Left-right Dimension Research Articles

Personality, Ideology, Prejudice, and Politics: A Dual‐Process Motivational Model

Early theorists assumed that sociopolitical or ideological attitudes were organized along a single left-right dimension and directly expressed a basic personality dimension. Empirical findings, however, did not support this and suggested that there seem to be 2 distinct ideological attitude dimensions, best captured by the constructs of right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation, which express 2 distinct sets of motivational goals or values. We outline a dual-process motivational (DPM) model of how these 2 dimensions originate from particular personality dispositions and socialized worldview beliefs and how and why their different underlying motivational goals or values generate their wide-ranging effects on social outcomes, such as prejudice and politics. We then review new research bearing on the model and conclude by noting promising directions for future research.

Conceptualizing Left and Right in comparative politics

Despite the importance of the Left-Right dimension in comparative politics, establishing an index that captures this dimension in both a theoretically and empirically sound manner remains an ongoing challenge for political scientists. Having reviewed existing attempts to construct measures for the Left-Right dimension, and having concluded that they are merely inductive and problematic from a methodological perspective, this article proposes a deductive approach based on Norberto Bobbio’s theory of Left and Right and suggests a combination with statistically robust measures drawn from the data provided by the Comparative Manifesto Project (CMP). The fundamental features of the proposed index are: first, Left and Right are theoretical concepts which should be accounted for in the empirical analysis. Second, the Left-Right dimension is time- and country-specific. Third, different statements have different meanings on a Left-Right scale. Fourth, the importance of the Left-Right dimension itself varies over time and across countries. Finally, the data have to be analysed adequately.

Assimilation, contrast and voter projections of parties in left-right space

When voters place parties in their system along the left-right dimension, they often pull their preferred party closer towards them (assimilation) and push the opposition further away (contrast). This article asks a simple question: are such assimilation and contrast effects similarly powerful across different types of electoral system? I hypothesize that systems employing single-member districts will tend to strengthen assimilation and contrast because they mechanically reduce the number of parties, while shifting the focus of electoral competition away from the party and towards the candidate. Using data from 18 advanced democracies compiled by the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems and hierarchical modelling I find that contrast effects are indeed stronger in majoritarian systems, while assimilation effects appear similarly strong regardless of the institutional setting. These findings suggest that institutional design holds lasting consequences for how we perceive politics and, perhaps also, for our ability to effectuate democracy.

Image-Guided Radiotherapy (IGRT) for Prostate Cancer Comparing kV Imaging of Fiducial Markers With Cone Beam Computed Tomography (CBCT)

To present our single-institution experience with image-guided radiotherapy comparing fiducial markers and cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) for daily localization of prostate cancer. From April 2007 to October 2008, 36 patients with prostate cancer received intensity-modulated radiotherapy with daily localization by use of implanted fiducials. Orthogonal kilovoltage (kV) portal imaging preceded all 1244 treatments. Cone-beam computed tomography images were also obtained before 286 treatments (23%). Shifts in the anterior-posterior (AP), superior-inferior (SI), and left-right (LR) dimensions were made from kV fiducial imaging. Cone-beam computed tomography shifts based on soft tissues were recorded. Shifts were compared by use of Bland-Altman limits of agreement. Mean and standard deviation of absolute differences were also compared. A difference of 5 mm or less was acceptable. Subsets including start date, body mass index, and prostate size were analyzed. Of 286 treatments, 81 (28%) resulted in a greater than 5.0-mm difference in one or more dimensions. Mean differences in the AP, SI, and LR dimensions were 3.4 ± 2.6 mm, 3.1 ± 2.7 mm, and 1.3 ± 1.6 mm, respectively. Most deviations occurred in the posterior (fiducials, 78%; CBCT, 59%), superior (79%, 61%), and left (57%, 63%) directions. Bland-Altman 95% confidence intervals were -4.0 to 9.3 mm for AP, -9.0 to 5.3 mm for SI, and -4.1 to 3.9 mm for LR. The percentages of shift agreements within ±5 mm were 72.4% for AP, 72.7% for SI, and 97.2% for LR. Correlation between imaging techniques was not altered by time, body mass index, or prostate size. Cone-beam computed tomography and kV fiducial imaging are similar; however, more than one-fourth of CBCT and kV shifts differed enough to affect target coverage. This was even more pronounced with smaller margins (3 mm). Fiducial imaging requires less daily physician input, is less time-consuming, and is our preferred method for prostate image-guided radiotherapy.

