Intelligence is easily one of the most controversial and
divisive issues in scientific psychology. Add the issue of political ideology
and the result is likely to stir up heated debate. Dr Goal Saedi at Psychology Today touched on the subject of how intelligence
is related to political ideology and provoked
quite a strong response. The subject is a complex one and not yet fully
understood. A review of the research literature reveals some conflicting findings, but
one theme that seems to emerge is that the cultural context appears to influence the way
that intelligence and political orientation are related to each other.
Psychologists have often been unkind to conservatives
A variety of theories have been proposed about the nature of
the relationship between political views and intelligence. Some scholars (for
example Stankov, 2009) have argued that
conservative political ideologies tend to be associated with lower intelligence
on average. Conservatives generally value tradition, respect for authority, and
social order, and tend to be low in openness to experience, and so are leery of innovation and change. These scholars
have argued that such values tend to be associated with cognitive rigidity and
may therefore appeal to people who have difficulty with intellectual challenges
that require them to process novel information. In support of this, Stankov
(2009) cited evidence that people with more conservative views tend to score lower
on IQ tests and to have lower levels of education. Not surprisingly,
conservatives tend to react angrily to such assertions. Accusations of
liberal bias among academics are often made and there does appear to be a
degree of truth to these, especially among social psychologists in particular (e.g. Prentice, 2012).
An alternative theory, originally proposed by Hans Eysenck,
is that higher intelligence is associated with avoidance of extreme political
views in general. Hence, more intelligent people are thought to be
moderate/centrist in their political views. The argument is that more extreme
views, whether right-wing or left-wing, tend to be associated with dogmatism
and rigidity, which are more appealing to less intelligent people. A recent
proponent of this view is Rinderman
who argued that more intelligent people tend to have civic values that lead
them to support political systems they believe will foster education and the
growth of knowledge (Rindermann, Flores-Mendoza,
& Woodley, 2012). Hence, according to this view, intelligent people
tend to believe that moderate/centrist parties are more likely to promote their
particular social interests compared to more clearly left or right parties. In
support of this, Rinderman et al. cite findings from Great Britain and Brazil
showing that people who expressed support for centrist parties (including
centre-right and centre-left) had higher average IQ’s compared to those who
supported more clearly left or right parties. An interesting finding from the
study in Brazil was that people who had a political orientation at all tended
to have a higher IQ than those who said they had no political orientation. This
suggests that people who are more intelligent tend to be more interested in and
informed about politics generally. It is worth noting that the average IQ’s
cited for the various political orientations in Rinderman et al.’s study were all
well within the normal range (an IQ
ranging between 90 – 110 is considered “average”). For example, those who
supported centre-right parties had the highest IQ (about 105) whereas those who
supported clearly left or right parties had IQ’s around 94.
Although Rinderman et al. found that more intelligent people
tended to support more moderate views, an American study found the opposite
effect. Kemmelmeier (2008) surveyed
college students who scored above average in academic achievement tests (e.g.
SAT and ACT) and found two trends. There was a linear trend for more
intelligent students to be less conservative overall, in line with Stankov’s
findings. Additionally, there was a non-linear trend[1] for the most intelligent students to support more extreme (i.e. left or
right-wing) political views as opposed to more moderate ones, contrary to the
findings of Rinderman et al. Political views in this study was measured by
first asking people how liberal vs. conservative they were, and additionally
asking about their views on more specific issues referred to as “traditional
gender roles” and “anti-regulation” attitudes. Participants’ views on the
former issues (e.g. gay marriage and abortion) were more strongly associated
with their overall conservatism than their views on government regulation (e.g.
gun control, higher taxes for the wealthy, speech codes on campus).
Interestingly, higher intelligence was associated with less conservative views
on traditional gender roles on the one hand, but more “conservative” views
opposing government regulation. This suggests that more intelligent people in
this study tended to support both greater personal freedom and less government
regulation in general (libertarians take note). This finding is similar to that
of a previous finding that higher education was associated with greater support
for liberal social policies but not with support for greater economic
regulation (Gerber, Huber, Doherty, Dowling,
& Ha, 2010).
The respective findings of Rinderman et al. and of
Kemmelmeier would seem to contradict each other. The conflicting findings might
possibly reflect differences between the samples. Participants in Rinderman’s
study were predominantly of average intelligence, whereas those in
Kemmelmeier’s study were students from elite colleges with high levels of
intellectual ability. Perhaps, there is a complicated relationship with
intelligence such that people of average ability tend to prefer moderate views,
whereas those with greater intellectual gifts might perceive more extreme
ideologies, whether left or right-wing, as more sophisticated and hence more
appealing. Further research is needed to assess whether this is the case.
