Katherine B Smith
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 170502 |
|---|---|
| NOME | Katherine B Smith |
| PRENOMES | Katherine B |
| SOBRENOME | Smith |
| ASSINATURA | SMITH K B |
| AFILIAÇÕES | University of Nebraska–Lincoln |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0312-2284 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 73 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 928 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 73 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 1973 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 16 |
When Politics Causes Panic
Objective We compare an eight‐item political anxiety measure developed by Smith, Weinschenk, and Panagopoulos to previous surveys. We replicate and extend previous analyses using a more detailed measure of generalized anxiety. We also examine the correlates of political and general anxiety. Methods Using data from an original survey fielded in 2025, we report the results of a factor analysis and several regression models. Results We report confir…
Afterword
Data sharing not applicable as no data was generated for this article
They Know What They Know and It Ain’t Much
The difference between what Americans know about politics and what they think they know about politics is described as a classic case of Dunning–Kruger, a cognitive bias characterized by overestimation of competence. That bias has potentially malign civic implications, making interventions that reliably reduce overconfidence an issue of high importance. Here, we report the results of a quasi-experiment testing one such intervention among undergra…
Is political anxiety different than general anxiety
Recently, there has been growing interest in the concept of political anxiety. One important question that remains unanswered is whether political anxiety is just a symptom of general anxiety-that those reporting anxiety tied to politics are the same individuals who would already score highly on measures of general anxiety. Using survey data collected in 2023 ( N = 436), we find that measures of political and generalized anxiety do not appear to …
Politics makes bastards of us all
Moral judgment is politically situational—people are more forgiving of transgressive copartisans and more likely to behave punitively and unethically toward political opponents. Such differences are widely observed, but not fully explained. If moral values are nonnegotiable first‐principle beliefs about right and wrong, why do similar transgressions elicit different moral judgment in the personal and political realm? We argue this pattern arises …
Election-Related Post-Traumatic Stress
The 2020 U.S. presidential election saw rising political tensions among ordinary voters and political elites, with fears of election violence culminating in the January 6 riot. We hypothesized that the 2020 election might have been traumatic for some voters, producing measurable symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We also hypothesized that negative sentiment toward the opposing party correlates with PTSD. We measured PTSD using a m…
The Psychophysiology of Political Ideology
This article presents a large-scale, empirical evaluation of the psychophysiological correlates of political ideology and, in particular, the claim that conservatives react with higher levels of electrodermal activity to threatening stimuli than liberals. We (1) conduct two large replications of this claim, using locally representative samples of Danes and Americans; (2) reanalyze all published studies and evaluate their reliability and validity;…
Kevin Smith response to David Trigger
Political attitudes vary with detection of androstenone
Building on a growing body of research suggesting that political attitudes are part of broader individual and biological orientations, we test whether the detection of the hormone androstenone is predictive of political attitudes. The particular social chemical analyzed in this study is androstenone, a nonandrogenic steroid found in the sweat and saliva of many mammals, including humans. A primary reason for scholarly interest in odor detection i…
Do People Really Become More Conservative as They Age
Folk wisdom has long held that people become more politically conservative as they grow older, although several empirical studies suggest political attitudes are stable across time. Using data from the Michigan Youth-Parent Socialization Panel Study, we analyze attitudinal change over a major portion of the adult life span. We document changes in party identification, self-reported ideology, and selected issue positions over this time period and …
Are Moral Intuitions Heritable
Darwin’s bureaucrat
The study of bureaucratic behavior-focusing on control, decision-making, and institutional arrangements-has historically leaned heavily on theories of rational choice and bounded rationality. Notably absent from this research, however, is attention to the growing literature on biological and especially evolutionary human behavior. This article addresses this gap by closely examining the extant economic and psychological frameworks-which we refer …
Ideology Justifies Morality