The spirits of capitalism and socialism

The World Values Survey contains an item on ownership which is polled 200 times in 92 countries at the four waves of 1990, 1995, 2000 and 2005. These polls are developed into the CS-score that measures the aggregate mass support for capitalism and socialism. Four hypotheses are advanced and tested to explain the wide variation in the 200 CS-scores. It is due to: the cross-country distribution of income, and consequently the West stands out as the most capitalist-minded area of the world; institutions of the country such as legal quality; the left-right dimension in politics; and cultural differences.

The Impact of Religion on the Space of Competition: The Dutch Case

AbstractThe political practice of consociational democracies to take religion off the political agenda has led to the idea that religious issues only play a marginal role in the left-right ideological framework. This study demonstrates that religion has more than a marginal effect on the left-right placement of parties and thus on the space of competition. The analysis shows that voters for secular parties and voters for religious parties have different motives and beliefs on which they base the orderings of parties on the left-right scale. In other words, each group of voters defines its own left-right scale. These different left-right scales are individually single-peaked but there is no collective transitivity of orderings of parties. The intransitivity is a clear violation of Downs' condition for placing all parties on a single line in a manner agreed upon by all voters. Instead of having one left-right dimension as some sort of “super issue,” there are at least two left-right scales, one for voters for secular parties and one for voters for religious parties.

The Spirits of Capitalism and Socialism - A Cross-Country Study of Ideology

The World Values Survey contains an item on ownership, which is polled 200 times in 92 countries at the four waves of 1990, 1995, 2000 and 2005. It is developed into the CS-score that measures the aggregate mass support for capitalism and socialism. Four hypotheses are advanced and tested to explain the wide cross-country variation in the CS-score: (A1) It is partly due to the cross-country distribution of income, and consequently the West stands out as the most capitalist-minded area of the world. (A2) It is associated with the institutions of the country such as legal quality. (A3) It is related to the left-right dimension in politics. (A4) It is influenced by cultural differences.

Implications of Respiratory Motion as Measured by Four-Dimensional Computed Tomography for Radiation Treatment Planning of Esophageal Cancer

To evaluate the respiratory motion of primary esophageal cancers and pathologic celiac-region lymph nodes using time-resolved four-dimensional computed tomography (4D CT). Respiration-synchronized 4D CT scans were obtained to quantify the motion of primary tumors located in the proximal, mid-, or distal thoracic esophagus, as well as any involved celiac-region lymph nodes. Respiratory motion was measured in the superior-inferior (SI), anterior-posterior (AP), and left-right (LR) directions and was analyzed for correlation with anatomic location. Recommended margin expansions were determined for both primary and nodal targets. Thirty patients underwent 4D CT scans at Massachusetts General Hospital for planned curative treatment of esophageal cancer. Measurements of respiratory tumor motion were obtained for 1 proximal, 4 mid-, and 25 distal esophageal tumors, as well as 12 involved celiac-region lymph nodes. The mean (SD) peak-to-peak displacements of all primary tumors in the SI, AP, and LR dimensions were 0.80 (0.45) cm, 0.28 (0.20) cm, and 0.22 (0.23) cm, respectively. Distal tumors were found to have significantly greater SI and AP motion than proximal or mid-esophageal tumors. The mean (SD) SI, AP, and LR peak-to-peak displacements of the celiac-region lymph nodes were 0.92 (0.56) cm, 0.46 (0.27) cm, and 0.19 (0.26) cm, respectively. Margins of 1.5 cm SI, 0.75 cm AP, and 0.75 cm LR would account for respiratory tumor motion of >95% of esophageal primary tumors in the dataset. All celiac-region lymph nodes would be adequately covered with SI, AP, and LR margins of 2.25 cm, 1.0 cm, and 0.75 cm, respectively.