Another possibility is that the cultural context has an
important impact on what political ideologies are most acceptable to
intelligent people. The results of Rinderman et al.’s study might have been
influenced by the fact that Brazilian people have had a long history of living
through more extreme political regimes than in the USA. Hence, intelligent, sophisticated
voters in Brazil might be more wary of extreme political parties than in the
United States. Additionally, the ideologies that intelligent people support
might be influenced by social norms. Woodley’s cultural mediation hypothesis
proposes that that the highly intelligent are better at detecting and espousing
the values that are normative at a particular time (Woodley, 2010). Hence, intellectuals might fluctuate in their
support for left or right-wing views according to changing social norms. In support
of this, Woodley notes a study of white South Africans in the 1980’s that found
that higher cognitive ability was correlated with support for traditional
conservative religious and political views, which were socially normative in
that time and place. Woodley argues that since the 1960s, post-materialist
values have become normative among intellectuals in much of the Western world.
Hence apparent associations between left-liberal views and intelligence may
reflect currently prevailing Western values.
The findings discussed illustrate a number of key points. Firstly,
highly intelligent individuals may actually support right-wing views, not just
left-wing ones, contrary to claims that support for right-wing positions
reflects a lack of intellectual sophistication. It seems fair to say then that not
only liberals, but conservatives (and those with other positions, such as
libertarians) can have intellectually sophisticated reasons for their political
views. The second point is that categorising people simply as generally liberal
or conservative may mask differences in people’s views on social versus
economic issues. The results of Kemmelmeier’s study suggest that when people
are asked if they are liberal or conservative, they may give more weight to
their views on social issues (such as abortion and gay rights) than to their
views on economic issues (such as taxation). Therefore, in order to better
understand how political attitudes are related to intelligence, a
two-dimensional model that separates social and economic attitudes (see The World’s Smallest Political Quiz
for one example) may be preferable to the traditional yet overly simplistic
left/right distinction.
Finally, the relationship between intelligence and political
attitudes is most likely not fixed in some simple way, but probably changes
across time and context.
Footnote
[1] This could be visualised as like a U-shaped distribution of intelligence across the political spectrum. That is, there was a peak of intelligence on the left side, a dip in the middle, and a rise towards the right side. The left side tended to have more highly intelligent people than the right though, in line with the linear trend.
[1] This could be visualised as like a U-shaped distribution of intelligence across the political spectrum. That is, there was a peak of intelligence on the left side, a dip in the middle, and a rise towards the right side. The left side tended to have more highly intelligent people than the right though, in line with the linear trend.
© Scott McGreal. Please do not reproduce without
permission. Brief excerpts may be quoted as long as a link to the original
article is provided.
This article also appears on Psychology Today on
my blog Unique - Like Everybody Else.
Image credit: EN2008
Other articles discussing intelligence or the psychology of political orientation
Cold Winters and the Evolution of
Intelligence -
The
Illusory Theory of Multiple Intelligences – a critique of Howard Gardner’s
theory
What is an Intelligent Personality?
What is an Intelligent Personality?
References
Gerber, A. S., Huber, G. A., Doherty, D., Dowling, C.
M., & Ha, S. E. (2010). Personality and
Political Attitudes: Relationships across Issue Domains and Political Contexts. American Political Science Review, 104(01),
111-133. doi: doi:10.1017/S0003055410000031
Kemmelmeier, M. (2008). Is there a relationship between political orientation and cognitive ability? A test of three hypotheses in two studies. Personality and Individual Differences, 45 (8), 767-772 DOI: 10.1016/j.paid.2008.08.003
Prentice, D. A. (2012). Liberal Norms and Their Discontents. Perspectives on
Psychological Science, 7(5), 516-518. doi:
10.1177/1745691612454142
Rindermann, H., Flores-Mendoza, C., & Woodley, M.
A. (2012). Political
orientations, intelligence and education. Intelligence, 40(2), 217-225. doi: 10.1016/j.intell.2011.11.005
Stankov, L. (2009). Conservatism and cognitive
ability. Intelligence,
37(3), 294-304. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.intell.2008.12.007
Woodley, M. A. (2010). Are
high-IQ individuals deficient in common sense? A critical examination of the
‘clever sillies’ hypothesis. Intelligence,
38(5), 471-480. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.intell.2010.06.002
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