Psychological Dispositions and Political Preferences Across Hard and Easy Issues

Psychological Dispositions and Political Preferences across Hard and Easy IssuesChristopher D. JohnstonDepartment of Political ScienceDuke University [email protected]Julie WronskiDepartment of Political ScienceStony Brook University [email protected] Acknowledgements: We would like to thank Stanley Feldman, Howard Lavine, Chris Federico, Matt Lebo, and Ben Newman for comments on earlier drafts. This project was funded by NSF award # SES-1023255. Paper prepared for the 2012 meeting of the MPSA.AbstractMuch recent research has been concerned with the stable traits which structure preference formation and ideology in the mass public. Most of this work, however, utilizes an overly simplistic, “direct effects” approach to understanding their influence. Furthermore, while this literature has demonstrated associations between traits and political identifications, social, and foreign policy preferences, it has largely failed in the economic domain. The present paper seeks a more comprehensive theoretical framework for understanding how the stable dispositions of citizens matter for public opinion. In addition to the direct path intrinsic to other work, we argue that dispositions may structure the acquisition of information at the elite level, and thus may indirectly structure preferences through elite cue-taking. We theorize that the latter path should be particularly important for economic (i.e. “hard”) issues, and that lack of theoretical attention to this more complex pathway can account for the failures of previous empirical work. 2 INTRODUCTIONHow and why do stable psychological dispositions (e.g. personality traits, psychological needs, chronic goals) matter in the context of political preference formation in the United States?1 With respect to the former question, almost all recent research has utilized a “direct effects” approach, whereby dispositions constrain preferences independently of citizen interactions with elite-level politics (e.g. Carney et al. 2008; Mondak 2010). In other words, the influence of traits on preferences is specified as though citizens form preferences in a political vacuum. Empirical investigations within this paradigm, however, have found heterogeneity in the influence of dispositions on preferences across ideological domains (e.g. Carney et al. 2008; Feldman and Johnston 2009; Van Hiel, Pandaelere and Duriez 2004). In particular, prior research suggests that citizen dispositions have a much weaker effect on preferences in the economic domain than in the social and foreign policy domains, and that political sophistication plays a moderating role in their influence in the former (Federico et al. 2011). Such heterogeneity of dispositional influence across ideological domains, and across citizens, suggests complexities in 1 We will use the terms “disposition” and “trait” interchangeably throughout the paper.3 the processes by which they are translated into preferences, yet little previous work has expanded the direct effects model to account for such variation within a more general theoretical framework. With respect to the second question, recent research has not sufficiently considered the normative implications of the role of dispositions in preference formation for American politics (but see Hetherington and Weiler 2009). More bluntly, why should political scientists care about the effect of constructs such as personality? Can we not simply accept that some portion of the variance in preferences is dispositional (perhaps even genetic in origin), and focus attention on political factors? Moreover, given its relative lack of success in accounting for economic preferences, to what extent is this paradigm normatively relevant to a contemporary American politics defined largely by economic conflict (e.g. Ansolabehere et al. 2006; Bartels 2006; Smith 2009)? We believe that for this literature to hold normative weight it must account for preference formation within the economic domain as well.The current paper presents a more comprehensive theoretical approach to how and why citizens’ stable psychological dispositions matter in the context of political preference formation.With respect to the former, we argue that the influence of dispositions on political preferences may occur through at least two pathways. The first pathway is direct, and coincides with other recent work. The second, however, is indirect, and occurs through a two-step process by which citizens select trustworthy elites on the basis of matches between their own dispositions and the imagery projected by elite-level partisan conflict, and subsequently receive and accept cues and frames from these elites, thus shaping their policy preferences, but in a way initially constrained by dispositions (see, e.g., Lupia and McCubbins 1998). 4 We argue that the first pathway is evident for “easy” issues, whereas the second is engaged when dealing with “hard” issues (Carmines and Stimson 1980; Pollock, Lilie and Vittes 1993). Easy issues are non-technical issues, those for which symbolic referents are readily accessible to all citizens regardless of their political knowledge or engagement. Consistent with the view that traits operate on preferences through their “resonance” with symbolic aspects of issues (Jost, Federico and Napier 2009), the ready accessibility of such referents for easy issues should generate straightforward and strong relationships. We suggest that in contemporary American politics, social and foreign policy issues have such characteristics. Hard issues, by contrast, are less inherently symbolic, often revolving around the means by which to achieve common symbolic goals (e.g. economic prosperity), and thus may be quite technical (Carmines and Stimson 1980). For hard issues in general, then, citizens rely more on elite cues in order to connect their dispositions to their policy preferences, and to develop more abstract and symbolic representations of the issues. Thus, the constraining role of dispositions for hard issues should be translated through such citizen-elite interactions. We argue that these characteristics are epitomized by many, if not most, economic issues. If correct, our model could account for the asymmetry in the success of recent research on traits and preferences across ideological domains.With respect to normative considerations, we argue that the indirect pathway of traits to preferences in the economic domain has important implications for the distribution of preferences over government provided social welfare in the United States. More specifically, the dispositions which most strongly structure ideological conflict in contemporary American politics (discussed further below), namely those related to psychological needs for certainty and security (see Hetherington and Weiler 2009; Jost et al. 2003), are also strongly and negatively related to socioeconomic status. As a result, citizens high in these needs tend to have a lower 5 SES than those low. However, the Republican Party, in its symbolic association with cultural conservatism, is more appealing to citizens high in these needs than the Democratic Party (Hetherington and Weiler 2009; Mondak 2010). Thus, if such traits do indeed structure the selection of trusted elites in the process of forming economic preferences then, ipso facto, when exposed to elite political conflict, citizens with stronger needs for security and certainty, on average, will generate preferences that may contradict their own material interests, strictly defined. In this way, despite the continuing dominance of the economic domain in contemporaryAmerican politics, cultural conflict may nonetheless alter the level of social welfare provision in the United States as its traditional base of support is weakened through the interaction of symbolic party imagery and relevant citizen dispositions.POLITICALLY RELEVANT DISPOSITIONSResearch examining the influence of dispositions on political attitudes and behavior has been quite diverse with respect to the specific paradigm utilized (e.g. Alford, Funk and Hibbing 2005; Hetherington and Weiler 2009; Jost et al. 2003; Mondak 2010). Nonetheless, much of this work displays conceptual convergence with respect to the core dispositions which are most relevant to understanding contemporary partisan and ideological conflict within the American public. This convergence is best articulated by Jost and colleagues (Jost et al. 2003; Jost, Federico and Napier 2009; Thorisdottir et al. 2007) who argue that contemporary work in political psychology, as well as historical work in psychology proper, on the connection between stable psychological traits and political orientations can be understood within a unified theoretical framework which emphasizes citizen differences in needs for threat and uncertainty management (hereafter, needs for security and certainty). 