of modern politics that it’s very easy to portray our rivals as lacking in moral fiber, but is that really the case? New research from Penn State explores whether our personal values or our political affiliation tend to come first, and discovers that our choice of political party actually has a significant impact on our values.
The researchers attempted to track the moral foundations and political attitudes of people over time to see how they tracked one another. The analysis revealed that it was largely true that morals were a good indicator of one’s future political attitudes, but that the reverse was largely not the case. It’s a finding that the authors believe might go some way towards explaining some of the mental gymnastics people undergo to justify behaviors and actions within their party of choice.
“There are examples of members of both the political left and right of excusing or explaining away things that on paper should go against their moral compass,” they explain. “We’ll recondition anything, on average, through our ideological lens. If we see something within our political party that may conflict with our morals, we will often say ‘no, it’s moral because of this,’ or ‘no, it really is fair because of that.’ We tailor what we find acceptable to our politics.”
Moral foundations
It’s previously been believed that our moral foundations are what influence our political ideology. While previous studies have indeed found a connection between the two, what wasn’t clear is which was causing which.
“We were really driven by this question of why people are so different,” the authors explain. “People can be so passionate about political issues, and sometimes these are issues that don’t affect them directly. Why is that? The moral foundations theory suggests that we maybe we have these deep-seated moral compasses that are driving these beliefs, so we wanted to see if that was true.”
Data was collated from three studies, with participants asked to complete a questionnaire that was designed to measure five distinct moral foundations: our attitudes and beliefs around fairness, care, authority, loyalty and purity. Each participant was also asked about their political attitudes, with both measures recorded several times over a period of time to observe any changes.
The data strongly suggests that our morals don’t accurately predict our political ideology, but that our political ideology was a good predictor of our moral foundations. What’s more, our political views appear to be more stable over time than our morals do.
“Something predicting another measure doesn’t prove causation,” the researchers say. “But what it does mean is that I may not know all your beliefs or anything about you, but if I know with which political party you identify, I’m going to have a pretty good guess at your position on a lot of issues.”
The authors believe their findings are crucial in helping us to understand the way we process political information, especially in these times of apparent polarization and dogmatism.
“No amount of information will change an ideologue,” they conclude. “But for people who are more open politically, they can use this information and use it to help them think about their thoughts and decisions a little better. They can pause and say, ‘Am I processing this information in a thoughtful way or am I drinking the Kool Aid?'”