Benefit from spatial separation of multiple talkers in bilateral hearing-aid users: Effects of hearing loss, age, and cognition

To study the spatial hearing abilities of bilateral hearing-aid users in multi-talker situations, 20 subjects received fittings configured to preserve acoustic cues salient for spatial hearing. Following acclimatization, speech reception thresholds (SRTs) were measured for three competing talkers that were either co-located or spatially separated along the front-back or left-right dimension. In addition, the subjects’ working memory and attentional abilities were measured. Left-right SRTs varied over more than 14 dB, while front-back SRTs varied over more than 8 dB. Furthermore, significant correlations were observed between left-right SRTs, age, and low-frequency hearing loss, and also between front-back SRTs, age, and high-frequency aided thresholds. Concerning cognitive effects, left-right performance was most strongly related to attentional abilities, while front-back performance showed a relation to working memory abilities. Altogether, these results suggest that, due to raised hearing thresholds and aging, hearing-aid users have reduced access to interaural and monaural spatial cues as well as a diminished ability to ‘enhance’ a target signal by means of top-down processing. These deficits, in turn, lead to impaired functioning in complex listening environments.SumarioPara estudiar las habilidades auditivas espaciales de usuarios de audífonos bilaterales en situaciones de hablantes múltiples, 20 sujetos recibieron auxiliares configurados para preservar las más destacadas claves acústicas de la audición espacial. Después de un período de adaptación, se midieron los umbrales de recepción del habla (SRTs) con tres hablantes en competencia que fueron colocados cerca o espacialmente separados en las dimensiones frente-atrás o izquierda-derecha. Además, se midieron las habilidades de memoria activa y atención. Los SRTs izquierda-derecha variaron más de 14 dB mientras que los SRTs frente-atrás, variaron más de 8 dB. Más aún, se observaron correlaciones significativas entre SRTs frente-atrás, edad y pérdida auditiva en las frecuencias graves y también entre SRTs frente-atrás, edad y umbrales con auxiliares auditivos en las frecuencias agudas. En relación con los efectos cognitivos, el rendimiento izquierda-derecha se relacionó más firmemente con habilidades de atención, mientras que el rendimiento frente-atrás, mostró relación con habilidades de memoria activa. En general, estos resultados sugieren que, debido a la elevación de los umbrales auditivos y el envejecimiento, los usuarios de auxiliares auditivos tienen un acceso reducido a las claves espaciales interaurales y monoaurales así como una habilidad disminuida para “mejorar” una señal blanco por medio del procesamiento arriba-abajo. Estos déficits, a su vez, conducen a un funcionamiento disminuido en ambientes de escucha complejos.

Beyond liberal and conservative: Two-dimensional conceptions of ideology and the structure of political attitudes and values

This article analyzes conceptual similarities and differences in selected prior work on ideological multi-dimensionality and finds substantial conceptual convergence accompanied by some provocative divergence. The article also finds that evidence from a recent survey of the American public largely validates areas of conceptual convergence. Respondents' political attitudes vary in two dimensions that are associated with different value structures—specifically, with different rankings of liberty, order, and ‘caring for those who need help’. As a result, liberals, conservatives, and libertarians are identified more fully than previously possible. But the evidence does not allow the validation of one conception over another in the area where they diverge most markedly. Does the fourth ideological type value order and equality, making them ‘communitarians’, or are these respondents better understood as a humanitarian, paternalistic, hierarchical subtype, the ‘inclusive social hierarch’, since they value order as well as ‘caring for those who need help’? Although politicians, philosophers, and social scientists often discuss politics as if it were organized on a single left-right dimension, 50 years of research on public opinion shows that a unidimensional model of ideology is a poor description of political attitudes for the overwhelming proportion of people virtually everywhere.1

Ideology: Its Resurgence in Social, Personality, and Political Psychology.

