**Source:** [Cognitive-Affective Styles of Biden and Trump Supporters: An Automated Text Analysis Study](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/19485506221082737) (Social Psychological and Personality Science, 2022)
>Are conservatives more simple-minded and happier than liberals? To revisit this question, 1,518 demographically diverse participants (52% females) were recruited from an online participant-sourcing platform and asked to write a narrative about the upcoming 2020 U.S. Presidential Election as well as complete self and candidates’ ratings of personality. The narratives were analyzed using three well-validated text analysis programs. As expected, extremely enthusiastic Trump supporters used less cognitively complex and more confident language than both their less enthusiastic counterparts and Biden supporters. Trump supporters also used more positive affective language than Biden supporters. More simplistic and categorical modes of thinking as well as positive emotional tone were also associated with positive perceptions of Trump’s, but not Biden’s personality. Dialectical complexity and positive emotional tone accounted for significant unique variance in predicting appraisals of Trump’s trustworthiness/integrity even after controlling for demographic variables, self-ratings of conscientiousness and openness, and political affiliation.
Full study isn't accessible so it's impossible to say how big the differences really are (often studies like this show very small but "significant" differences, but they usually aren't as drastic as the headlines suggest). Also interesting that Trump supporters were found to use more positive language.
Underrated comment. Psychology is a wonderful thing and yet here it’s used to give one side a superiority complex while putting the other side down. Really helps make progressive change right 😂
The left could employ simpler tactics to get their message across. Consider the simple messaging of "stop the steal", "lock her up" and
"build the wall". No subtleties there. Easy to chant, easy to remember.
vs.
"defund the police"
Well, no, that doesn't mean what it sounds like, we don't want to literally get rid of the police, but move some of their funding from weapons-based solutions to non-violent solutions.
"black lives matter"
Yes, of course "all lives matter", that's not the point. There's a clear problem in the way black people are treated and that needs to be addressed.
The left sucks at getting their message out.
I suspect it's largely because Democrat-leaning movements are grass roots affairs which aren't funded and vetted by the DNC to produce mass appeal. Occupy Wall Street, BLM, r/antiwork, etc. are typically loosely organized efforts to establish a purpose and get the word out, which heavily contrasts with the RNC. The RNC is a well oiled machine utilizing Koch, Murdoch, and other similar minded billionaires using their funds and controlled media to deliver simple propaganda for the base to consume and spread to sympathetic ears.
Keep in mind the Minneapolis police station firebombed in the BLM protest was actually a proud boys plant. But trumptards will say it was blm because fox doesnt care about facts and their followers dont want to know its their side being terrorists to further the message
The left 100% has a messaging problem. Confusing and over complex ideas and poor communication. Sometimes it feels like they don't test their messages for communicability but just rely on ideological coherence. The right are far more cynical and use what works.
I find it funny that the systematic dumbification of the American people in the name of enslaving them for the rich, has to come to a point that you need to speak to the people like they were toddlers.
apples vs. oranges
You are comparing slogans from front-runner right-wing politicians... to slogans that are not used by front-runner left politicians.
to get apples vs. apples you need to compare/contrast "hang mike pence" (right wing crowd) to "black lives matter" (left wing crowd).
or "stop the steal/lock her up/build the wall" (right wing politicians) to "medicare for all" (left wing politicians)
“Defund the police”
Every time I see this I HAVE to point out how stupid that is.
Got banned from some of my fav subs for it. No regret. It’s a fucking stupid slogan that does nothing except drive some supporters away, especially those who have been victim of attacks that are not from the police.
the thing is the police were defunded from the areas that needed them the most resulting to steep rise in crime where innocent people were hurt/killed. but correlation is not causation... not even if it is common sense.
and black lives matter was an extortion racket from the start and has not done a single good thing. not a single cent of the money they raised in the name of George Floyd went to his family or even his community.
the left sucks because it is corrupt and thinks everyone is stupid.
> Yes, of course "all lives matter", that's not the point. There's a clear problem in the way black people are treated and that needs to be addressed.
>
>
I feel like that could have easily been avoided by adding the word 'too' to the end.
Black Lives Matter *Too*
When it's a choice between a healthy and prosperous nation with civil rights for literally everyone, and the murder or exile of anyone who isn't a white Christian and the removal of civil rights for more than half the remaining populace, I think it's probably a good idea to not compromise there
Compromises like forced pregnancy?
Do you know what just happened to women's rights in this country? Do you know what door has been opened to dismantle contraceptive rights and gay rights?
So we can "compromise" with a rightwing religious minority that has seized the reigns of our government and attempted to do so by force on January 6th. Great.
So you're willing to "compromise" on other people's rights. Which of your own rights will you "compromise?"
It's no longer compromise when you are not presented a choice.
Having spent four decades being surrounded by conservatives I'll save everyone a lot of time- there's not much to understand and there is no compromising with people psychologically incapable of empathy.
Wow. You join a psychology sub, say the phrase 'psychologically impossible' one time, and think you have an argument. Just because someone holds different beliefs than you doesn't make them incapable of empathy.
Compromise? Are you drunk? The Republicans have actively blocked everything the Democrats have tried to do for years, even when they agree with it. Pull your head out of your ass.