Moral Foundations Theory (MFT) is employed as a causal explanation of ideology that posits political attitudes are products of moral intuitions. Prior theoretical models, however, suggest the opposite causal path, that is, that moral judgments are driven by political beliefs. In both instances, however, extant research has assumed rather than explicitly tested for causality. So do moral intuitions drive political beliefs or do political beliefs d…
In your face
Research suggests that people can accurately predict the political affiliations of others using only information extracted from the face. It is less clear from this research, however, what particular facial physiological processes or features communicate such information. Using a model of emotion developed in psychology that treats emotional expressivity as an individual-level trait, this article provides a theoretical account of why emotional ex…
Genetic Attributions
Many scholars argue that people who attribute human characteristics to genetic causes also tend to hold politically and socially problematic attitudes. More specifically, public acceptance of genetic influences is believed to be associated with intolerance, prejudice, and the legitimation of social inequities and laissez-faire policies. We test these expectations with original data from two nationally representative samples that allow us to ident…
Intuitive Ethics and Political Orientations
Originally developed to explain cultural variation in moral judgments, moral foundations theory (MFT) has become widely adopted as a theory of political ideology. MFT posits that political attitudes are rooted in instinctual evaluations generated by innate psychological modules evolved to solve social dilemmas. If this is correct, moral foundations must be relatively stable dispositional traits, changes in moral foundations should systematically …
Giving, Saving, Spending
This article explores children's responses to a single question: ‘If someone gave you £1 million today, what would you do with it?’ Although such an exploration might seem trivial, we argue that their responses provide important insights into children's values and priorities. One‐third intend to spend it all, one quarter to save it. But the largest group claim that they would give all or some of the money away. Their responses highlight the diver…
Physiology and political beliefs
In a recent paper in this journal, Knoll et al. question three studies from our laboratory. In this response to that paper, we address deficiencies in their “reproduction.” Notably, we demonstrate that their data provide little evidence of a negativity bias among research subjects, suggesting a failure not only to reproduce findings from our earlier studies, but also a failure to find a widely acknowledged universal human physiological response t…
Physiological Arousal and Self-Reported Valence for Erotica Images Correlate with Sexual Policy Preferences
Individuals do not always accurately report the forces driving their policy preferences. Such inaccuracy may result from the fact that true justifications are socially undesirable or less persuasive than competing justifications or are unavailable in conscious awareness. Because of the delicate nature of these issues, people may be particularly likely to misstate the reasons for preferences on gay marriage, abortion, abstinence-only education, an…
Speaking Different Languages or Reading From the Same Script? Word Usage of Democratic and Republican Politicians
This article refers to:Speaking Different Languages or Reading from the Same Script? Word Usage of Democratic and Republican Politicians
Fy ardal/my neighbourhood
The purpose of this study is to explore curricular and young people’s orientations to, and representations of, the areas in which they live contrasted against curricular representations of place in Wales. This is accomplished through a mixed methods approach incorporating statistical and content analysis. Responses were coded with a positive, neutral or negative value and organised into categories emerging from the data. While the majority (64.6%…
Differences in negativity bias underlie variations in political ideology
Disputes between those holding differing political views are ubiquitous and deep-seated, and they often follow common, recognizable lines. The supporters of tradition and stability, sometimes referred to as conservatives, do battle with the supporters of innovation and reform, sometimes referred to as liberals. Understanding the correlates of those distinct political orientations is probably a prerequisite for managing political disputes, which a…
Beyond Survey Self-Reports
Some aspects of our attitudes are composed of things outside of our consciousness. However, traditional survey research does not use measurements that are able to tap into these aspects of public opinion. We describe, recommend, and demonstrate a procedure by which non-self-reported responses can be measured in order to test whether these responses have independent effects on individuals’ preferences. We use one of the better-known physiological …
Applying the Flanker Task to Political Psychology
One of the two stated objectives of the new “Research Note” section of Political Psychology is to present short reports that highlight novel methodological approaches. Toward that end, we call readers' attention to the “flanker task,” a research protocol widely employed in the study of the cognitive processes involved with detection, recognition, and distraction. The flanker task has increasingly been modified to study social traits, and we belie…