We trace the rise, fall, and resurgence of political ideology as a topic of research in social, personality, and political psychology. For over 200 years, political belief systems have been classified usefully according to a single left-right (or liberal-conservative) dimension that, we believe, possesses two core aspects: (a) advocating versus resisting social change and (b) rejecting versus accepting inequality. There have been many skeptics of the notion that most people are ideologically inclined, but recent psychological evidence suggests that left-right differences are pronounced in many life domains. Implicit as well as explicit preferences for tradition, conformity, order, stability, traditional values, and hierarchy-versus those for progress, rebelliousness, chaos, flexibility, feminism, and equality-are associated with conservatism and liberalism, respectively. Conservatives score consistently higher than liberals on measures of system justification. Furthermore, there are personality and lifestyle differences between liberals and conservatives as well as situational variables that induce either liberal or conservative shifts in political opinions. Our thesis is that ideological belief systems may be structured according to a left-right dimension for largely psychological reasons linked to variability in the needs to reduce uncertainty and threat.

The Democracy Barometers (Part I): The Rise of Populism and the Left in Latin America

Abstract: AmericasBarometer data point to some overall trends that merit careful attention. The ideological center of gravity in Latin America is, by world standards, slightly to the right, yet attitudes are moving to the left. Ideological cleavages in Latin America, long after the Cold War's end, still line up along a distinct left-right dimension, and voters support parties consistent with their ideological orientations. The gap between left and right is very narrow, however, in some countries like Costa Rica, but strikingly wide in other countries such as Chile, El Salvador, and Nicaragua.

Measuring Left-Right Political Orientation: The Choice of Response Format

Although left-right items are a standard tool of public opinion research, there is little agreement about the optimal response format. Two disputes can be identified in the literature: (1) whether to provide respondents with a small or large number of answer categories, and (2) whether or not to administer the response scale including a midpoint. This study evaluates the performance of the 101, 11, and 10-point left-right scales, which directly speak to the two disputed aspects of measuring the left-right dimension. Drawing on data from a split ballot multitrait multimethod experiment carried out in a methodological pretest to the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP), the analysis shows that the choice of a response format makes a difference in terms of data quality: the 11-point left-right scale produces the highest validity of left-right data closely followed by the 10-point scale. Moreover, an application from electoral research illustrates that the choice of response formats affects substantive interpretations about the nature of the left-right dimension. Since all three scales perform about equally well in terms of reliability and the ease of administration, the findings suggest that the 11-point left-right scale should be used in survey research.

Intensity-Modulated Radiotherapy Using Implanted Fiducial Markers With Daily Portal Imaging: Assessment of Prostate Organ Motion

To assess our single institutional experience with daily localization, using fiducials for prostate radiotherapy. From January 2004 to September 2005, 33 patients were treated with 1,097 intensity-modulated radiation treatments, using three implanted fiducials. Daily portal images were obtained before treatments. Shifts were made for deviations > or =3 mm in the left-right (LR), superior-inferior (SI), and anterior-posterior (AP) dimensions. Of 1,097 treatments, 987 (90%) required shifts. Shifts were made in the LR, SI, and AP dimensions in 51%, 67%, and 58% of treatments, respectively. In the LR dimension, the median distance shifted was 5 mm. Of 739 shifts in the SI dimension, 73% were in the superior direction for a median distance of 6 mm, and 27% were shifted inferiorly for a median distance of 5 mm. The majority of shifts in the AP dimension were in the anterior direction (87%). Median distances shifted in the anterior and posterior directions were 5 mm and 4 mm, respectively. The median percentage of treatments requiring shifts per patient was 93% (range, 57-100%). Median deviations in the LR, SI, and AP dimensions were 3 mm, 4 mm, and 3 mm, respectively. Deviations in the SI and AP dimensions were more often in the superior rather than inferior (60% vs. 29%) and in the anterior rather than posterior (70% vs. 16%) directions. Interfraction prostate motion is significant. Daily portal imaging with implanted fiducials improves localization of the prostate, and is necessary for the reduction of treatment margins.

‘One and a Half Dimensional’ Preferences and Majority Rule

I examine a model of majority rule in which alternatives are described by two characteristics: (1) their position in a standard, left-right dimension, and (2) their position in a good-bad dimension, over which voters have identical preferences. I show that when voters’ preferences are single-peaked and concave over the first dimension, majority rule is transitive, and the majority’s preferences are identical to the median voter’s. Thus, Black’s (The theory of committees and elections, 1958) theorem extends to such a “one and a half” dimensional framework. Meanwhile, another well-known result of majority rule, Downs’ (An economic theory of democracy, 1957) electoral competition model, does not extend to the framework. The condition that preferences can be represented in a one-and-a-half-dimensional framework is strictly weaker than the condition that preferences be single-peaked and symmetric. The condition is strictly stronger than the condition that preferences be order-restricted, as defined by Rothstein (Soc Choice Welf 7:331–342;1990).