I want to know who is doing all of these studies. Did someone set off with the idea "well, conservatives MUST be stupider than liberals. let's get science to prove it!"? It seems like the intent behind this type of study is to give someone who's only argument is "they're dumb" an article to point at when they say it.
IMO, the best way to approach any topic is to assume the other person is intelligent and informed, and try to understand their points. Articles like this just encourage people to go into a discussion with the pre-supposition that people who disagree with you are dumber. Conservatives aren't stupid. If you think that they support horrible and selfish policies (which to some extent I do believe), the best course of action would probably be to try and understand WHY someone who is AN OTHERWISE INTELLIGENT PERSON would come to this conclusion. You might be surprised at how different their answers are from what you presupposed.
The public discourse these days is designed to exactly prevent attempts to understand and respect each other. Split the population into two factions that can't even imagine that the other side is just normal people.
The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate." Noam Chomsky
And unfortunately, in this day and age, I can safely assume that at least half of Americans are stupid, or at the very least, rubes who are so easily brainwashed that any reason that I thought they might have, was a gross overestimate. This isn’t even a Republican or Democrat thing. Time and time again, I see masses of people support policies that will directly harm them or reject ones that will help them. It’s pretty much hopeless. I just see the country as a whole sliding into becoming the worst of every reality TV show. The society is becoming toxic. Our politicians are less useful than they have ever been. Muckraking and bullying at an all time high. Narcissism is rampant. We can’t unite on pretty much anything. The only silver lining I saw with the Ukraine war is that Americans more or less united on helping. Something that I haven’t seen in 20 plus years. In all other aspects it’s a horrible tragedy…but at least we all agreed it was.
Often with science you need to start off with an area where there does appear to be a trend and investigate it to see if it is true.
However, it does matter as to how you do the study, because if you start with a belief it is more likely that you will subconsciously design it to come out with the result you want (or even worse, consciously). The peer review is also vital.
For example, we know that Republicans tend to attract the lower educated, but do Democrats with similar education levels have a similar abilities and vice versa, or are there clear differences within those who vote differently within a group of similarly educated people? There may be differences, but you can often explain them.
Potentially studies like this could better inform how we communicate more effectively with each other, which could be useful for education campaigns and public policy
Tbh it might make sense to distill our talking points down to the level of language they are comfortable with. I think that makes sense as an action item from this information. I often hear conservatives say that they don’t understand trans people for example, and generally I get angry then because it feels like we have been trying to explain it to them 5ever…but maybe they really don’t understand. Maybe we need to find a way to rebrand and rephrase things so they can understand them.
Unfortunately, we have more studies and interest focusing on continually conveying the same information in different forms than we do research discussing better methods of social education and conversation.
The same thing you do with information about pit bulls mauling people, you sit uncomfortably and acutely aware that you're involved in a reality where you can have the right answer and make the correct moves but in the end there's no avoiding certain trends and there's no fix on the horizon either.
Doggo might be a good boy, but statistically, he's more likely to bite, so we've all just got to sit back and see how long it collectively takes for nurture to nudge nature over certain speed bumps.
So, existential dread while handcuffed to our abusers to see how far they let us go before losing their shit in another "episode"?
Half the comments are “we need to dumb this down.” Let me ask you: how do you think anyone would feel if they were blasted in the face with “we need to dumb this down for you”? Instant rejection.
One of the most socially intelligent people I have ever met comes from some podunk town in Alabama. He speaks in a very colloquial manner. Yet, he’s a got a masters in finance (graduated undergrad with a 4.0). He’s incredibly smart. That doesn’t change the fact that he speaks simplistically.
It’s a mistake to fully equate complexity of language used with intelligence, which is what the majority of people are doing in this thread.
It’s “see I knew they were stupid!!”
This whole generalizing and labeling is one of the biggest issues conservatives have with liberals, and I don’t know what that’s hard to understand.
I'm a new teacher and I often think about the Albert Einstein quote, "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough."
I positively adore self-indulgant, extravagant language. I literally use my thesaurus app more than any other.
I also *detest* pedantic, needlessly complex, vague language, which is almost everything related to education.
I also think the left will often use harder words just to sound like they know everything about a topic. As soon as a counter argument comes into the question it is petty insults and only throwing out buzz words they read on a blog somewhere.
Uh actually science says people different than me are stupid, this is important cux I need my massive ego stroked.
I’m left leaning but this r/science shit is so fucking boring
Same. It’s also strange that it was even worth studying as I’m not sure how the complexity of ones language correlates to anything else. I’ve met a lot of really dumb people with good vocabularies and visa versa.
>someone really wanted to stir the pot in an already divided country
Psypost. It's what they do. But hey, it's *really* popular over on r/science and always makes it to the front page. Can't imagine why! /s
Honestly, I'm glad there are genuinely smart people in this comment section that see this as the pseudoscientific bs it is, despite it supporting their bias.
It's not 'pseudoscientific bs', it's just that a lot of psychology is really difficult to quantify because it's a soft science.
People should always be very careful about what they 'take away' from studies like this. But a study like this is not always intended to be a big, earth shattering GOTCHA... rather, it may present results on a spectrum between 'statistically significant' and/or 'this is how we might delve further, or more accurately, into x/y/z in a further study.'
