did they control for this sort of response prior to watching Fox news?

Conservatives, Hibbing's research suggests, go through the world more attentive to negative, threatening, and disgusting stimuli

(really sounds like someone got seriously into the VK machine from Blade Runner)

I did a little research on this topic when I was still in grad school.

One of the general conclusions we came to was that political ads targeted at liberals should be positive in nature (e.g., "rock the vote") as positive messages will more likely influence liberals to vote.
Conversely, political ads targeted at conservatives should be negative in nature (e.g., mudslinging ads) as negative messages will more likely influence conservatives to vote.

We found pretty robust results. Most people will notice, unfortunately, that the vast majority of political ads are negative. Maybe that's a strong reason why conservatives tend to vote more regularly than liberals?

I'm amazed at how often I turn out to be right when guessing someone's political tilt upon first meeting, while the conversation is still on mindless pleasantries, or if turning on the radio or TV mid-story when an interviewee is speaking and before I can figure out the subject of the piece. There's some quality of the voice, whether male or female, perhaps bolstered by word choice or body language—a sense of being strained or tightly wound.

Does it count the number of taps it hears in airport men's rooms?

I keep trying to explain how this is going down here in Seattle now. Again, and again, and again, we're presented with arguments based in fear. Beware the doom that awaits! Don't become an outlier! We must proceed cautiously into this scary, scary new territory.

There are lots of voters who hop to when you sow fear. There are lots of places where the rhetoric of fear will win elections. Conservative voters. Conservative places.

It doesn't work here. There aren't enough conservative voters to whip up a fear storm. In a liberal town you have to present a positive argument, and you have to present your case as making a common sacrifice working to a common good. Embracing the other, not demonizing those at the bottom of society.

If all you're doing is rehashing the Seattle Times' anti-sick leave FUD, replacing "sick leave" with "minimum wage," you're going to to repeat the same failure. Especially when everyone notices that the sky didn't really fall.

Time to make a political sorting hat to stick on everyone when they reach voting age!

Violent startle reflex: check. Revolted by gross pictures: check. No wonder I'ma conservative librul.

I guess a machine to test a libertarian would be one that measures how much of a control freak you are: a liberal would score high as a control freak and so would a conservative, while a libertarian would just be more likely to go with the flow, as long as no one was hurting anyone.

Conservatives want government to run our bodies, liberals want government to control our thoughts and money, while libertarians want neither.

If you're sensitive to certain imagery, not afraid of spiders, and believe in the value of a strong democratically-elected central government as a countervailing force against plutocracy, are you a liberal or conservative?

@9 Actually a machine to test a libertarian would be as simple as a dollar bill glued down in front of a spanking machine.

"Conservatives want government to run our bodies, liberals want government to control our thoughts and money, while libertarians want neither.'

LOL.

Libertarians constantly demonstrate how much they don't understand about the real world; they wear it as a badge of pride.

@2 - interesting if unsurprising research.

@9 - you fundamentally don't get the political compass, do you? Authoritarians are the opposite of Libertarians and there are just as many liberals and conservatives in both camps; they are on a perpendicular axis. Unfortunately for you, most of the "libertarian" focus for conservatives is limited to "corporate citizens" and not private citizens, while liberals seem more concerned with private civil liberties. The police state authoritarians cum fascists are all conservatives in this country.

@12 - that is what they have in common with teahadist talibangelicals, and why they hang out under the same "big tent".

@13: but liberals want to control your thoughts. YOUR VERY THOUGHTS! that's so fascist! liberals are fascists!

And they want your MONEY. they want to CONTROL YOUR MONEY! telling me I can't buy ivory or rhino tusks, or that, if I were ever to win the Powerball, that I'd have to pay my fair share in taxes! What kind of fascist BS is that? liberals are fascists!

Most people consider me liberal and Left-minded. I do not want anyone to control my thoughts, speech, or my sources of entertainment.

Where do I fit into collectivism_sucks universe?

@11 -- that's hilarious, but you forgot the microphone. Libertarians love their soapboxes.

Fear is the mind killer

Libertarian Fear doubly so

@15, thank you for the actual laugh-out-loud.

Just look for the money boner. You don't need a machine.

9: A libertarian would be entirely submissive to their corporate masters.

@21 - the thing I keep wondering is how long it will take them to figure that out after the Glorious Anarcho-Capitalist Revolution...they seem pretty impervious.

Where does this theory leave us liberals with extreme startle responses?

sorry; your all centrists. Anarchists, libertarians and paleo capitalists are far more open minded, honest and free thinking than ya'll.

But what happens when someone changes their political philosophy?

@25 -- Spankings!

That article makes me pity conservatives. They're physiologically doomed to experience life with aversion, and to treat all new encounters with disgust and fear. What a shitty way to spend your time alive.

@26: Spankings!

This is one of my fave threads of all time here on Slog!

Does this mean that "conservatives" are more prone to taking up arms and shooting the happy, peace-loving "liberals", who will always lose in a war because all they want is peace & love? In a violence-driven world, will violence and fear be more "evolutionarily successful" because the wingnuts & sociopaths will kill all the hippies & artists? Did Hobbes not, in fact, describe the past as "nasty, brutish & short", but instead predict the future based on the observed social rules of the day which will only come to full fruition in the years to come? Am I painting this picture with an overly-polarized brush?

I don't know, but let's continue to laugh at the soi-disant "libertarians".

@11
I make 40,000 a year and I am actually not interested in becoming a millionaire. I have yet to meet this mythological "rich libertarian"...I've met plenty of rich liberals, but never a rich Libertarian.

@16
It's called the public school system, where kids are taught how not to think for themselves or question anything. Try being a Marxists in public schools (I was when I was younger) and questioning the Founding Father's "greatness" and see what happens.

@21
I 100% hate giant corporations and would like to see most of them destroyed. I am a left-libertarian (nobody ever notices that it's Lysander Spooner on my profile) I want the market to be freed and when they have no government to bail them out, we will not have to "eat the rich," the market will do that for us.

I also 100% support a constitutional amendment ending corporate personhood.

I have yet to meet this mythical "pro-big-business" libertarian...I've met plenty of liberals like that, and there is also Bailout Obama, but I've never met a libertarian who likes Corporatism.

@31: I dunno, maybe you had a really shitty history teacher. Where I went to high school, I learned all sorts of critical thinking and reasoning skills, and we certainly critiqued the "Founding Fathers". Did you know that George III of England and his government actually did offer to seat colonial representatives in Parliament? The deal fell through mainly because the travel involved was unappealing to people on both sides and because the Continentals couldn't decide how to choose their representatives.
The myth of "liberals are brainwashing our kids in public schools" is pretty much baseless. Try and prove me wrong, I dare you.

@32: TRUST ME, WE ALL KNOW IT'S LYSANDER SPOONER ON YOUR PROFILE PIC. God damn, you're worse than vegans that way.
"the market will do that for us": this phrase sums up the ideological laziness and simplisticness of the conservative libertarian. The theoretical "free market" does not magically solve all ills, and there is no such thing as a "free market" without sufficient government to prevent collusion to fix prices et cetera.
You believe that government regulation of industry is bad for consumers and good for big business. That alone is proof that you're "pro-big-business" even though you may not realize it.

@24: You forgot to call everyone "sheeple".