Makes perfect sense. A predisposition toward fear makes a person vulnerable to authoritarian conservative pitches: "I'm strong, I'll protect you (all you have to do is give up your civil liberties and learn perfect obedience)".
Sensitivity to startlement sounds like the flip side of scoring low on measures such as openness to new experience. New experiences can be startling, and that type of personality would shy away from them.
I wonder if one of the reasons that Conservatives seem so terrified of Liberals is that we're always coming up with startling new ideas, and we neglect to reassure the fearful Conservatives that change really will be for the better, and they won't be harmed. We're so busy grooving on change we fail to notice that we're scaring the bejeezus out of a minority of our fellow citizens, the ones who don't intuitively grasp that change is good. We need to do more outreach.
Current Events » in reply to "Startle Response Linked to Politics."
The fear factor
The whole thread (33 posts)
- Jonathan Haidt: The real difference between liberals and conservatives
- Very nice...however he forgot to mention one thing...
- "Startle Response Linked to Politics."
- That was truly remarkable
- That was superb.
- Fascinating and insightful,