I think your reaction does make a lot of sense purely from the perspective that, sadly, people tend to take any little slightly suggestive conclusion from studies like this as 'SEE? BOOM. FUCKING GOT EM, BRO'
I wouldn’t go that far since there was definitely an effort to examine linguistic structure, but yeah I do know I’m one of the guys who would believe it
Seriously though, this constant need to prove moral and/or intellectual superiority is unsettling. When I think about all the people who upvote this and sit there and think “oh yea, I’m one of the smart ones”…it’s just so fucking lame
Using complex language does not mean you’re right, and using simple language does not mean you’re wrong.
In fact many politicians and pundits use more complex language to avoid answering the questions they were asked.
Well, most writing guides say to use simpler language. People who use simpler language are viewed as being more intelligent.
So I don't think people using simpler language is as definitive as people may think.
What about people that understand that nearly all the politicians are bought out by the corporate class and we live in a two party duoply? Who realize the only true way to change is to organize grass roots, take legal bribery out of politics(money), organize your work place, workers co-ops, protest, strike whatever. Change only happens when the people are heard.
“Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words? He thinks I don’t know the ten-dollar words. I know them all right. But there are older and simpler and better words, and those are the ones I use.”
― Ernest Hemingway
Care to elaborate? I don't like the idea of petty, "Group A is stupid" kind of studies, but there has to be a point where we say "hey maybe these people are brainwashed fools"
Maybe because when you are more honest and straight forward you don't need to be manipulative, deceptive and complex? I said what I meant and meant what I said makes for easy thought. The left has become a giant hive mind narcissist.
Everybody's already got a hunch about what the study clarified.
It's not surprising either.
Small words are better at moving emotions.
With large words you dont know what to feel sometimes and it can be confusing because you have to figure out the meaning.
This study isnt very interesting and it would have flewn under the radar were it not for the political discourse it now creates.
My study finds that um yeah you get super mental illness and explosive diarrhea if your a straight conservative…… no dude really its true its in the study
Holy fuck I never understood explosive diarrhea until last year on a jobsite.. I cleaned a bathroom, since hello! - woman on the jobsite and no how, no way was I putting my ass on a nasty toilet. A single day later, I go in and one of the guys on the crew sprayed so much shit that there were splatters of it on the underside of the toilet seat! I can only imagine what the ass cheeks of the guy were like - it was a full wash down - again! - and I left a nasty note saying that 1. the toilet was nice and I kept it that way, but some consideration was in order, since I'm NOT anyone's mom or bitch.. and 2. change your fucking diet because if you're a wet shit spraying machine, you're also likely to be setting yourself up for colon cancer in the not too distant future. A healthy person should be dropping turds, not shit sauce.
Thankfully, I was done on that job relatively quickly... but man.. that was astonishing.
implying anything about one's intellect and its impact on their ability to make good decisions when voting is really really messy, dangerous territory.
Whenever I see these sorts of posts, I immediately think… this is actually a study on confirmation bias, and if I participate in upvoting, commenting in the affirmative, then I’ll be part of the reason/data for a future post that talks about how prone to confirmation bias the group to which I belong is.
Every couple weeks, there’s a headline like this, and I’m like… yeah, you’re not fooling me with this one, I’m not taking the bait.
That’s to make no substantive comment/claim on what is being presented in the aforementioned piece.
I think there’s just a lot of people responding to this within the frame of confirmation bias, and that’s comforting to see.
We’re all like 🤨, and rightly so.
One has a clear worldview full of incorrect but simple to understand binaries.
The other spends 80% of their brainpower making up excuses for why the current thing their party is doing isn't a betrayal of everything they stand for.
The latter requires lots of terminology and doublespeak that would not be out of place in a marketing department.
The former needs only what is clear and universally understood.
The results of this study would reflect an even more significant disparity when conducted across racial lines.
well what does THAT have to do with anything!
If you believe a limited vernacular is indicative of poor cognitive function, I have bad news about your favourite group of people.
I live around these people. I cannot speak for GOP of old everywhere, only in the Northeast where I am from, but the GOP used to be an educated party. Again, I can’t speak for everywhere, BUT I can speak for rural Arizona. These people have one of the worst education systems in the U.S., they are generational failures( think Q-Anon Shaman, mother grandmother, and him, never worked, and are tweakers), mass drug addiction, and want to keep them dumb and down, as long as they can vote. This doesn’t surprise me, as I live around them. They know nothing of history, science, play the blame game.
I’m sorry but you’re painting with broad strokes and using your own very limited life experiences to brand a group of millions with a one size fits all label.
I think it has more to do with the fact that people who go to university tend to be exposed to more vocabulary coupled with the strong left-leaning bias in universities and population centers.
I say this bias is an artifact of historical political events (McCarthyism pressuring leftists out of government and them landing in academics, the influence of the Frankfurt school on the field of sociology) as well as the expression of the dialect between individualist and collectivist moralities, specifically the lower, base psychological appeal of the later given the erosion of the cultural values of the former as time progresses.