6 Connecting these dispositions to the political domain, Jost et al. (2003), drawing on a meta-analysis of over eighty previous studies on the topic, argue that political conservatism is differentially appealing to citizens high in needs for certainty and security, while liberalism is differentially appealing to those low in such needs. The theoretical link emerges from a consideration of political conservatism as a force for institutional stability, whether in terms of values or socioeconomic hierarchies. Put simply, citizens high in needs for certainty and security see liberal attempts at institutional innovation as threatening and uncertain, and support conservative policies to counter such threats and restore predictability to the social order. Such innovation is, however, appealing to those comfortable, or attracted to, uncertainty and novelty.This general understanding of the link between traits and political orientations is echoed in other recent work within political science. Gerber et al. (2010) hypothesize that openness to experience (which is negatively associated with these same basic needs; Carney et al. 2008; McCrae 1996) should lead to both social and economic liberalism, because these “typically involve new programs or interventions that overturn existing practices” (p. 116). They argue that conscientiousness (which is positively associated with these needs) should, conversely, drive conservatism because citizens high on this trait are more prone to rule and norm-following (see also Mondak (2010) for similar claims regarding the influence of these two traits on liberalism and conservatism and partisanship).The recent literature on authoritarianism also converges theoretically. Over the last decade or so, this trait has been conceptualized as an indicator of differential threat sensitivity, and related differences in needs for order, certainty and security (Feldman 2003; Hetherington and Weiler 2009; Lavine et al. 1999; Lavine, Lodge and Freitas 2005; Stenner 2005). In other words, citizens high in authoritarianism tend to be chronically sensitive to threatening stimuli 7 and information, and show a preference for certainty over ambiguity (see Jost et al. 2003; see also Higgins 1998, p. 85). On the basis of this understanding of authoritarianism, Hetherington and Weiler (2009) argue that the symbolic imagery of the contemporary American political parties appeal differentially to citizens across levels of this trait, with high authoritarians flocking to the Republicans for their emphasis on cultural conservatism and militaristic and patriotic rhetoric and action concerning terrorism, and low authoritarians drawn to the Democrats due to their cultural tolerance and emphasis on diplomacy and understanding the root causes of terrorist activity. Thus, the rise of cultural and security-based conflict since the early 1990s has led to trait-based partisan sorting in the American mass public. Indeed, they show that since at least 2004, authoritarianism constitutes a strong basis for party identification in the American mass public.These frameworks thus largely converge on the hypothesis that traits related to differential needs for certainty and security will be associated with political conservatism and Republicanism relative to liberalism and Democratic identification. Evidence for this hypothesis, however, is heterogeneous across operationalizations of political ideology. In particular, while such psychological needs appear to be strongly related to political identification (Federico et al. 2011; Hetherington and Weiler 2009; Mondak 2010), social conservatism (Carney et al. 2008; Jost et al. 2003; Thorisdottir et al. 2007), and foreign policy conservatism (Hetherington and Suhay 2011; Hetherington and Weiler 2009), the evidence for a similar connection with the economic domain is mixed at best.Feldman and Johnston (2009), for example, find a strong association of authoritarianism with social conservatism, but no significant relationship with economic conservatism. Carney et al. (2008) find relationships of both openness to experience and conscientiousness with 8 identification as a social conservative but not with economic ideological self-placement. Van Hiel, Pandelaere and Duriez (2004) find that the need for epistemic certainty is related to cultural but not economic conservatism. Moreover, some empirical evidence suggests a relationship with the economic domain, but in the opposite direction expected by theory. Thorisdottir et al. (2007), for example, find that the need for security is positively related to moral traditionalism, but negatively related to acceptance of inequality. Golec (2001) also finds a negative relationship of economic conservatism with the need for epistemic certainty in Polish samples.Despite this seemingly disconfirming evidence for the theorized connection between needs for certainty and security and economic conservatism, a small number of studies show the expected relationships. The characteristics shared by these studies, however, are illuminating and suggest the need for a more complex model, which we develop in the subsequent section. First, Gerber et al. (2010) find relationships of both openness to experience and conscientiousness with economic policy liberalism and conservatism, respectively. Their sample, however, consisted of registered voters in the U.S., and thus of citizens with higher levels of political engagement. In a recent paper, Federico et al. (2011) find that authoritarianism predicts moral traditionalism strongly regardless of political sophistication, but is only strongly related to egalitarianism among the politically sophisticated. Finally, while Golec (2001) finds a negative relationship of the need for epistemic closure to economic conservatism among Polish students, he finds the expected positive relationship among political activists. This research suggests that political engagement moderates the relationship of needs for security and certainty in the economic domain. In the next section, we develop a theoretical model which can account for the diverse empirical findings above.PREFERENCE FORMATION ACROSS HARD AND EASY ISSUES9 What drives the variation in the influence of traits across the social, foreign and economic domains of policy? Why does there appear to be a moderating effect of political engagement on its influence in the economic domain? We argue that the key to understanding this asymmetry lies in the distinction between “easy” and “hard” issues (Carmines and Stimson 1980). Easy issues possess symbolic referents which are available to all citizens regardless of their political engagement. Gay marriage, for example, is a prototypical easy issue in the sense that citizens can largely derive their preferences on same-sex legislation regardless of exposure to elite discourse. The symbolic considerations at the heart of the debate (e.g. religion; attitudes toward sex) are accessible to most everyone. This also suggests a straightforward, or