Side by Side, Worlds Apart
The degree to which people desire policy change is a function of two factors: preferences for future policies and perceptions of current policies. Political scientists, pollsters, and pundits know a good deal about people’s policy preferences but surprisingly little about the distance of those preferences from policy perceptions. In this article, we assess the distance between policy perceptions and policy preferences to calculate the amount of p…
Ideology Justifies Morality
Moral Foundations Theory (MFT) is employed as a causal explanation of ideology that posits political attitudes are products of moral intuitions. Prior theoretical models, however, suggest the opposite causal path, that is, that moral judgments are driven by political beliefs. In both instances, however, extant research has assumed rather than explicitly tested for causality. So do moral intuitions drive political beliefs or do political beliefs d…
The Politics of Punishment
Why have incarceration rates dramatically increased even as crime rates have remained stable or even declined? This is a question of considerable policy and theoretical relevance that currently has no satisfactory answer. I attempt to address this question by examining the key political explanations of prison populations and the unit of analysis and data limitation obstacles that make it difficult to conduct a comprehensive empirical analysis of …
Do People Really Become More Conservative as They Age
Folk wisdom has long held that people become more politically conservative as they grow older, although several empirical studies suggest political attitudes are stable across time. Using data from the Michigan Youth-Parent Socialization Panel Study, we analyze attitudinal change over a major portion of the adult life span. We document changes in party identification, self-reported ideology, and selected issue positions over this time period and …
Not by Twins Alone
Variance components estimates of political and social attitudes suggest a substantial level of genetic influence, but the results have been challenged because they rely on data from twins only. In this analysis, we include responses from parents and nontwin full siblings of twins, account for measurement error by using a panel design, and estimate genetic and environmental variance by maximum‐likelihood structural equation modeling. By doing so, …
Intuitive Ethics and Political Orientations
Originally developed to explain cultural variation in moral judgments, moral foundations theory (MFT) has become widely adopted as a theory of political ideology. MFT posits that political attitudes are rooted in instinctual evaluations generated by innate psychological modules evolved to solve social dilemmas. If this is correct, moral foundations must be relatively stable dispositional traits, changes in moral foundations should systematically …
When All's Fair
Studies of newspaper coverage of political campaigns have found gender-based patterns that disadvantage women. However, recent media portrayals of female candidates seem to have been more positive. Have historical coverage patterns shifted? Analyzing statewide campaigns in 1994, I find much smaller coverage differences than in studies relying on pre-1990 data. This indicates such a shift may be underway. Although systematic gender-based patterns …
Linking Genetics and Political Attitudes
In this paper, we trace the route by which genetics could ultimately connect to issue attitudes and suggest that central to this connection are chronic dispositional preferences for mass‐scale social rules, order, and conduct—what we label political ideology. The need to resolve bedrock social dilemmas concerning such matters as leadership style, protection from outgroups, and the degree to which norms of conduct are malleable, is present in any …
Typologies, Taxonomies, and the Benefits of Policy Classification
Although one of the most durable analytic frameworks in political science, policy typologies suffer from some well‐known flaws. Key among these is the problem of classification: thus far, it has proved impossible to consistently and objectively assign specific policies into conceptually distinct categories. The ambitious original promise of policy typologies, that is, to provide a precursor to a general theory of politics has gone unfulfilled in …
Biology, Ideology, and Epistemology
Evidence that political attitudes and behavior are in part biologically and even genetically instantiated is much discussed in political science of late. Yet the classic twin design, a primary source of evidence on this matter, has been criticized for being biased toward finding genetic influence. In this article, we employ a new data source to test empirically the alternative, exclusively environmental, explanations for ideological similarities …
Rags, Riches, and Bootstraps
Specific beliefs pertaining to wealth and poverty emanate from metatheories about socioeconomic inequalities. As cognitions, these metatheories filter social perceptions and generate beliefs about the specific causes of wealth and poverty. Four metatheories coexist in American culture and compete for public support. The four are individualism, culturalism, structuralism/situationalism, and fatalism. Using public opinion data on beliefs about 38 o…