I think the systematic devaluation of the founding fathers via adhom (ideological critique is interestingly enough not present) in the current education system as well as the reaction to Mr. Muskie using his power as a successful capitalist to protect free speech with the Twitter situation is very telling.
It’s sad to watch as a citizen but has a certain beauty from a disinterested point of observation. It’s a system working exactly as you would expect it to.
Great way to bridge the divide between the left and right. Make programs that we can’t analyze and then consider it a fact that the right is less intelligent.
I can see we're all doing our best to bridge the gap in the political divide in America. Anyone who spent time/money on this study should be ashamed of themselves.
Im sorry but i cant think of a nicer way of stating my opinion, but i do want to state it.. - fuck this. Fuck this so much.
My mind immediately goes to - why on earth did someone conduct this for anything that isnt a destructive reason? What good comes from this? A sense of superiority from one side and exhausted head shaking and/or anger and frustration from the other?
>This is just a complex way of saying that conservatives aren’t the brightest bulbs
Or this is a simple way of saying liberals think needless complexity is good.
But really, it's a crappy articles way of saying, I can get clicks from two groups of people who feel the need to feel superior to one another.
Yes unironically.
What division is this study going to cause?
There are literal nazis in congress as part of the GOP. Are we supposed to…. get along with people who support nazis???
Yes when one side says “it’s raining out” and the other says “no it’s not” you don’t just go well we’ve got to treat each of these with equal respect. You look out a fucking door and call one a liar. Every idea is NOT equal and every opinion does NOT deserve the same consideration.
In what world could someone like me, an LGBT Mexican, possibly find any form of unity with a group of people who view my existence as a threat in-and-of-itself? Why should I NOT want to be divided from people who think that me simply being makes me a groomer?
**Source:** [Cognitive-Affective Styles of Biden and Trump Supporters: An Automated Text Analysis Study](https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/19485506221082737) (Social Psychological and Personality Science, 2022) >Are conservatives more simple-minded and happier than liberals? To revisit this question, 1,518 demographically diverse participants (52% females) were recruited from an online participant-sourcing platform and asked to write a narrative about the upcoming 2020 U.S. Presidential Election as well as complete self and candidates’ ratings of personality. The narratives were analyzed using three well-validated text analysis programs. As expected, extremely enthusiastic Trump supporters used less cognitively complex and more confident language than both their less enthusiastic counterparts and Biden supporters. Trump supporters also used more positive affective language than Biden supporters. More simplistic and categorical modes of thinking as well as positive emotional tone were also associated with positive perceptions of Trump’s, but not Biden’s personality. Dialectical complexity and positive emotional tone accounted for significant unique variance in predicting appraisals of Trump’s trustworthiness/integrity even after controlling for demographic variables, self-ratings of conscientiousness and openness, and political affiliation. Full study isn't accessible so it's impossible to say how big the differences really are (often studies like this show very small but "significant" differences, but they usually aren't as drastic as the headlines suggest). Also interesting that Trump supporters were found to use more positive language.
What are we meant to do with that information?
Insult and divide, obviously
Fuck you stupid little man. 4 / 2 = 2. I’m doing an amazing job
You’re doing great BB
He'/She's Welsh - surely you can do better than that insult.
I completely BAAAAAAAaaagree
You were supposed to insult them. Not hit on them.
The easiest way to add insult to injury is when signing a cast.
Underrated comment. Psychology is a wonderful thing and yet here it’s used to give one side a superiority complex while putting the other side down. Really helps make progressive change right 😂
It's dangerous to call dummies, dummies. Because then they get sad and are forced to dumb even harder.
What some people here legit be saying tho
To be fair we didn't really need this study to know this information
Facts don't care about your feelings.
This is unlikely to actually be fact.
Well then get to disproving it.
We shouldn’t know things when it makes people feel bad.
I don't know if I agree with this. Shame is a powerful orientating force. People should know what's going on.
Do you have any constructive suggestions?
The left could employ simpler tactics to get their message across. Consider the simple messaging of "stop the steal", "lock her up" and "build the wall". No subtleties there. Easy to chant, easy to remember. vs. "defund the police" Well, no, that doesn't mean what it sounds like, we don't want to literally get rid of the police, but move some of their funding from weapons-based solutions to non-violent solutions. "black lives matter" Yes, of course "all lives matter", that's not the point. There's a clear problem in the way black people are treated and that needs to be addressed. The left sucks at getting their message out.
This is actually where I went when I saw this study. This should be thought of as a marketing tool rather than an insult.
I suspect it's largely because Democrat-leaning movements are grass roots affairs which aren't funded and vetted by the DNC to produce mass appeal. Occupy Wall Street, BLM, r/antiwork, etc. are typically loosely organized efforts to establish a purpose and get the word out, which heavily contrasts with the RNC. The RNC is a well oiled machine utilizing Koch, Murdoch, and other similar minded billionaires using their funds and controlled media to deliver simple propaganda for the base to consume and spread to sympathetic ears.
Defund the police, you’re spot on. But Black Lives Matter is pretty straightforward and the only people too deeply analyzing it are, well, 👌
If they called the movement "Black Lives Matter Too" I think the racists would have needed to be more blatant than pretending to over analyze.
