I've long suspected that there is a correlation to be found between political persuasions and personality traits (or deeper psychological dispositions and attitudes). I suspect also that there is a similar correlation to be found between personality traits and philosophical intutitions.
In my Introduction to Philosophy class I start with a discussion theories of human nature, looking at E. O. Wilson's views in Human Nature and the acerbic response that Rose, Lewontin and Kamin present in Not in Our Genes. The latter clearly suggest that Wilson's philosophical and scientific position is motivated by a political agenda. I think they misrepresent both Wilson's views and his motivation. But it may well be that science (and perhaps philosophy) is sometimes (or even quite often) pushed by a political agenda (see Gould's Mismeasure of Man, for example). My suspicion, however, is that underneath it all is a set of psychological dispositions that are common to all theorizing, be it political, scientific, or philosophical. In a recent Psychology Today article ("The Ideological Animal" by Jay Dixit) there is an attempt to connect certain psychological profiles with different political persuasions.

We think our political stance is the product of reason, but we're easily manipulated and surprisingly malleable. Our essential political self is more a stew of childhood temperament, education, and fear of death. Call it the 9/11 effect.

I'd rather not call it the 9/11 effect since we need to be thinking about the "stew" of dispositions that are built-up from a lifetime of experiences, the constant influence of the environment, and the limitations imposed by our genes. The article clearly addresses this.

"All people are born alike?except Republicans and Democrats," quipped Groucho Marx, and in fact it turns out that personality differences between liberals and conservatives are evident in early childhood.

Dixit goes on to highlight the ways in which research supports the correlation between certain personality traits (tolerance of ambiguity, religiosity--at least toward orgainized religion, open-mindedness, curiosity, need for closure or structure, and so on) and political persuasion. But he wants to add that fear (even a single terrifying event--like that of 9/11) can bring about a shift in political stance--most likely toward a more conservative position (this is the real 9/11 effect he wants to introduce). It is not too surprising that in the face of immediate danger, even someone with a liberal world view would take a more conservative stance. And it would be as easy to over-state this and to over-simplify the explanation). Evidence from the last elections suggests this conversion to the more conservative stance might be temporary. It might also be experienced by only a few, perhaps those who were near the middle anyway, or those who easily fluctuate between opinions. And there remains the issue of how much of this emotional pull can be moderated by an appeal to education, reason and critical thinking.

In any case, it is certanly an empiricist kind of thing to think that somehow these emotional states or psychological profiles should have much to do with direction of one's political persuasion, especially one's philosophical intuitions. Left-leaning empiricist that I am, however, I'm not ready to conclude that a good shot of fear can turn an empiricist into a rationalist.

Psychology Today: The Ideological Animal

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