Genetic and Environmental Transmission of Political Orientations
This article reports results from the first twin study of adults in the United States that focuses exclusively and comprehensively on political traits. These data allow us to test whether a common set of genetic and environmental influences act upon a broad variety of values, personality traits, and political attitudes. In short, it allows us to empirically investigate whether there are a core set of predispositions that form the basis of our pol…
Evolutionary Theory and Political Leadership
Central to social systems are the attitudes of the rank and file toward those who make political decisions (leaders), and attitudes toward leaders are known to be characterized by two fundamental features. First, the modal attitude is acceptance of the necessity of leaders coupled with acute aversion to leaders who are believed to be motivated by ambition and avarice; second, people are highly variable with some being markedly more sensitive than…
Speaking Different Languages or Reading From the Same Script? Word Usage of Democratic and Republican Politicians
This article refers to:Speaking Different Languages or Reading from the Same Script? Word Usage of Democratic and Republican Politicians
Clean Thoughts and Dirty Minds; The Politics of Porn
Various justiftcations are givenfor regulating sexually explicit material, including that it causes social härm by eroding behavioral norms or violating basic civil rights. Theories ofmorality politics and policy, however, suggest that regulation of sexually explicit material is driven by attempts to redistribute values, i.e., by groups/vho seek to use the coercive power ofthe state to impose their moral codes on others. The analysis here tests f…
Public Choice in Education
School choice is an increasingly popular education reform. Proponents of choice argue that market forces can improve education through the mechanism of competition-the schools that best satisfy the demands of parents and students will attract clientele and prosper and those that do not will close. A key assumption of choice theorists is that the engine driv ing an education marketplace will be a demand for a higher quality educa tion. This demand…
Politics, Bureaucrats, and Schools
In a provocative analysis, Chubb and Moe (1990, 1988) argue that private schools perform better than public schools. They reason that efforts by democratic institutions and the complex environments of public schools generate greater levels of bureaucracy in public schools than in private schools. Rules, regulations, and controls restrict the autonomy of teachers and prevent them from doing what they do best - teach. Only by permitting teachers to…
Seeing justice in poverty
The aim of this research was to empirically link the belief in a just world to a variety of ideas about social inequalities. Drawing from cognitive dissonance theory, it was argued that adherents of the Just World Belief redefine and reinterpret perceived inequalities in order to reduce or eliminate the contradiction between the two cognitions. Using data from a probability sample of adults, six hypotheses were formally stated and empirically tes…
Candidate Genes and Voter Turnout
Recently in this journal, Charney and English (2012) presented an extensive critique of candidate gene association studies using the widely noted Fowler and Dawes (2008) article on the relationship between self-reported voter turnout and both 5-HTT (serotonin transporter) and MAOA (monoamine oxidase A) as the driving example of their evaluation. Reanalysis of the Fowler and Dawes data by Charney and English, based on four critiques of candidate g…
OLS is AOK for ACE
Policy, Markets, and Bureaucracy
Public choice is an idea that is gaining support as a policy option for the nation's schools. Advocates of choice argue decoupling education from the control of democratic institutions and substituting a market mechanism will promote effective schools. This paper analyzes the underlying premises of the public choice argument and empirically tests them on a district-level data set of Florida schools. The relationships hypothesized by public choice…
The Psychophysiology of Political Ideology
This article presents a large-scale, empirical evaluation of the psychophysiological correlates of political ideology and, in particular, the claim that conservatives react with higher levels of electrodermal activity to threatening stimuli than liberals. We (1) conduct two large replications of this claim, using locally representative samples of Danes and Americans; (2) reanalyze all published studies and evaluate their reliability and validity;…
The Biology of Political Behavior
A broad cross-section of the social sciences is increasingly turning to biology and evolutionary theory to help explain human behavior. Political science is a notable exception to this trend, even though there are sound conceptual reasons for expecting biological processes to play an important role in explaining political behavior. While agreeing with the conceptual arguments, the authors believe original empirical research is the most persuasive…
A Mixed Relationship
