How a cultural revolt against "political correctness" helped launch Trump into the presidency

Donald Trump's 2016 election victory in part reflected deep cultural opposition to Political Correctness (PC) norms. People dislike being told that they are not allowed to speak their mind, and Donald Trump represented a cultural foil to express that frustration. New research from Lucian Gideon Conway III, which studies the 2016 election campaign, shows that a sample of moderate Americans were influenced to support Trump by a brief mention of the PC movement, even though the PC movement was framed positively and the discussion had nothing directly to do with either candidate. Taken together, these results suggest that we need to look beyond simple markers of ideology to understand the Trump phenomenon – part of his support stems from a cultural revolt against Political Correctness

The geography of literacy:Understanding poleward increases in literacy rates

Asian social psychology has often focused on East/West comparisons. However, a latitudinal psychology perspective suggests that cultures will vary in predictable ways along north/south (latitudinal) gradients, rather than along east/west (longitudinal) gradients. We apply this perspective to better understand the geographical placement of literacy rates across the world. We find across 206 nations that latitude shows no linear relationship with worldwide literacy rates, but a significant curvilinear relationship, such that as one moves north from the equator, higher latitudes are associated with more literacy, whereas this relationship reverses as one moves south from the equator. No such curvilinear relationship consistently emerged for longitude. To better understand the geography of literacy, we included four potential explanatory socioecological variables (pathogens, climate, national tightness, and wealth). These analyses revealed that increases in literacy as one moves towards the North and South Poles was partially accounted for by all four variables, but a larger portion of the variance was due to pathogens. These results suggest that latitude—which, taken on its own, is just a set of abstract lines on a map—can help us organize and understand global literacy

Left-Wing Authoritarianism Short Form Scale

Qualtrics and SPSS Syntax Files for LWA Short/Long Form

An attributional perspective on the communication of norms

Why do some shared beliefs and behaviors spread across a given population and persist over time, whereas other beliefs and behaviors do not? Different perspectives that help provide an answer to this question are critically reviewed. These perspectives fall under two broad headings: those that focus on the degree that norms correspond to some kind of objective reality, and others that focus on the degree that norms correspond to some kind of subjective reality. An attributional perspective is introduced that suggests that whether a norm will likely be communicated in a given context or not is partially determined by the degree that it is perceived to be objectively tied to reality. The present four studies focus on two psychological cues that tend to influence these attributional processes. Across all studies, participants read stories about a normative behavior and then answered questions about those stories. Studies 1 and 2 focused on an "impression management" cue. Study 1 provides evidence that the presence of a member of a positively stereotyped group reduces the intention to communicate a positive impression of that group later on. Study 2 provides weaker evidence that this same process occurs for a negatively stereotyped group. Studies 3 and 4 focus on an authority figure's command cue, both providing evidence that the explicit command of an authority figure can, under some circumstances, decrease the likelihood that persons will endorse a normative behavior. Study 3 suggests that this effect is moderated by the level of control the authority figure has over the participant. Study 4 suggests that this effect is moderated by the expertise of the authority figure in the area of knowledge relevant to the norm. Theoretical and practical implications of the attributional perspective are discussed.Arts, Faculty ofPsychology, Department ofGraduat

Are American Presidents Becoming Less Rhetorically Complex? Evaluating the Integrative Complexity of Joe Biden and Donald Trump in Historical Context

Are American political leaders becoming simpler in their rhetoric? To evaluate, in the present study we place the two most recent U.S. presidents’ integrative complexity against a historical context for three different types of comparable materials: Presidential Debates, Inaugural Addresses, and State of the Union (SOTU) speeches. Results overwhelmingly suggest that both Joe Biden and Donald Trump are historically simple when compared to the typical president, and that is true both across parties and within their own political party. Further, segmented regression analyses suggest that part of the reason for Biden’s and Trump’s low complexity is the continuation of an ongoing historical decline in complexity among Presidents that began in 1960. However, each president uniquely defies this trend on one material type: Biden is a historical outlier for his low-complexity debates, and Trump is a historical outlier for his low-complexity inauguration speech. Taken as a whole, these data suggest that although American presidents have been declining in complexity, both Biden and Trump are nonetheless uniquely low in complexity in some ways – possibly for reasons that are different for each president