So, Conservatives not the psychotic ones, after all..

[Dill]

(06-06-2019, 11:09 PM)bfine32 Wrote: From your link:

Sounds a whole lot like the definition I posted.

BTW, what have I been warned about? 

The last half of your definition could fit. The first part encourages distortion.  Hence inadequate.

You were warned to "check definitions and read the paper." When you are discussing how terms are used in social science papers, that does not mean run to  dictionary. It means look at how the term in question is deployed in whatever theory is being used.

Don't read in sound bites--i.e. without examples and directions for application, or recognition of how the same terms can have different or shaded meanings in different disciplines and research projects. 

The main topic covered [in this paper] is Eysenck's view of psychoticism as a dimension of personality and temperament. Eysenck's theory of psychoticism is based on mostly physiological factors. It states that normal subjects who are not diagnosable psychotics can, under certain circumstances, exhibit some qualities commonly found among psychotics. It is also shown how he ascribes this theory to creativity and how the genetic and psychological traits of psychoticism and creativity are found to be greatly overlapping.

As I said above, this "psychoticism" is also balanced by something called "socialization." It is a diagnostic tool applied to a trait it is presumed everyone has in some degree.

Psychoticism and socialization are deployed with two other dimensions: extroversion and introversion, and neuroticism and stability. Taken together, these are all deployed in a multifactoral analysis testing for correlations between personality traits and political attitudes. 

I add that Colin DeYoung, one of the researchers who exposed the error, thinks that "psyochticism" is itself a poor term for what is measured here, which is really "impulsivity, nonconformity, and antisociality." (bottom of the first email in this chain http://images.nymag.com/images/2/daily/2016/07/emails1.pdf.)

At this point, you should read the paper, at least the concluding discussion and "conclusion." The authors are not claiming that political party determines mental stability, nor does the correction correct that.  https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1540-5907.2011.00568.x


Researchers in personality and politics have assumed

a causal link between personality traits and political

ideology. The results presented here do not support this

assumption. Rather, the primary connection between

personality traits and political ideology rests on common

genetic precursors of each. At this stage of research,

we find no support for the reigning assumption that

personality traits cause people to develop political

attitudes. Our results imply that humans are, at heart,

political animals. Political attitudes are not simply an

afterthought and while largely measured in adulthood,

the foundation elements exist as part of our core

disposition and appear to be just as important to shaping

our behavior as our personalities.