direct, relationship of citizens’ psychological dispositions to such issues. The theoretical work reviewed above posits that traits related to needs for security and certainty drive conservatism on the basis of their differential “fit” with an ideology emphasizing institutional and value stability. Thus, to the extent that symbolic referents related to such stability are accessible without attention to elite discourse, trait-based preference formation should be straightforward and direct.Hard issues, by contrast, are technical and non-symbolic by default, and thus the symbolic meaning of the issues must be constructed in the context of elite political competition. Put simply, in the absence of exposure to elite discourse, there is little reason to expect citizens to naturally connect complex issues to symbolic ideological divisions and abstract values (Converse 1964; Pollock, Lilie and Vittes 1993; Sniderman, Brody and Tetlock, 1991), and thus little reason to expect an unconditional effect of dispositions (Federico et al. 2011; Jost, Federico and Napier 2009). Instead, when issues are complex, citizens should rely more heavily on elites to form their preferences. More specifically, they should turn to trusted elites for information and guidance regarding the “correct” position to adopt on a given issue (Lupia and McCubbins 10 1998). Over time, intra-individually, such delegation processes may drive the development of more abstract values and ideologies related to the issue domain through the reception of elite issue frames and justificatory rhetoric (e.g. Goren 2005; Goren, Federico and Kittilson 2009; Sniderman, et al. 1993). Given that the structure of American political conflict largely revolves around the two major parties, such elite delegation should most often manifest as partisan delegation (Cohen 2003; Lavine, Johnston and Steenbergen 2012; Rahn 1993; Sniderman 2000; Sniderman and Bullock 2004; Tomz and Sniderman 2005). As such, whatever considerations determine partisan information seeking will also indirectly constrain preferences formed on the basis of such selectivity. As reviewed above, traits related to basic needs for certainty and security appear to be a key factor determining partisan trust and sorting in contemporary American politics as a result of the rise of cultural and security-based conflict and the readily accessible symbolic imagery of such concerns (Hetherington and Weiler 2009; Mondak 2010). This suggests that dispositions related to needs for certainty and security will indirectly constrain preferences over difficult issues in a two-step process of partisan delegation and cue-taking. Taken as a whole, we suggest at least two pathways by which dispositions influence political preferences: a direct path for easy issues, and an indirect path for hard issues.We posit that social or cultural issues, generally speaking, are easy issues. They are relatively non-technical and have readily accessible symbolic referents. Our categorization is highly consistent with the strong influence of personality on social preferences found in previous studies (e.g. Hetherington & Weiler, 2009). In contrast, we argue that economic issues are typically hard issues in that they are technical and not symbolic by default. The symbolic content of such issues is typically constructed for citizens by elites (e.g. Shapiro and Jacobs 2010), and 11 partisan cues should have a greater effect on citizen preferences in the economic domain relative to the social domain. At least some evidence supports this contention. Goren (2005) finds that the influence of partisanship on moral traditionalism is weaker than its influence on egalitarianism and preferences for limited government. Similarly, in an experimental context, Goren, Federico and Kittilsen (2009) find that the presence of partisan cues has a larger effect on citizens’ reported economic values than on their reported cultural values. Cohen (2003) finds very large effects of partisan cues on citizens’ preferences over social welfare provision, such that in the presence of cues which “reverse” party positions (i.e., Democrats as Conservative and Republicans as Liberal), citizens report preferences counter to their stated general ideologies (i.e.Liberal or Conservative identifications). Lavine, Johnston and Steenbergen (2012) find that partisanship is more important as a structuring force to policy preferences in the economic domain relative to the social domain. Given this distinction between easy and hard issues, we state our first two hypotheses for the present study as the following:(1) For social issues, the influence of needs for certainty and security will be direct, i.e., independent of the presence of elite cues(2) For economic issues, the influence of needs for certainty and security will be indirect, i.e., conditional on the presence of elite cuesFinally, we consider the expected dynamics for the foreign policy domain. On the one hand, such issues are often considered to be hard issues, and thus citizens are expected to rely strongly on elite cues when forming preferences in this domain (e.g. Berinsky 2007; Zaller 1992). On the other hand, in contemporary American politics, foreign policy issues related to the so-called War on Terror can function as easy issues, as they have readily accessible symbolic referents, namely 12 those related to religion, ethnicity, and the imagery associated with the September 11th, 2001 attacks on the United States. This latter possibility is consistent with the strong relationship of authoritarianism to foreign policy conservatism found in recent work (Hetherington and Suhay 2011; Hetherington and Weiler 2009). We thus test the following third hypothesis in the present study:(3) For foreign policy issues related to terrorism, the influence of needs for certainty and security will be direct, i.e., independent of the presence of elite cuesWe test all three of these hypotheses with a national survey experiment which manipulates the presence and absence of partisan cues in the context of social, economic and foreign policy preferences. In the next section, we describe the experiment in detail and the variables used to operationalize our key predictions. We then turn to the results of the experiment, and address the normative implications of our findings, specifically with respect to social welfare provision in the United States. We conclude with a brief summary and a discussion of broader implications.METHODSExperimental DesignTo test our three hypotheses, we adapt an experimental design inspired by Goren, Federico and Kittilson (2009) to the present concerns. In this general design, subjects are randomly assigned to one of two conditions. In both conditions, respondents are asked questions regarding their political preferences which may contrast two positions placed at opposite ends of a seven-point scale: one representing a stereotypical Liberal position, and the other a Conservative position. Subjects are asked to place themselves on this scale. In the first, or control condition, subjects are presented with the two issue positions absent of any political 13 labels. In the treatment condition, by contrast, the liberal and conservative sides of the issue are attributed to the Democratic and Republican Parties, respectively. By comparing the treatment to the control group, inferences regarding the importance of partisan cues to preference formation can be made.Our data come from a national sample of 1200 Americans conducted by the survey firm YouGov Polimetrix from March 4th to March 9th, 2011, weighted to be representative of the American public. In addition to questions regarding demographics, politics, and dispositions, the survey contained an embedded experiment, mentioned above, which we draw on for the present study. Of the 1200 total respondents, 497 were randomly assigned to one of two experimental conditions, and these individuals constitute the sample for our analyses. The embedded