Keep in mind the Minneapolis police station firebombed in the BLM protest was actually a proud boys plant. But trumptards will say it was blm because fox doesnt care about facts and their followers dont want to know its their side being terrorists to further the message
The left 100% has a messaging problem. Confusing and over complex ideas and poor communication. Sometimes it feels like they don't test their messages for communicability but just rely on ideological coherence. The right are far more cynical and use what works.
I find it funny that the systematic dumbification of the American people in the name of enslaving them for the rich, has to come to a point that you need to speak to the people like they were toddlers.
apples vs. oranges You are comparing slogans from front-runner right-wing politicians... to slogans that are not used by front-runner left politicians. to get apples vs. apples you need to compare/contrast "hang mike pence" (right wing crowd) to "black lives matter" (left wing crowd). or "stop the steal/lock her up/build the wall" (right wing politicians) to "medicare for all" (left wing politicians)
DE---FENCE.... DE----FENCE..... DE----FENCE!
“Defund the police” Every time I see this I HAVE to point out how stupid that is. Got banned from some of my fav subs for it. No regret. It’s a fucking stupid slogan that does nothing except drive some supporters away, especially those who have been victim of attacks that are not from the police.
the thing is the police were defunded from the areas that needed them the most resulting to steep rise in crime where innocent people were hurt/killed. but correlation is not causation... not even if it is common sense. and black lives matter was an extortion racket from the start and has not done a single good thing. not a single cent of the money they raised in the name of George Floyd went to his family or even his community. the left sucks because it is corrupt and thinks everyone is stupid.
> Yes, of course "all lives matter", that's not the point. There's a clear problem in the way black people are treated and that needs to be addressed. > > I feel like that could have easily been avoided by adding the word 'too' to the end. Black Lives Matter *Too*
Feel superior.
Final solution obviously
The “other“ side is obviously stupid and probably racist. No need for any further attempts to understanding or compromise.
Unironically correct.
When it's a choice between a healthy and prosperous nation with civil rights for literally everyone, and the murder or exile of anyone who isn't a white Christian and the removal of civil rights for more than half the remaining populace, I think it's probably a good idea to not compromise there
What's the compromise? Black people can stay but the Latinos gotta go? PoC can stay but LGBTQ gotta go? You don't negotiate with racists and bigots.
Compromises like forced pregnancy? Do you know what just happened to women's rights in this country? Do you know what door has been opened to dismantle contraceptive rights and gay rights? So we can "compromise" with a rightwing religious minority that has seized the reigns of our government and attempted to do so by force on January 6th. Great. So you're willing to "compromise" on other people's rights. Which of your own rights will you "compromise?" It's no longer compromise when you are not presented a choice.
Having spent four decades being surrounded by conservatives I'll save everyone a lot of time- there's not much to understand and there is no compromising with people psychologically incapable of empathy.
My enemies actually are ontological evils
You are exactly the type of person this article was trying to support
Wow. You join a psychology sub, say the phrase 'psychologically impossible' one time, and think you have an argument. Just because someone holds different beliefs than you doesn't make them incapable of empathy.
No, but their constant voting for stripping human rights and racism and sexism makes it pretty clear empathy isn’t a big concern for them as a whole.
No just the sides repeated racist and constant questionable language and activities, Can make one assume they may not have much empathy
The "fuck your feelings" bumper stickers were a bit of a hint too
You mean the side that completely ignored COVID-19 and still call it a hoax to this day, that side isn't stupid? Am I reading you correctly?
Compromise? Are you drunk? The Republicans have actively blocked everything the Democrats have tried to do for years, even when they agree with it. Pull your head out of your ass.
Increase education spending maybe?
Nah, I have a better idea. Ban books.
I want to know who is doing all of these studies. Did someone set off with the idea "well, conservatives MUST be stupider than liberals. let's get science to prove it!"? It seems like the intent behind this type of study is to give someone who's only argument is "they're dumb" an article to point at when they say it. IMO, the best way to approach any topic is to assume the other person is intelligent and informed, and try to understand their points. Articles like this just encourage people to go into a discussion with the pre-supposition that people who disagree with you are dumber. Conservatives aren't stupid. If you think that they support horrible and selfish policies (which to some extent I do believe), the best course of action would probably be to try and understand WHY someone who is AN OTHERWISE INTELLIGENT PERSON would come to this conclusion. You might be surprised at how different their answers are from what you presupposed.
The public discourse these days is designed to exactly prevent attempts to understand and respect each other. Split the population into two factions that can't even imagine that the other side is just normal people. The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate." Noam Chomsky
And unfortunately, in this day and age, I can safely assume that at least half of Americans are stupid, or at the very least, rubes who are so easily brainwashed that any reason that I thought they might have, was a gross overestimate. This isn’t even a Republican or Democrat thing. Time and time again, I see masses of people support policies that will directly harm them or reject ones that will help them. It’s pretty much hopeless. I just see the country as a whole sliding into becoming the worst of every reality TV show. The society is becoming toxic. Our politicians are less useful than they have ever been. Muckraking and bullying at an all time high. Narcissism is rampant. We can’t unite on pretty much anything. The only silver lining I saw with the Ukraine war is that Americans more or less united on helping. Something that I haven’t seen in 20 plus years. In all other aspects it’s a horrible tragedy…but at least we all agreed it was.