We argue the negative relationship between school bureaucracy and school performance that is commonly reported in the bureaucracy and educational policy literature is theoretically and empirically incomplete. Like most public agencies operating in complex task environments, we suggest that schools have to make trade‐offs between the multiple outputs they are expected to produce. Bureaucracy plays an important role in determining the nature of the…
Beyond Survey Self-Reports
Some aspects of our attitudes are composed of things outside of our consciousness. However, traditional survey research does not use measurements that are able to tap into these aspects of public opinion. We describe, recommend, and demonstrate a procedure by which non-self-reported responses can be measured in order to test whether these responses have independent effects on individuals’ preferences. We use one of the better-known physiological …
The Physiology of Political Participation
City Classification Handbook
A tedious and, on the whole, disappointing book, if one is looking for any novel contribution of classification methods to urban sociology or to the practice of urban planning in this country. The group responsible for this handbook met in Chicago, under the sponsorship of the International City Management Association, to develop a new approach to city classification and one that would help those responsible for urban management capitalize on the…
City Classification Handbook
Class Structure and Intergenerational Mobility from a Marxian Perspective
Four mobility and attainment propositions are extracted from a theoretical discussion relating class mobility and attainment processes to the development of capitalism. These propositions are evaluated empirically using United States Labor Statistics, General Social Survey data, and primary data collected from a SMSA. The first proposition maintains that paralleling the development of capitalism will be a structural decrease in the relative size …
Individual Correlates of the Belief in a Just World
The relationships between perceived social inequality, evaluated social inequality, the work ethic, political preference, several social-identity variables, and the belief in a just world were examined using data from a sample of 233 adults drawn from a metropolitan area. All seven variables were significantly associated with the belief in a just world except sex, educational attainment, and occupational prestige
Individual and Social Correlates of the Just World Belief
This paper reports the results of a study to identify empirically the nature and correlates of the Just World Belief among Taiwanese college students. Data were collected from over 1,000 students enrolled in two major Taiwanese universities. Similar to Western findings, the average Just World Scale score fell almost exactly at the midpoint of the acceptance-rejection attitudinal continuum. Also similar to Western findings were strong correlations…
I made It Because of Me
Using probability data collected from a sample of metropolitan residents, variation in beliefs about the “causes” of wealth and poverty was examined. It was found that respondents generally preferred individualistic explanations of wealth and poverty over structural ones. By comparing results from this study with those from other studies, it was concluded that many stratification beliefs are remarkably similar across locations and stable over tim…
Seeing justice in poverty
The aim of this research was to empirically link the belief in a just world to a variety of ideas about social inequalities. Drawing from cognitive dissonance theory, it was argued that adherents of the Just World Belief redefine and reinterpret perceived inequalities in order to reduce or eliminate the contradiction between the two cognitions. Using data from a probability sample of adults, six hypotheses were formally stated and empirically tes…
Education and intergroup attitudes
Drawing on the recent work of Jackman and Muha (1984), three views on the relationship between education and intergroup attitudes about social inequalities are presented, discussed, and empirically evaluated using probability samples of adult members of socially advantaged groups (males, whites, and non‐poor). The first view maintains that education leads to “moral enlightenment,” which in turn produces deeply‐held democratic and egalitarian atti…
Rags, Riches, and Bootstraps
Specific beliefs pertaining to wealth and poverty emanate from metatheories about socioeconomic inequalities. As cognitions, these metatheories filter social perceptions and generate beliefs about the specific causes of wealth and poverty. Four metatheories coexist in American culture and compete for public support. The four are individualism, culturalism, structuralism/situationalism, and fatalism. Using public opinion data on beliefs about 38 o…
Social class, parental values, and child-rearing practices in Taiwan
This research examines the relationships among social class, parental values, and child‐rearing practices using data from a recent national survey in Taiwan. Kohn's “self‐direction versus external conformity” hypothesis was not supported, nor was his “intent versus consequence” hypothesis. Data, however, showed some evidence in support of Bronfenbrenner's “physical versus psychological” hypothesis. Attempts were made to explain the results in ter…