experiment’s stimuli consisted of seven specific policy issues, four economic, two social, and one foreign. As described above, in the control condition, each item presented two sides of the respective issue, with each side placed at opposite ends of a seven-point scale. The first position was always attributed to “Some people,” while the second position was attributed to “others.” In the treatment, or “party cues” condition, the attributions of “Some people” and “others” were replaced with “Democrats” and “Republicans” depending on the ideological direction of the scale. For example, if in the control condition the “Some people” position was liberal relative to the “others” position, then “Some people” was replaced with “Democrats,” and “others” was replaced with “Republicans.” The exact wording for each policy item appears in the Appendix to this paper.Measuring Citizen Dispositions14 The YouGov survey contained three sets of items intended to measure psychological dispositions related to needs for certainty and security. First, four items operationalized the construct of authoritarianism. Much research on authoritarianism suggests that this trait is strongly related to aversion to uncertainty and threat sensitivity (e.g. see Jost et al. 2003 for a meta-analysis of studies related to this question). Consistent with recent work (Feldman and Stenner 1997; Hetherington and Suhay 2011; Hetherington and Weiler 2009; Stenner 2005), authoritarianism was measured by asking respondents to make four pairwise comparisons of values, and indicate which of each pair they consider more important for a child to possess. The comparisons included, “Independent or Respect for Elders,” “Curiosity or Good Manners,” “Obedience or Self-Reliance,” and “Considerate or Well-Behaved.”Second, five items measured Schwartz’s (1992) value dimension of conservation versus openness to change. Schwartz value theory (Schwartz and Bilsky 1987; Schwartz 1992) posits ten unique value domains, each defined by a set of subordinate individual values, which can be conceptualized as intrinsically desirable ends to which all human beings and groups aspire. Importantly, however, the pursuit of some values impedes the pursuit of others, and these patterns of conflict and harmony amongst desirable ends implies the necessity of trading off some for others. For example, while the simultaneous pursuit of security and conformity is often possible, the simultaneous pursuit of conformity and self-direction is often not possible. These patterns lend structure to citizens’ subjective importance ratings of the various value domains; specifically, they generate a two-dimensional structure (Schwartz 1992). The first of these two dimensions, the one of interest to the present study, is defined by the harmony of the values of security, tradition and conformity on one end, and by self-direction and stimulation on the other. Conceptually, Schwartz (1992) argues that this dimension “arrays 15 values in terms of the extent to which they motivate people to follow their own intellectual and emotional interests in unpredictable and uncertain directions versus to preserve the status quo and the certainty it provides in relationships with close others, institutions, and traditions” (p. 43). This dimension is thus conceptually related to basic needs for security and certainty (see Thorisdottir et al. 2007 for an example which uses Schwartz Value Theory in a similar fashion).This dimension was operationalized with five items, each of which placed two statements at opposite ends of a 10-point scale, and asked respondents to place themselves on that scale according to their relative agreement with each statement. For example, one item contrasted the statement, “To have a good life one must be willing to pursue adventures and take risks,” with, “A safe and secure environment is the best foundation for a good life.” The exact wording for all items is contained in the Appendix.Finally, we utilized five items to measure the construct need for nonspecific cognitive closure (Kruglanski 1989; Kruglanski and Webster 1996; Kruglanski, Webster and Klem 1993). Kruglanski and Webster (1996) define this need as a “desire for a firm answer to a question and an aversion to ambiguity.” Thus, individuals high in the need for closure tend to be dispositionally averse to epistemic uncertainty, and tend toward black and white, or “rigid,” cognitive styles. The five items operationalizing the need for closure in the present study were constructed identically to those for conservation versus openness to change above, using distinct sets of paired statements for each item. For example, the first item contrasted the statement, “I like to have friends who are unpredictable,” with, “I don’t like to be with people who are capable of unexpected actions.” The specific items in this scale appear in the Appendix. 16 On the basis of our review of the literature, we expected that these three dispositional orientations would be well represented as indicators of a superordinate dimension defined broadly in terms of citizens’ differential needs for epistemic certainty and existential security. To examine this possibility, we estimated a covariance structure model which defined three latent trait dimensions, one for each of the three sets of items described above. Each trait dimension then served as an indicator of a single, superordinate latent factor. The advantage of this specification is that it models the measurement error in the observed indicators, allows each trait to be empirically distinct, and yet still instantiates their common ancestry in a more general latent construct. To the extent that these three traits are indeed indicators of a more superordinate dimension, we should find strong loadings of each on this higher-order factor.On the technical side, we specified logit link functions for the four indicators of authoritarianism, and normal link functions for the other ten indicators. To account for the likely possibility that there are individual differences in the use of the specific instrument for these latter ten (e.g. differences in initial anchoring), we additionally modeled these as a function of a latent “measurement” factor. This is equivalent to a regression of each of the ten items on a latent factor, where the coefficients relating the factor to each indicator are constrained to be equal, and the factor itself is constrained to be uncorrelated with the other latent factors in the model. In other words, the measurement factor allows for the possibility that, independent of the content of the individual items, responses are related due to the idiosyncratic way in which each respondent utilizes the common instrument. All latent factors were identified by fixing their variances to one. The model was estimated via weighted least squares in Mplus (Muthén and Muthén 2007). To improve the efficiency of our estimates, we utilized the entire 1200 person sample.17 While the estimates for the model are provided in the Appendix C, we highlight the key result here. We find that each of the three latent personality indicators is strongly determined by the hypothesized superordinate dimension. The standardized factor loadings for authoritarianism, conservation versus openness to change, and the need for nonspecific closure on this latent dimension are, respectively, .81, .80, and .54. All three are thus above typical standards for a good indicator, and the loadings for authoritarianism and conservation are very large.2 Substantively, one can interpret these loadings as the expected change (in standard deviations) of each latent indicator for a one standard deviation change in the superordinate trait dimension. On the basis of these results, we concluded support for our reading of the recent literature, and thus generated factor scores (on the superordinate trait dimension) for each respondent. We utilize these scores as our key independent variable in all