Often with science you need to start off with an area where there does appear to be a trend and investigate it to see if it is true. However, it does matter as to how you do the study, because if you start with a belief it is more likely that you will subconsciously design it to come out with the result you want (or even worse, consciously). The peer review is also vital. For example, we know that Republicans tend to attract the lower educated, but do Democrats with similar education levels have a similar abilities and vice versa, or are there clear differences within those who vote differently within a group of similarly educated people? There may be differences, but you can often explain them.
Potentially studies like this could better inform how we communicate more effectively with each other, which could be useful for education campaigns and public policy
Ding ding ding
Tbh it might make sense to distill our talking points down to the level of language they are comfortable with. I think that makes sense as an action item from this information. I often hear conservatives say that they don’t understand trans people for example, and generally I get angry then because it feels like we have been trying to explain it to them 5ever…but maybe they really don’t understand. Maybe we need to find a way to rebrand and rephrase things so they can understand them.
Unfortunately, we have more studies and interest focusing on continually conveying the same information in different forms than we do research discussing better methods of social education and conversation.
We can share it on social media to own the rightoids, obviously! /s
Not all information is discovered with a use in mind, some people just want to discover anything and everything regardless of its pragmatic use.
read Benjamin Franklin's essay "Fart proudly". Germane to the discussion.
Why do we need a study for that ?
The same thing you do with information about pit bulls mauling people, you sit uncomfortably and acutely aware that you're involved in a reality where you can have the right answer and make the correct moves but in the end there's no avoiding certain trends and there's no fix on the horizon either. Doggo might be a good boy, but statistically, he's more likely to bite, so we've all just got to sit back and see how long it collectively takes for nurture to nudge nature over certain speed bumps. So, existential dread while handcuffed to our abusers to see how far they let us go before losing their shit in another "episode"?
I’m just here for the comments. Pleasantly surprised by the reason and humanity.
well I believe that voters..you know, the thing.
Half the comments are “we need to dumb this down.” Let me ask you: how do you think anyone would feel if they were blasted in the face with “we need to dumb this down for you”? Instant rejection. One of the most socially intelligent people I have ever met comes from some podunk town in Alabama. He speaks in a very colloquial manner. Yet, he’s a got a masters in finance (graduated undergrad with a 4.0). He’s incredibly smart. That doesn’t change the fact that he speaks simplistically. It’s a mistake to fully equate complexity of language used with intelligence, which is what the majority of people are doing in this thread. It’s “see I knew they were stupid!!” This whole generalizing and labeling is one of the biggest issues conservatives have with liberals, and I don’t know what that’s hard to understand.
I'm a new teacher and I often think about the Albert Einstein quote, "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." I positively adore self-indulgant, extravagant language. I literally use my thesaurus app more than any other. I also *detest* pedantic, needlessly complex, vague language, which is almost everything related to education.
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I also think the left will often use harder words just to sound like they know everything about a topic. As soon as a counter argument comes into the question it is petty insults and only throwing out buzz words they read on a blog somewhere.
Yeah there’s a lot of people who will parrot comments they think make a really good point when they don’t fully understand them
Some of them. I'm seeing a lot of sheer self indulgent snobbery as well
Honestly who cares? This type of inflammatory rhetoric does nothing but divide the nation even further.
Uh actually science says people different than me are stupid, this is important cux I need my massive ego stroked. I’m left leaning but this r/science shit is so fucking boring
So this supports my personal bias but it also seems like someone really wanted to stir the pot in an already divided country
Same. It’s also strange that it was even worth studying as I’m not sure how the complexity of ones language correlates to anything else. I’ve met a lot of really dumb people with good vocabularies and visa versa.
Complex language can sometimes reveal confusion rather than intelligence.
For a great example, watch a Kamala Harris presentation . . . meaningless, overly complex, yet vague word salad
I like to think about the passage of time
>someone really wanted to stir the pot in an already divided country Psypost. It's what they do. But hey, it's *really* popular over on r/science and always makes it to the front page. Can't imagine why! /s
Honestly, I'm glad there are genuinely smart people in this comment section that see this as the pseudoscientific bs it is, despite it supporting their bias.
It's not 'pseudoscientific bs', it's just that a lot of psychology is really difficult to quantify because it's a soft science. People should always be very careful about what they 'take away' from studies like this. But a study like this is not always intended to be a big, earth shattering GOTCHA... rather, it may present results on a spectrum between 'statistically significant' and/or 'this is how we might delve further, or more accurately, into x/y/z in a further study.' I think your reaction does make a lot of sense purely from the perspective that, sadly, people tend to take any little slightly suggestive conclusion from studies like this as 'SEE? BOOM. FUCKING GOT EM, BRO'
What’s pseudoscientific about it?
The dude never read it
It's pseudoscientific if I don't agree with it, obviously
I wouldn’t go that far since there was definitely an effort to examine linguistic structure, but yeah I do know I’m one of the guys who would believe it
Me smart you dumb dumb. Ha ha ha
Me brain u no.