Logistics diplomacy at Casablanca
Social Correlates of Confucian Ethics in Taiwan
Using data from a recent nationwide social survey in Taiwan, this study investigated the extent of support for Confucian ethical beliefs across socio-demographic groups in the Taiwanese population. Although the extent of such support varied across occupation, residence, and place of origin, it did not significantly vary across most socioeconomic groups. The convergence of Confucianism was suggested and explained in terms of the recent economic de…
Politics, Bureaucrats, and Schools
In a provocative analysis, Chubb and Moe (1990, 1988) argue that private schools perform better than public schools. They reason that efforts by democratic institutions and the complex environments of public schools generate greater levels of bureaucracy in public schools than in private schools. Rules, regulations, and controls restrict the autonomy of teachers and prevent them from doing what they do best - teach. Only by permitting teachers to…
Policy, Markets, and Bureaucracy
Public choice is an idea that is gaining support as a policy option for the nation's schools. Advocates of choice argue decoupling education from the control of democratic institutions and substituting a market mechanism will promote effective schools. This paper analyzes the underlying premises of the public choice argument and empirically tests them on a district-level data set of Florida schools. The relationships hypothesized by public choice…
Politics and the Quality of Education
Public Choice in Education
Public Choice in Education
School choice is an increasingly popular education reform. Proponents of choice argue that market forces can improve education through the mechanism of competition-the schools that best satisfy the demands of parents and students will attract clientele and prosper and those that do not will close. A key assumption of choice theorists is that the engine driv ing an education marketplace will be a demand for a higher quality educa tion. This demand…
Politics and the Quality of Education
Social science has provided poor guidance for educational policymakers interested in improving student performance. While education research is a large and active field of scholarship, much of the literature has concen trated on influences beyond the control of policymakers. This paper ex plores the influences of realistic policy options. Several policies are identified that meet the criteria of a positive relationship with student per formance a…
A Cross-Sectional Study of Moral Development in the South African Context
This study has two aims, to examine aspects of Kohlberg's claims of universality within a unique research context and to explore differences in moral development between black and white South Africans. 81 participants from four different age groups were administered Form A of Kohlberg's moral judgement interviews. Analysis supported the age-relatedness of Kohlberg's stages of moral development and provided some support for the notion that the sta…
Conflict over Convoys
Explaining Variation in State-Level Homicide Rates
This study presents a systematic examination of the impact of competing crime policies on homicide rates in the 50 states from 1975 to 1990. The findings indicate that politically popular options for addressing violent crime, especially those that increase prison populations, are not achieving their policy objectives While there is some weak evidence for deterrence policies, the most promising policy approach appears to be long-term commitments t…
Explaining Variation in State–Level Homicide Rates
This study presents a systematic examination of the impact of competing crime policies on homicide rates in the 50 states from 1975 to 1990. The findings indicate that politically popular options for addressing violent crime, especially those that increase prison populations, are not achieving their policy objectives While there is some weak evidence for deterrence policies, the most promising policy approach appears to be long-term commitments t…
When All's Fair
Studies of newspaper coverage of political campaigns have found gender-based patterns that disadvantage women. However, recent media portrayals of female candidates seem to have been more positive. Have historical coverage patterns shifted? Analyzing statewide campaigns in 1994, I find much smaller coverage differences than in studies relying on pre-1990 data. This indicates such a shift may be underway. Although systematic gender-based patterns …
Mobilizing for Modern War
Although the military-industrial complex became familiar to most Americans during the Cold Paul Koistinen shows that its origins actually go back to the dawn of this century. Mobilizing for Modern War, the second of a five-volume study on the political economy of American warfare, highlights the emergence of this pivotal relationship. In this volume, Koistinen examines war planning and mobilizing in an era of rapid industrialization and reveals h…
Expensive Lessons
Political science (55 obras) · Politics (48 obras) · Psychology (45 obras) · Law (41 obras) · Law (37 obras) · Social Psychology (37 obras) · Social Psychology (32 obras) · Economics (31 obras) · Sociology (30 obras) · Social and Intergroup Psychology (27 obras)