analyses to follow. This variable itself has a mean of zero and a standard deviation of one, but was recoded to range from zero to one such that higher values indicate greater needs for security and certainty.Dependent Variables3Our three dependent variables represent respondent preferences over social, foreign and economic policy issues, respectively. The YouGov survey contained two items operationalizing preferences in the social domain, namely, abortion and gay marriage. These two items were highly correlated (r=.50), and were thus averaged to form a single scale with higher values indicating greater social conservatism. Foreign policy preferences were operationalized with a 2 The strong relationship between authoritarianism and conservation versus openness to change is consistent with Feldman’s (2003) work and his conceptualization of the authoritarianism construct.3 Recall that the individual items differ across the two experimental conditions with respect to the presence or absence of party attributions.18 single item asking whether the government should be allowed to hold suspected terrorists indefinitely without charging them with a crime. This measure thus taps respondents’ preferences regarding expanded government power to fight terrorism. The item was coded such that higher values indicate greater support for holding terrorists indefinitely, and thus greater foreign policy conservatism in the realm of terrorism. Finally, four items measured economic conservatism, including preferences regarding government provision of health insurance, unemployment insurance, social security, and the desirability of increased regulation of the financial industry. These items formed a highly reliable scale (α=.79) which was coded such that higher values indicate greater economic conservatism. The exact wordings for all items are contained in the Appendix. Further, all three dependent variables were recoded to range from zero to one prior to analysis.Control VariablesWe control for several additional variables which are likely or arguably exogenous to the key personality dimension of interest, but may be related to both personality and political ideology. These include age, gender (1=male), race (1=black), education (nominally operationalized as six separate categories to allow for non-linearity), income, employment status (1=unemployed), and religiosity. For the religiosity variable, we constructed a scale using three items: the importance of religion to the individual, their frequency of religious service attendance, and their frequency of prayer (α=.87). All controls were recoded to range from zero to one prior to analysis.Analysis19 We tested our hypotheses with three OLS regressions with robust standard errors. Each model regressed social, foreign, or economic policy conservatism on needs for security and certainty, a dummy indicator for the party cues treatment condition, the interaction of needs with treatment condition, and all controls described above. With this specification, in the social and foreign policy models, we expected a positive and significant constituent term for needs, but minimal and insignificant interaction terms. This pattern suggests an unconditional relationship of traits to preferences in these two domains; or, in other words, a strong direct relationship regardless of the presence or absence of elite cues. Conversely, in the economic preferences model, we expected to find a minimal effect of needs in the control condition, but a strong and significant relationship in the treatment condition, indicating a conditional relationship within this domain, and thus support for the two-step model theorized above.RESULTSInfluence of Needs on Policy ConservatismThe estimates for these three models are shown in the first three columns of Figure 1a. Our results strongly support theoretical expectations. For social and foreign policy preferences, dispositions related to needs for security and certainty strongly and significantly predict conservatism regardless of the presence or absence of elite cues. In both models the coefficient for needs is substantively large, in the expected positive direction, and statistically significant. Additionally, the interactions of needs with treatment condition are minimal and insignificant, as hypothesized. To better interpret these coefficients, we plot the marginal effects of needs across ideological domains and conditions in Figure 1b. Each dot represents the expected change in domain-specific policy conservatism for a change in needs for certainty and security from its 5th 20 to its 95th percentile. Looking at the first two pairs of dots, one can see that the magnitudes of the coefficients are comparable between the social and foreign domains. Across domains and conditions, the effective influence of needs for security and certainty on conservatism is about .30. In other words, a change in these needs from low to high, all else equal, is expected to increase social and foreign policy conservatism by about 30% of their respective scales. These are effects of substance, and are consistent with recent work (e.g. Hetherington and Weiler 2009). In contrast, for economic preferences, the coefficient for needs in the control condition, although attaining statistical significance, is about one-third the size of the other two models. From Figure 1b we see that the influence of traits on economic conservatism in the absence of elite cues is only .09, or 9% of the scale of the dependent variable. In the presence of partisan cues, however, this effect increases substantially. The interaction of needs with treatment condition is substantively large, and statistically significant with a one-tailed test.4 In the party cues treatment condition, a change from the 5th to the 95th percentile of needs for certainty and security entails an expected increase in economic conservatism of 21 percentage points, or more than twice the size of the control condition, and approaches the magnitudes for social and foreign preferences. Discovery of such a large effect is striking given that prior research has failed to consistently find any effect of personality variables in the economic domain (e.g. Carney et al. 2008; Feldman and Johnston 2009; Van Hiel, Pandaelere and Duriez 2004). Thus needs for certainty and security exert a strong influence on preferences in all three domains, but only conditionally so in the economic domain. 4 Given our directional hypothesis, we utilize a one-tailed test for significance. Ninety-five percent confidence intervals are reported in Figure 1a for the reader’s convenience.21 The importance of partisan cues to the translation of dispositions into economic preferences suggests the possibility that the influence of dispositions will be larger for White Americans, particularly in relation to Black Americans, who tend to identify with the DemocraticParty at high rates. As such, Black Americans, regardless of dispositional orientations, are unlikely to accept Republican cues. Indeed, in our sample, less than 6% of Black Americans identify with the Republican Party. To examine this possibility, we re-estimated the economic preferences model including only White Americans.56 These estimates are shown in the last column of Figure 1a, and in the last pair of dots in Figure 1b. Once again, our conditional hypothesis receives strong support. In addition, the size of the interaction term is larger than for the full sample model. Looking at Figure 1b, a change from the 5th to the 95th percentile of needs in the control condition entails an expected increase in economic conservatism of about 10 percentage points. In the treatment condition, by contrast, this change entails a 26 percentage point increase in conservatism. There is thus some suggestion that these dynamics may be stronger for White Americans, which would be consistent with other recent work (Gerber et al. 2010), but further research is clearly needed to explore racial