7/28/2003
In the rapidly expanding Blog universe, political commentaries from “ePoliticos” such as myself are legion. However, I do claim one advantage over many bloggers, not to mention those in the professional media, I know data and I have both a BA and an M Ed. degree in psychology. So I’m very familiar with that world.
Oddly enough, with my intense psychology background, I now work in the IT industry as an IT Manager. The dot com bust sent hundreds of companies spinning into oblivion, but the IT industry as a whole is just as robust as ever, and it practices and concepts remain strong and precise in their application.
So what does any of this have to do with a study recently released from Berkeley which supposedly investigates the makeup of political conservatives? Simply put; its all about the data!
Just to bring you up to date, a study was recently undertaken at Berkely to examine factors which contribute to the makeup of a politically conservative person. The study proposes the following common factors:
->Fear and aggression
->Dogmatism and intolerance of ambiguity
->Uncertainty avoidance
->Need for cognitive closure
->Terror management
The data itself was pulled from “among 88 samples, involving 22,818 participants, taken from journal articles, books and conference papers. The material originating from 12 countries included speeches and interviews given by politicians, opinions and verdicts rendered by judges, as well as experimental, field and survey studies.” These results were obtained by “ten meta-analytic calculations performed on the material - which included various types of literature and approaches from different countries and groups - yielded consistent, common threads”
While the summary of this study sounds rather authoritative and conclusive, a closer look at the http://www.viewpointjournal.com
4 Comments
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Comment by online blackjack — 12/12/2004 @ 10:58 am
Good grief! I highly recommend that you seek honorable employment or even employ your talents to producing a work product that is beneficial instead of a mass of confusion (garbage) about nothing significant that matters.
Comment by Gary McDonald — 2/21/2005 @ 6:13 pm
So, you agree that the Berkeley study was worthless as well?
Thanks,
David
Comment by David Flanagan — 2/21/2005 @ 8:21 pm
Actually, one quick note. I’m going to have to fix a large number of my posts. They were brought over from another site a few months back and, unfortunately, not all of them were brought over in their entirety. As I reread the post, it certainly looks messy. Really, it used to be a complete post, as opposed to the way it looks now.
David
Comment by David Flanagan — 2/21/2005 @ 8:23 pm