Conservative Views = HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY

I can’t believe I am about to say this but I think MSNBC actually stumbled on something here. Apparently there was a study performed by two researchers from the New York University that I actually feel was done in a subjective manner (and not due to the fact that it comes out telling me that I am happier for my views. Oh no, I would NEVER use substantiated research to verify that my position in certain topics places me in an elitest class. Nope.):

 (Full article HERE)

Are conservatives happier than

liberals?

Right-wingers rationalize (or reason away) nation’s problems

By Jeanna Bryner

Individuals with conservative ideologies are happier than liberal-leaners, and new research pinpoints the reason: Conservatives rationalize social and economic inequalities.

Regardless of marital status, income or church attendance, right-wing individuals reported greater life satisfaction and well-being than left-wingers, the new study found. Conservatives also scored highest on measures of rationalization, which gauge a person’s tendency to justify, or explain away, inequalities.

The rationalization measure included statements such as: “It is not really that big a problem if some people have more of a chance in life than others,” and “This country would be better off if we worried less about how equal people are.”

To justify economic inequalities, a person could support the idea of meritocracy, in which people supposedly move up their economic status in society based on hard work and good performance. In that way, one’s social class attainment, whether upper, middle or lower, would be perceived as totally fair and justified.

If your beliefs don’t justify gaps in status, you could be left frustrated and disheartened, according to the researchers, Jaime Napier and John Jost of New York University. They conducted a U.S.-centric survey and a more internationally focused one to arrive at the findings.

“Our research suggests that inequality takes a greater psychological toll on liberals than on conservatives,” the researchers write in the June issue of the journal Psychological Science, “apparently because liberals lack ideological rationalizations that would help them frame inequality in a positive (or at least neutral) light.”

The results support and further explain a Pew Research Center survey from 2006, in which 47 percent of conservative Republicans in the U.S. described themselves as “very happy,” while only 28 percent of liberal Democrats indicated such cheer.

This article can be taken a few different ways, but it basically states that conservatives have a habit of not rationalizing things away into oblivion but putting them into a definable perspective that can be digested and, if the subject is one of a percieved inequality, it can be justified and / or presented as a potentially attainable goal.

If I have a problem with my current salary I don’t blame a glass ceiling or inherent racism in a specific industry as to what is holding me back, I look at factors such as the marketability of my knowledge and the upward mobility in my company. If I wanted this to change I don’t grab a placard and paint some witty slogan in preparation of a protest, I will begin looking within my industry but outside of said company for a potential increase in position / pay and market myself accordingly… with no blame placed on the shoulders of some ghostly “other” (be it a process or a body) for my immediate woes. Basically my view can be summed up by the old “If you see a wall” theory:

“If you see a wall in front of you, how many ways do you see forward?

-I see ways above, below, beside and beneath, if through is not an option.”

NOTE: Can anyone tell that I have been sober for two days? Is it that obvious?

~ by Old Iron on May 8, 2008.