and ethnic heterogeneity in the translation of dispositional factors into political preferences.Implications for Social Welfare Provision5 Ideally we would estimate separate models for all racial and ethnic groups in our sample, but the sample sizes for these latter groups would be too small to generate the power needed for a proper test.6 We also estimated models for social and foreign preferences using this Whites-only subsample to see if this influenced the moderating impact of party cues for these domains. No evidence was found for this additional possibility in the form of interactions with treatment condition, and the substantive results remained nearly identical. The constituent term on needs in the foreign policy model was slightly larger, however.22 Having demonstrated the importance of elite cues for the translation of citizens’ psychological dispositions into economic preferences, we turn now to the question of why this dynamic matters for political outcomes in the United States. While the task of uncovering the various influences on political preferences in the mass public may be worthwhile in and of itself, we believe that the dynamics observed above have broader implications, more specifically with respect to the provision of social welfare. On the basis of classical models of economic preferences, we expect citizens of low socioeconomic status to prefer the provision of social welfare and government redistribution to a greater extent than their fellow citizens of high socioeconomic status (Meltzer and Richard 1981). Importantly, however, socioeconomic status is negatively associated with needs for security and certainty, but these needs are positively associated with economic conservatism in the context of exposure to elite-level politics. The interaction of these two insights suggests a perhaps surprising conclusion: as citizens of low socioeconomic status become more involved and engaged with elite-level politics they are expected to become increasingly economically conservative on average – exactly the opposite of what would be expected on the basis of classical rational choice models. As low SES citizens traditionally represent the primary base of support for the provision of social welfare, this dynamic has the capacity to reduce the overall extent of the welfare state in a political environment where the symbolic aspects of party conflict (i.e. cultural concerns) resonate with psychological needs for security and certainty.We examine this dynamic empirically through the specification of a structural equation model linking socioeconomic status to economic preferences both directly and indirectly through needs for security and certainty. In other words, we simultaneously estimated two equations: one identical to those examined above, and a second regressing needs for security and certainty on all23 demographic and control variables. Given the results above, and the focus of recent “culture war” arguments on blue-collar White America (e.g. Bartels 2006; Frank 2004), we restrict our sample here to White Americans. To account for the moderating role of partisan cues on the influence of needs for certainty and security, we estimated a multiple groups model which allows the effect of needs, and thus the indirect effects of all other variables on economic preferences, to vary across experimental conditions. The model was estimated via maximum likelihood in MPLUS (Muthén and Muthén 2007).The key results of this estimation are shown in Figure 2 (the full model results are shown in the Appendix). Panel A of this table displays all direct effects of independent variables on needs for certainty and security. As the estimates for the regression of economic preferences on all variables are largely identical to that of the ordinary least squares model above, we do not consider these further here. Examining Panel A, we confirm the relationship of socioeconomic status to needs for security and certainty. Looking at the pattern of coefficients for the education dummies (where “less than a high school degree” is the excluded category), it is clear that there is a strong, yet non-linear relationship between the acquisition of human capital and these basic needs. More specifically, there is an abrupt division between those with a high school degree or less, and those with more than a high school degree, with the latter significantly lower in these needs. Interestingly, however, there appears to be little additional influence of education after the high school degree level, with the possible exception of post-graduate degrees. The relationship of needs to education confirms expectations derived from previous literature. In addition, after controlling for education there is no additional association of needs with income.On the basis of this pattern, and to get a better sense of the substantive meaning of these results, we re-estimated the model treating education as a dummy variable taking a value of one 24 for those with more than a high school degree, and a value of zero for those with a high school degree or less. We then generated predicted values of economic conservatism, across experimental conditions, for each of the two levels of education. These estimates, with their associated 95% confidence bounds, are graphed in Figure 2b. The first two dots show estimated levels of economic conservatism for low education citizens across the two experimental conditions, while the second two dots show the same for high education citizens. This configuration reveals a striking confirmation of the counter-intuitive nature of economic preference formation for low SES citizens, as predicted by the theory above. Specifically, in the presence of elite cues, low education respondents are expected to be more conservative economically than their counterparts in the control condition, and more conservative than high education respondents in either condition. The effect of the treatment is not insubstantial. Moving from the control to the treatment group, respondents with a high school degree or less are expected to be about seven percentage points more conservative on average (p<.05). In contrast, we find no change in economic conservatism for the combined high education categories across the two conditions, and no other significant comparisons between groups. It is also important to note that this increase in conservatism for low education respondents is due solely to the presence of party cues in this one instance. In the real world of day-to-day American politics, we should expect consistent exposure to such cues for politically engaged citizens, and thus more pronounced effects.CONCLUSIONSThe findings of the present paper have several important implications related to our initial inquiries regarding how and why citizens’ stable psychological dispositions matter for preference formation in American politics. We discuss these in turn.25 Heterogeneity across Ideological DomainsThe vast majority of work on personality and political ideology (e.g. Jost et al. 2003; but see Gerber et al. 2010) treats the latter construct as either a unidimensional continuum ranging from liberal to conservative, or utilizes operationalizations which pertain solely to the social domain. These limited conceptualizations of mass preferences give rise to overly simplistic conclusions regarding their relationship to key traits. The first contribution of the present research, then, is to challenge the validity of these conclusions and initiate a dialogue regarding the conditional nature of the influence of stable traits on political ideology. Given the vitriolic and polarized nature of contemporary American politics which highlights stereotypical representations of “liberals” and “conservatives,” it is appealing to assume unidimensionality, and thus to assume that traits will operate in a similar fashion across domains. However, preferences in the mass public remain complex in structure (Feldman and Johnston 