Study Links Low I.Q. To Prejudice, Racism, Conservatism

The following article was published by the Huffington Post, February 2, 2012.
The article has a video that is not visible in this post.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/...n_1237796.html

Intelligence Study Links Low I.Q. To Prejudice, Racism, Conservatism

Are racists dumb? Do conservatives tend to be less intelligent than liberals? A provocative new study from Brock University in Ontario suggests the answer to both questions may be a qualified yes.

The study, published in Psychological Science, showed that people who score low on I.Q. tests in childhood are more likely to develop prejudiced beliefs and socially conservative politics in adulthood.

I.Q., or intelligence quotient, is a score determined by standardized tests, but whether the tests truly reveal intelligence remains a topic of hot debate among psychologists.

Dr. Gordon Hodson, a professor of psychology at the university and the study's lead author, said the finding represented evidence of a vicious cycle: People of low intelligence gravitate toward socially conservative ideologies, which stress resistance to change and, in turn, prejudice, he told LiveScience.

Why might less intelligent people be drawn to conservative ideologies? Because such ideologies feature "structure and order" that make it easier to comprehend a complicated world, Dodson said. "Unfortunately, many of these features can also contribute to prejudice," he added.

Dr. Brian Nosek, a University of Virginia psychologist, echoed those sentiments.

"Reality is complicated and messy," he told The Huffington Post in an email. "Ideologies get rid of the messiness and impose a simpler solution. So, it may not be surprising that people with less cognitive capacity will be attracted to simplifying ideologies."

But Nosek said less intelligent types might be attracted to liberal "simplifying ideologies" as well as conservative ones.

In any case, the study has taken the Internet by storm, with some outspoken liberals saying that it validates their suspicions about conservatives and conservatives arguing that the research has been misinterpreted.

What do you think? Do conservatives tend to be less intelligent? Or is this just political opinion masquerading as science?

Rather than basic intelligence, perhaps it has more to do with people's direction of sight. Most people are constantly looking at the world as it passes by, watching as it retreats into the past. They spend their time re-hashing stuff that's already happened and, I believe, maintaining that reality with their attention.

Those who want to maintain the status quo because it is treating them right focus their attention on conservative ideologies because they are more comfortable in those pre-set structures and they don't want to have to change.

When you turn to face the oncoming time, looking at what is to come, it requires an open mind, expansion of awareness, and possibly forging paths that haven't already been laid out for you. This is a challenge at any level of intelligence, but perhaps the more 'intelligence' you score on tests that measure certain mental abilities, the more you are able to see new directions and aim for them.

New directions are often the distinction of 'liberal' ideologies, so it does not surprise me that those who score higher on intelligence [sic] tests are more likely to affiliate with liberal thought.

There is no value judgment or political affiliation associated with cognitive capacity. In our souls' journeys, all of us have experienced limitations on every level, and even those of us who call ourselves 'intelligent' are tiny drops in infinity. I think it is more a matter of which way we are looking and whether we have an ability to aim for, react to, and work with oncoming changes or if we are looking only at what we have so far and want to keep.