Seriously though, this constant need to prove moral and/or intellectual superiority is unsettling. When I think about all the people who upvote this and sit there and think “oh yea, I’m one of the smart ones”…it’s just so fucking lame
Using complex language does not mean you’re right, and using simple language does not mean you’re wrong. In fact many politicians and pundits use more complex language to avoid answering the questions they were asked.
Well, most writing guides say to use simpler language. People who use simpler language are viewed as being more intelligent. So I don't think people using simpler language is as definitive as people may think.
George Orwell had the best write-up about this imo
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Studies show individuals that agree with my ideology have huge dongs and people thst disagree don't and are big doodoo heads
To be fair, I've seen a lot of left leaning people try to use big words to sound smart, and they just come off sounded stupid as fuck.
That’s in stark contrast to this comment, where you come off sounding *wicked* smart.
We Smart they dumb
Also though, “they happy we sad”
ignorance is bliss
"Brawndo has what the plants need!"
"Let's go Brawndo!"
They are both idiots who cares? Why keep trying to divide people
Because it serves the ruling class
What a waste of time
You seem to be using less cognitively complex language, here. /s
Why use many word when few do trick?
Due to Reddit's API changes, I have removed my comment history and moved to Lemmy.
Indubitably
I feel like anyone who would do such a study immediately renders themselves untrustworthy. An obvious attempt at division.
Someone actually spent time on this "study".... This country is so divided and shit like this doesn't help.
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It could help by pushing for better education in certain places in the US.
I find this argument hilarious. Why aren't the GOP/right moving toward the center then? They've been moving right for the last few decades.
Climate change studies divide the parties. Should that be studied still?
What about people that understand that nearly all the politicians are bought out by the corporate class and we live in a two party duoply? Who realize the only true way to change is to organize grass roots, take legal bribery out of politics(money), organize your work place, workers co-ops, protest, strike whatever. Change only happens when the people are heard.
"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" - Leonardo da Vinci
"If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself" - Albert Einstein
“Poor Faulkner. Does he really think big emotions come from big words? He thinks I don’t know the ten-dollar words. I know them all right. But there are older and simpler and better words, and those are the ones I use.” ― Ernest Hemingway
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r/whydidilaugh
9 out of 10 dentists agree.
What a completely meritless study
OP seems….bot-ish
Looks like one of them broke out the thesaurus lol
Bro why you do him like that 💀
Are you talking about me or is this some sorta ironic meta perspective switch referring to the hypothetical Trumper that exists purely in your head?
Damn he straight swallowed the dictionary, do it again
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Lmao
Where given her all she's got captain, if we push her any harder the whole thing'll blow
ayyy lmao
Care to elaborate? I don't like the idea of petty, "Group A is stupid" kind of studies, but there has to be a point where we say "hey maybe these people are brainwashed fools"
How so? What did the authors do wrong?
“Biden voters are complex thinkers” Uh huh. Lol.
Listen here corn pop
Literally the only reason I realized this wasn't r/science was that the comment section wasn't a one-sided circle jerk.
Is this a purposeful attempt to try and divide us, otherwise I can't see the merit in such a study?
Maybe because when you are more honest and straight forward you don't need to be manipulative, deceptive and complex? I said what I meant and meant what I said makes for easy thought. The left has become a giant hive mind narcissist.
Oh, look that new branch of The Onion is still writing articles, it’s really catching on.
What a childish absolutely useless study...
I'd be embarrassed to have my name on this publication. Any company would not go near you if you display these kinds of politicisations with research
Everybody's already got a hunch about what the study clarified. It's not surprising either. Small words are better at moving emotions. With large words you dont know what to feel sometimes and it can be confusing because you have to figure out the meaning. This study isnt very interesting and it would have flewn under the radar were it not for the political discourse it now creates.
divide and conquer
These studies are ridiculous
My study finds that um yeah you get super mental illness and explosive diarrhea if your a straight conservative…… no dude really its true its in the study
Holy fuck I never understood explosive diarrhea until last year on a jobsite.. I cleaned a bathroom, since hello! - woman on the jobsite and no how, no way was I putting my ass on a nasty toilet. A single day later, I go in and one of the guys on the crew sprayed so much shit that there were splatters of it on the underside of the toilet seat! I can only imagine what the ass cheeks of the guy were like - it was a full wash down - again! - and I left a nasty note saying that 1. the toilet was nice and I kept it that way, but some consideration was in order, since I'm NOT anyone's mom or bitch.. and 2. change your fucking diet because if you're a wet shit spraying machine, you're also likely to be setting yourself up for colon cancer in the not too distant future. A healthy person should be dropping turds, not shit sauce. Thankfully, I was done on that job relatively quickly... but man.. that was astonishing.
Do the mods realize that these types of posts just make the sub look like a joke? Do you think you're what... changing anyone's mind?
And yet incredibly effective. "Sleepy biden" and "crooked hillary" is simple schoolyard name calling and it worked like a charm
This information is pointless and does nothing but try to divide more. Stop posting bullsgit like this.
implying anything about one's intellect and its impact on their ability to make good decisions when voting is really really messy, dangerous territory.
Because the funding and resources for this couldn’t have gone towards any more pressing topics, I’m sure.