2009; Treier and Hillygus 2009), and ignoring this complexity, while generating parsimonious models, leads to overgeneralizations and misunderstandings both with respect to the extent of personality’s influence across domains, and the underlying reasons for it. As we have shown, there is no psychologically necessary relationship of traits related to needs for security and certainty to preferences in the economic domain. These associations are likely generated (or not), at least in large part, on the basis of exposure (or obliviousness) to elite-level, partisan conflict. Beyond the “Direct Effects” Approach to Personality and PreferencesIn a related vein, the unidimensional conceptualization of ideology has obscured the ways in which elites mediate the translation of dispositions into preferences. The generic model of work on personality and preferences is a “direct effects” approach, manifested empirically as 26 simple associations between ideological orientations and measures of citizen traits (e.g., Jost et al. 2003; Mondak 2010). From this standpoint, citizen preference formation is modeled as if it occurs within a political vacuum, independent of elite-level conflict. But such an approach to preference formation is, as political scientists have emphasized (e.g. Sniderman 2000; Zaller 1992), an inaccurate portrayal of the nature of public opinion. Citizens develop bonds to political groups which serve as their “anchors” within the political space. Policies rarely enter the political arena without readily accessible “brand names” (Tomz and Sniderman, 2005), and citizens seek coherence between their political identity and positions over specific issues (e.g. Kunda 1990; Lavine, Johnston and Steenbergen 2012; Taber and Lodge 2006). This is not to say that citizens can never form preferences over policy without the aid of elite referents, but rather that many of the most important issues debated in American politics are difficult. In such cases, citizens rely extensively on elite delegation in the form of selective information seeking and assimilation to establish their own position within the policy space (Lupia and McCubbins 1998).All of this suggests a more complex role for dispositions in preference formation, but one which may be of even greater importance. If citizens structure their information seeking on the basis of perceived matches on basic traits,7 then subsequent preference formation, as a function of such delegation, is indirectly constrained by these same traits. It is our sense that, in an effort to emphasize the “bottom-up” sources of political preferences (in contrast to the “top-down” approach historically taken in political science), much recent work has lost sight of the 7 We do not intend to imply that such delegation must be consciously trait-based, simply that feelings of trust are more likely to emerge when core dispositions are shared. Such matches could simply manifest as feelings of “fit” between a party or elite figure and the self, a feeling derivative of the resonance between symbolic rhetoric or actions of actors and the chronic motives and goals which underlie personality (e.g. Cesario, Grant and Higgins 2004; Haidt 2001; Higgins 1998; Jost, Federico and Napier 2009). 27 importance of political discourse and citizen-elite interactions.8 Thus, future work must consider in more depth the moderating conditions which alter the pathways from dispositions to preferences. Racial and Ethnic Heterogeneity in Personality ProcessesAn important, yet underemphasized, aspect of the personality and politics literature concerns the potential heterogeneity that exists in the nature of trait-based influence across racial and ethnic groups. Put simply, we know next to nothing about potential variation in the effects of traits on preferences across such social groups, but there are both theoretical reasons, and suggestive empirical evidence, to believe that such heterogeneity may exist. Theoretically, our two-pathway model suggests the possibility that traits may function much differently for White Americans as compared to other groups, and in particular, to Black Americans. We speculate that this heterogeneity is driven by ethnic variation in partisan affiliations, in which Black Americans identify at high rates with the Democratic Party. Such one-sided partisanship effectively removes the elite delegation pathway for these citizens, since they predominantly refer to the one party for elite cues regardless of any variation in psychological dispositions. This suggests that any influence of dispositions within the economic domain will likely operate in a qualitatively distinct fashion. We would expect similar deviations from our dual pathway model for any group that possesses much stronger ties to one party over the other. At least some empirical evidence is suggestive of this possibility. Gerber et al. (2010), for example, find that the “Big Five” traits are associated with economic preferences for Whites but not for Blacks. They attribute their findings to the differential socioeconomic experiences of the latter, on average, but this theorizing is vague at best. In a recent dissertation, Johnston (2011) finds that 8 This is, perhaps, beginning to change. See, for example, Federico et al. (2011).28 authoritarianism is strongly associated with the economic domain for White Americans, but has no influence for either Blacks or Hispanics. Finally, our own experimental evidence shows a slight increase in the influence of partisan cues when moving from the full sample to the Whites- only sample, suggesting that the inclusion of other groups “dilutes” the expected dynamic. Unraveling the heterogeneity of trait-based influence across social groups is a critical area for future research as this literature moves forward, and has the potential to generate new insights into the intermediate mechanisms by which dispositions exert their influence. At present, however, our conclusions are largely limited to non-Hispanic, White Americans.The Importance of the “Culture War”Perhaps the most important conclusion of this paper concerns the normative implications of the two-pathway theoretical approach for our understanding of the importance of the “culture war” in American politics. The common wisdom behind the culture war argument (e.g. Frank 2004) suggests that the economic domain has been displaced in favor of mass voting on the basis of cultural issues. The implications of the displacement hypothesis are quite important, because, as noted by Ansolabehere, Rodden and Snyder (2006), it implies less social welfare provision over the long-term due to decreased support among lower socioeconomic status voters who vote conservative politicians into office for cultural reasons. Recent work in political science, however, has empirically debunked the displacement claim (Ansolabehere, Rodden and Snyder 2006; Bartels 2006; Gelman 2008; Smith 2009). The problem with this research, however, is that it takes economic preferences as “givens,” thus assuming that any association between the economic domain and political choice represents prospective voting, and/or rationally driven self-interested behavior. Our present 29 research plainly makes this assumption untenable, and instead demonstrates that the origins of economic preferences are of critical importance to understanding the normative implications of the culture war. More specifically, when symbolic elite divisions have a substantial cultural component, even if this component is not the focus of day-to-day policymaking, traits which strongly resonate with cultural liberalism and conservatism will be highly influential in determining elite delegation. Thus, preferences over difficult issues become derivative of citizen delegations made on the basis of cultural symbolism and its interaction with stable dispositions. Importantly, the basic needs for certainty and security which appear so influential in shaping elite delegation in American politics are also negatively associated with socioeconomic status. 