title: Does Biology Justify Ideology? The Politics of Genetic Attribution.
abstract: Conventional wisdom suggests that political conservatives are more likely than liberals to endorse genetic explanations for many human characteristics and behaviors. Whether and to what extent this is true has received surprisingly limited systematic attention. We examine evidence from a large U.S. public opinion survey that measured the extent to which respondents believed genetic explanations account for a variety of differences among individuals as well as groups in society. We find that conservatives were indeed more likely than liberals to endorse genetic explanations for perceived race and class differences in characteristics often associated with socioeconomic inequality (intelligence, math skills, drive, and violence). Different ideological divisions emerged, however, with respect to respondents' explanations for sexual orientation. Here, liberals were more likely than conservatives to say that sexual orientation is due to genes and less likely to say that it is due to choice or the environment. These patterns suggest that conservative and liberal ideologues will tend to endorse genetic explanations where their policy positions are bolstered by "naturalizing" human differences. That said, debates over genetic influence may be more politicized with respect to race, class, and sexual orientation than population differences generally: We find that left/right political ideology wasnotsignificantly associated with genetic (or other) attributions for individual differences in intelligence, math skills, drive, or violence. We conclude that conceptions of the proper role of government are closely intertwined with assumptions about the causes of human difference, but that this relationship is a complex one.
authors.affiliation: E lizabeth S uhay is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Government and Law, Lafayette College, Easton, PA, USA. T oby E pstein J ayaratne is an Assistant Research Scientist in the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, School of Public Health, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA. The authors would like to thank Bill Dunne, Michael Feola, Martin Johnson, and Kristina Petronko as well as participants in the Spring 2010 New York Area Political Psychology Meeting, especially Leonie Huddy, Stanley Feldman, and Jeremiah Garretson. They would also like to thank Luc Bruggeman, Ryan Dawe, Brian Selvarajah, and Kelly Senters for excellent research assistance and the anonymous reviewers for helpful feedback and suggestions. This work was supported by the National Human Genome Research Institute [HG01881 to T.E.J.].
authors.forename: Elizabeth
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Suhay
authors.affiliation: E lizabeth S uhay is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Government and Law, Lafayette College, Easton, PA, USA. T oby E pstein J ayaratne is an Assistant Research Scientist in the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, School of Public Health, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA. The authors would like to thank Bill Dunne, Michael Feola, Martin Johnson, and Kristina Petronko as well as participants in the Spring 2010 New York Area Political Psychology Meeting, especially Leonie Huddy, Stanley Feldman, and Jeremiah Garretson. They would also like to thank Luc Bruggeman, Ryan Dawe, Brian Selvarajah, and Kelly Senters for excellent research assistance and the anonymous reviewers for helpful feedback and suggestions. This work was supported by the National Human Genome Research Institute [HG01881 to T.E.J.].
authors.forename: Toby Epstein
authors.initials: TE
authors.lastname: Jayaratne