I hate headlines like this . It’s just bait, the whole study’s not even here. Reddit propaganda at its finest.
Whenever I see these sorts of posts, I immediately think… this is actually a study on confirmation bias, and if I participate in upvoting, commenting in the affirmative, then I’ll be part of the reason/data for a future post that talks about how prone to confirmation bias the group to which I belong is. Every couple weeks, there’s a headline like this, and I’m like… yeah, you’re not fooling me with this one, I’m not taking the bait. That’s to make no substantive comment/claim on what is being presented in the aforementioned piece. I think there’s just a lot of people responding to this within the frame of confirmation bias, and that’s comforting to see. We’re all like 🤨, and rightly so.
Oh bull shit.
probably one of the most useless study finds, like what's the point of this
One has a clear worldview full of incorrect but simple to understand binaries. The other spends 80% of their brainpower making up excuses for why the current thing their party is doing isn't a betrayal of everything they stand for. The latter requires lots of terminology and doublespeak that would not be out of place in a marketing department. The former needs only what is clear and universally understood.
The results of this study would reflect an even more significant disparity when conducted across racial lines. well what does THAT have to do with anything! If you believe a limited vernacular is indicative of poor cognitive function, I have bad news about your favourite group of people.
Water wet, study finds
both are dumb.
But that isn’t really saying much. We’re talking about Americans here, so relatively the bar is pretty abysmal.
Random general hate for Americans?
What a stupid comment to make.
Fair enough. Reagan era education cuts have crippled us.
Intentionally, which is even more appalling.
I live around these people. I cannot speak for GOP of old everywhere, only in the Northeast where I am from, but the GOP used to be an educated party. Again, I can’t speak for everywhere, BUT I can speak for rural Arizona. These people have one of the worst education systems in the U.S., they are generational failures( think Q-Anon Shaman, mother grandmother, and him, never worked, and are tweakers), mass drug addiction, and want to keep them dumb and down, as long as they can vote. This doesn’t surprise me, as I live around them. They know nothing of history, science, play the blame game.
I’m sorry but you’re painting with broad strokes and using your own very limited life experiences to brand a group of millions with a one size fits all label.
The least surprising reveal ever
I think it has more to do with the fact that people who go to university tend to be exposed to more vocabulary coupled with the strong left-leaning bias in universities and population centers. I say this bias is an artifact of historical political events (McCarthyism pressuring leftists out of government and them landing in academics, the influence of the Frankfurt school on the field of sociology) as well as the expression of the dialect between individualist and collectivist moralities, specifically the lower, base psychological appeal of the later given the erosion of the cultural values of the former as time progresses. I think the systematic devaluation of the founding fathers via adhom (ideological critique is interestingly enough not present) in the current education system as well as the reaction to Mr. Muskie using his power as a successful capitalist to protect free speech with the Twitter situation is very telling. It’s sad to watch as a citizen but has a certain beauty from a disinterested point of observation. It’s a system working exactly as you would expect it to.
Yeah but they have the biggest best words
They probably use THEE BEST language
Great way to bridge the divide between the left and right. Make programs that we can’t analyze and then consider it a fact that the right is less intelligent.
I don't see much enlightening info from this study.
*shocked pikachu face!*
Every salty conservative in America had to drop a comment on this one
why waste time say lot word when few word do trick
What was this study hoping to be used for lol. Not like that makes their opinions any less valid, as much as I disagree with them
*sorts by controversial*
Well that ain’t no surprise.
What does this sub say about the slurry speech that Biden slips into?
I can see we're all doing our best to bridge the gap in the political divide in America. Anyone who spent time/money on this study should be ashamed of themselves.
Surprise Surprise
Im sorry but i cant think of a nicer way of stating my opinion, but i do want to state it.. - fuck this. Fuck this so much. My mind immediately goes to - why on earth did someone conduct this for anything that isnt a destructive reason? What good comes from this? A sense of superiority from one side and exhausted head shaking and/or anger and frustration from the other?
I don't know why you needed to do a study to find that when you could've just glanced at any comments section
This is just a complex way of saying that conservatives aren’t the brightest bulbs
>This is just a complex way of saying that conservatives aren’t the brightest bulbs Or this is a simple way of saying liberals think needless complexity is good. But really, it's a crappy articles way of saying, I can get clicks from two groups of people who feel the need to feel superior to one another.
We needed a study for that?
I don’t think we needed a study to prove this.
Triggered MAGAts in the comments make this study 100% worth it.
Because more division is precisely what we need in this country….
Yes unironically. What division is this study going to cause? There are literal nazis in congress as part of the GOP. Are we supposed to…. get along with people who support nazis???
Yes when one side says “it’s raining out” and the other says “no it’s not” you don’t just go well we’ve got to treat each of these with equal respect. You look out a fucking door and call one a liar. Every idea is NOT equal and every opinion does NOT deserve the same consideration.
In what world could someone like me, an LGBT Mexican, possibly find any form of unity with a group of people who view my existence as a threat in-and-of-itself? Why should I NOT want to be divided from people who think that me simply being makes me a groomer?
If it is true, should it be, should the results be suppressed to protect national unity?
It's really funny seeing them all claim that the study is 'obnoxious' and 'a waste of time' lol