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SCHWARTZ VALUES AND NEED FOR CLOSURE ITEMSSchwartz Values“How would you place your views on this scale? 1 means you agree completely with the statement on the left; 10 means you agree completely with the statement on the right; and if your views fall somewhere in between, you can choose any number in between.”[Left] To have a good life one must be willing to pursue adventures and take risks [Right] A safe and secure environment is the best foundation for a good life[Left] It is best for everyone if people try to fit in instead of acting in unusual ways [Right] People should be encouraged to express themselves in unique and possibly unusual ways[Left] People should not try to understand how society works but just accept the way it is [Right] People should constantly try to question why things are the way they are[Left] It is most important to give people the freedom they need to express themselves [Right] Our society will break down if we allow people to do or say anything they want[Left] We should admire people who go their own way without worrying what others think [Right] People need to learn to fit in and get along with othersNeed for Nonspecific Cognitive Closure35 “How would you place your views on this scale? 1 means you agree completely with the statement on the left; 10 means you agree completely with the statement on the right; and if your views fall somewhere in between, you can choose any number in between.”[Left] I don’t like going into a situation without knowing what I can expect from it. [Right] I enjoy the uncertainty of going into a new situation without knowing what might happen.[Left] In most social conflicts, I can easily see which side is right and which is wrong [Right] In most social conflicts, I can easily see how both sides could be right[Left] I think it is fun to change my plans at the last moment [Right] I hate to change my plans at the last moment[Left] I like to have friends who are unpredictable [Right] I don’t like to be with people who are capable of unexpected actions[Left] I tend to put off making important decisions until the last possible moment [Right] I usually make important decisions quickly and confidentlyAPPENDIX B. EXPERIMENTAL DEPENDENT VARIABLES (In Party Cues Condition, “Some” and “Others” replaced with party labels)Economic Items1. Some people believe there should be a government insurance plan which would cover all medical expenses for everyone. Suppose these people are at one end of a scale, at point 1. Others believe that all medical expenses should be paid by individuals through private insurance plans. Suppose these people are at the other end, at point 7. And, of course, some other people have opinions somewhere in between, at points 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Where would you place YOURSELF on this scale? (1) Government insurance plan (7) Private Insurance plan2. Some people believe that we should get rid of government provided unemployment insurance altogether. Suppose these people are at one end of the scale at point 1. 36 Others believe that we should greatly increase unemployment insurance. Suppose these people are at the other end of the scale at point 7. And, of course, some other people have opinions somewhere in between at points 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Where would you place YOURSELF on this scale? (1) Get rid of unemployment insurance altogether (7) Greatly increase unemployment insurance3. Some people believe that we should greatly increase government regulation of the financial industry. Suppose these people are at one end of the scale at point 1. Others believe that we should get rid of financial regulations altogether. Suppose these people are at the other end of the scale at point 7. And, of course, some other people have opinions somewhere in between at points 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Where would you place YOURSELF on this scale? (1) Greatly increase financial regulations (7) Get rid of financial regulations altogether4. Some people believe that we should allow people to invest all of their Social Security benefits in the private markets. Suppose these people are at one end of the scale at point 1. Others believe that all Social Security benefits should be handled by the government. Suppose these people are at the other end of the scale at point 7. And, of course, some other people have opinions somewhere in between at points 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Where would you place YOURSELF on this scale? (1) Allow all benefits to be invested in private markets (7) All benefits handled by governmentSocial Items 1. Some people strongly oppose legalizing gay marriage. Suppose these people are at one end of a scale, at point 1. Others strongly support legalizing gay marriage. Suppose these people are at the other end, at point 7. And, of course, some other people have opinions somewhere in between, at points 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Where would you place YOURSELF on this scale? (1) Strongly oppose legalizing gay marriage (7) Strongly support legalizing gay marriage37 2. Some people believe that women should always be able to get an abortion for any reason. Suppose these people are at one end of a scale, at point 1. Others believe that abortions should always be illegal no matter what the reason. Suppose these people are at the other end, at point 7. And, of course, some other people have opinions somewhere in between, at points 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Where would you place YOURSELF on this scale? (1) Always able to get an abortion (7) Abortion always illegalForeign Policy (Terrorism)1. Some people believe that the government should be allowed to hold suspected terrorists indefinitely without charging them with a crime. Suppose these people are at one end of a scale, at point 1. Others believe that suspected terrorists should be afforded the same rights as regular suspected criminals. Suppose these people are at the other end, at point 7. And, of course, some other people have opinions somewhere in between, at points 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6. Where would you place YOURSELF on this scale? (1) Hold terrorist suspects indefinitely (7) Give terrorist suspects same rights38 APPENDIX C. COVARIANCE STRUCTURE MODEL ESTIMATES FOR DISPOSITIONSItem Std. Loading Conservation v. Openness to Change 1 .39 2 -.56 3 -.43 4 .48 5 .58 Need for Closure 1 -.57 2 -.23 3 .55 4 .60 5 .11 Authoritarianism 1 .72 2 .73 3 .70 4 .51Superordinate Dimension CO .80 NC .54 AT .81TLI .85 RMSEA .07 χ2/df 6.46 N 120039 Figure 1a. OLS Regression Estimates and 95% Confidence BoundsSocial Terrorism Econ - All Rs Econ - Whites Needs for C&S Needs x Cues R2=.37, N=493 R2=.15, N=492 R2=.14, N=494 R2=.20, N=360Party Cues Age Male Black HS Degree Some College 2-Year Deg. BA Deg. Post-Grad Income Unemployed Religiosity-.2 0 .2 .4 .6 .8 -.2 0 .2 .4 .6 .8 -.2 0 .2 .4 .6 .8 -.2 0 .2 .4 .6 .8Notes: All variables are coded on a 0-1 scale40 Figure 1b. Marginal Effects of Needs on Policy ConservatismSocialTerrorismEcon - All RsEcon - Whites0 .1 .2 .3 .4 .5Control Party CuesNotes: Effects are for changes in needs from 5% to 95%41 Figure 2a. Predictors of Needs for Certainty and Security7-Cat Education 2-Cat Education AgeMaleHS Degree/>HSSome College2-Year DegreeBA DegreePost-GradIncomeUnemployedReligiosity-1 -.5 0 .5 -1 -.5 0 .5Notes: ML estimates from structural equation model. DV: mean=0, sd=18 Figure 2b. Predicted Values of Economic ConservatismHS Degree or LessMore Than HS Degree.45 .5 .55 .6 .65 .7 Control Party CuesNotes: Based on SEM estimates. All controls held at central tendencies. DV ranges 0-1.42 43

Psychological Dispositions and Political Preferences Across Hard and Easy Issues

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