Intelligence Study Links Low I.Q to Prejudice, Racism, Conservative Views

[Sensia]

A recent study from Brock University in Ontario suggests that IQ and the way our brains our formed affects whether someone is conservative or liberal. The Huffington Post reports that 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. is a score determined by standardized tests, but whether the tests truly reveal intelligence remains a topic for debate among psychologists.
Theories include that people of low intelligence gravitate toward socially conservative ideologies, which stress resistance to change and, in turn, prejudice. Less intelligent people are possibly drawn to conservative ideologies because such beliefs feature "structure and order," which make it easier to comprehend a complicated world. Many of these features can also lead to prejudice, one experts says.

Dr. Brian Nosek, a University of Virginia psychologist, reached out to The Huffington Post and stated the following:
"Reality is complicated and messy, he wrote 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."
Interesting. The one thing that is certain is that this study probably has quite a few people upset! Don't take it to heart, no one said this was written in stone but the explanation does make sense.

[Rakhir]

I would love to see the test questions and how they were skewed to get these results. Especially from university with decidedly biased leanings.

[Iaintliein]

Yeah, right, a "study" about IQ. Really want to go there?

http://www.news-medical.net/news/2005/04/26/9530.aspx

Same university involved here as well. Maybe they should do a study on the relationship of IQ to believing their "studies" have any meaning in the real world.

I consider myself more of a libertarian than a conservative, but at least my IQ was high enough to speed a few seconds googling to come up with this.

[CJ7]

Sure the study was skewed to fit an agenda ... they used test results that speak volumes ...

http://www.11points.com/images/prote...eakenglish.jpg


speaking of Google ... hahahahahaha

[CuteOldGuy]

How many threads have we had on this already? A liberal organization does a study that says they are smarter than non-liberals. What a shock.

This has been discussed ad nauseum. Let's move on.

[MC]

Originally Posted by CuteOldGuy

How many threads have we had on this already?

Reminds me, how many more Anti-Obama/Liberal threads do you plan on making?

As for the study, while I can see less intelligent people = prejudiced people, any study that says that "being part of this political party makes you ignorant" seems like a stretch and is probably just done to rile people up.

[CuteOldGuy]

I don't cite the same damn story about Obama every time. I cite to real things that he, and others, are doing to destroy freedom. It's just that there a way too many examples of that.

I'm not a Republican or conservative, either. I detest both major parties. If Romney gets elected, I expect we will find many examples of his assault on freedom as well. Along with other Republicans.

[1NEMESIS]

Originally Posted by Iaintliein

Yeah, right, a "study" about IQ. Really want to go there?

http://www.news-medical.net/news/2005/04/26/9530.aspx

Same university involved here as well. Maybe they should do a study on the relationship of IQ to believing their "studies" have any meaning in the real world.

I consider myself more of a libertarian than a conservative, but at least my IQ was high enough to speed a few seconds googling to come up with this.

"but at least my IQ was high enough to speed a few seconds googling to come up with this."

I can tell because that study has nothing to do with what GP posted.

[I B Hankering]

Note how the title and text in the “Huffy article” insinuates something different than does the title and text of the actual, original study:

Low IQ & Conservative Beliefs Linked to Prejudice
Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
Date: 26 January 2012 Time: 10:29 AM ET

. . . Attitudes toward other races were captured by measuring agreement with statements such as "I wouldn't mind working with people from other races." (These questions measured overt prejudiced attitudes, but most people, no matter how egalitarian, do hold unconscious racial biases; Hodson's work can't speak to this "underground" racism.)

As suspected, low intelligence in childhood corresponded with racism in adulthood. . .

. . . Hodson was quick to note that the despite the link found between low intelligence and social conservatism, the researchers aren't implying that all liberals are brilliant and all conservatives stupid. The research is a study of averages over large groups, he said.

"There are multiple examples of very bright conservatives and not-so-bright liberals, and many examples of very principled conservatives and very intolerant liberals," Hodson said. . .

. . . there are other possible explanations that fit the data. For example, Nosek said, a study [not this study] of left-wing liberals with stereotypically naïve views like "every kid is a genius in his or her own way," might find that people who hold these attitudes are also less bright. In other words, it might not be a particular ideology that is linked to stupidity, but extremist views in general. . .

http://www.livescience.com/18132-int...sm-racism.html

[RichardGozenya]

"stupid/low IQ" is just some more bullshit
from the progressive playbook

the inability to win debates with fact,
generates LOUD instead of information

when LOUD becomes ineffective,
LIES become the method

when LIES become ineffective,
people are tagged as TOO STUPID to comprehend

there is a reason that the Huffington Post
is an online "newspaper".....
if it were printed,it would only make it to the outhouse,
being placed next to the corncobs and sears catalog,
for its only suitable function
(for you city folk,nobody would read it there,either)

[timpage]

Originally Posted by CuteOldGuy

I don't cite the same damn story about Obama every time. I cite to real things that he, and others, are doing to destroy freedom. It's just that there a way too many examples of that.

I'm not a Republican or conservative, either. I detest both major parties. If Romney gets elected, I expect we will find many examples of his assault on freedom as well. Along with other Republicans.

We're more free than we've ever been and our freedom isn't being threatened, at least not in the sense that you blather on about. You're a slogan-reciting conservative, why do you continue to deny it? Embrace it....you'll feel more comfortable with yourself, and you can quit reminding everybody in every other post that you have no political affiliations.....(other than libertarianism, sort of, I know, I know....)

[CuteOldGuy]

More free than ever, Timmy? How do you defend that? (This should be fun.)

[Jdriller]

Most of us start out when we are young as more liberal than conservative. Assuming as we grow older, we learn from our experiences and mistakes....why is it that more of us become more conservative than liberal? Hopefully as we age we do become a little smarter having learned something from life experiences.

[I B Hankering]

Originally Posted by Jdriller

Most of us start out when we are young as more liberal than conservative. Assuming as we grow older, we learn from our experiences and mistakes....why is it that more of us become more conservative than liberal? Hopefully as we age we do become a little smarter having learned something from life experiences.

+1
Even a child learns (or should learn) not to touch a hot stove twice!

[CuteOldGuy]

As Winston Churchill once said, "If at 20 you are not a liberal, you have no heart. If at 40 you are not a conservative, you have no brain."

I'm not a conservative, but I think the point is made.