Party position changes through EU membership ? the (non-)europeanisation of Austrian, Finish and Swedish political parties

The article seeks to analyse whether a Europeanisation of national parties has taken place amongst the EU-newcomers of 1995 – Austria, Finland and Sweden – studying Euro-manifestos. Europeanisation is measured based on two characteristics: first, salience a party attributes to the European level and second, policy positions a party holds towards European issues. Moreover, we assume that Europeanisation may result in an impact on the traditional national cleavage lines changing the dominant Left-Right dimension. Our results show that Europeanisation in terms of salience has indeed taken place; Europeanisation in terms of policy position change however, could only be observed in Sweden and Austria. Regarding the cleavage structure, we noticed a reinforcement of the Left-Right divide by the European issue in Sweden and in Finland, while in Austria a new cleavage line could be identified: Green/Alternative/Libertarian versus Traditional/Authoritarian/Nationalism. The Europeanisation process has therefore progressed most strongly in Austria. Overall, we conclude that the European integration process does have an influence on national political parties.

Mapping Out Political Europe: Coalition Patterns in EU Decision-Making

This article evaluates member states’ and supranational institutions’ preference patterns in European Union decision-making. We present a research design that encompasses data on the policy profiles of the 15 member states, the Commission, and the European Parliament for 70 European legal acts that were negotiated just before the May 2004 enlargement. We apply principal-component analysis which results in reduction of the different policy issues into a three-dimensional solution. The Commission and the European Parliament are much more favorable toward increased integration than the Council members are. Thus, there appears to be a “north versus south” coalition pattern rather than a “Franco-German axis.” The positions of Ireland and Belgium indicate that the member states’ status as net contributors or net receivers of European Union subsidies are important. Our findings do not support the pro-less integrationist argument nor the left-right dimension that reconciles economic and sociopolitical issues.

Governing the Quango: An Auditing and Cheating Model of Quasi-Governmental Authorities

The New Public Management has a paramount implication for the delegation of authority to implement public policy, namely that such delegations be designed according to the substance of the task to be performed by a quasi-governmental agent. In other words, the government must be able to choose the best agent to carry out a particular task, which implies that the set of agents must not be confined to actors and departments within the bureaucracy. This flexibility of form increases the importance of ex ante design in the legislature to avoid misuse of public funds by the quango. It also has the potential to increase ex post enforcement activity by the government. This article examines ex ante design from the perspective of auditing, presenting a simple formal model of the construction of auditing procedures as a response to expectations of the misuse of funds. By creating such requirements as the requisite submission of annual plans, reports, and accounts, governments attempt to create a compliance-inducing scheme much like that present in tax enforcement. The theoretical model generates empirical predictions that are statistically examined using data on public bodies in the Netherlands created between 1946-1993. Empirical results demonstrate strong support for the theory.

Rate-Limited, But Accurate, Central Processing of Interaural Time Differences in Modulated High-Frequency Sounds. Focus on: “Neural Sensitivity to Interaural Envelope Delays in the Inferior Colliculus of the Guinea Pig”

Interaural time difference (ITD; the delay between arrival of sound at the 2 ears) is one of the primary cues for localization of sound in the azimuthal (left-right) dimension. Its use, however, is limited to tone frequencies below ∼1,500 Hz in part due to the ambiguity of leading and lagging high

La dimension izquierda-derecha en America Latina

SUMMARY We present voters' self-placement and 68 political party locations on the left-right dimension in 17 Latin American countries. Innovative calculations are based on data from Latinobarometer annual surveys from 1995 to 2002. Our preliminary analysis of the results suggests that most Latin American voters are relatively highly ideological and rather consistently located on the left-right dimension, but they have very high levels of political alienation regarding the party system.