POLITICAL PSYCH

Similarities and Differences between PP and Behaviouralism:

 Both can be presented quantitatively, PP can also be presented in descriptive form

 PP more on the preferences
 PP goes further, more on the personal preferences of an individual – causal effect, a phenomena
can be explained through the preferences of the individual
 More on the unusual behaviour
 Personal attributes, motivations, of the individuals maybe the cause of a certain phenomena
 They both rooted from Psych.
 Applied in studying the lives of people: presidents like Kennedy, military officer, etc. by studying
their personalities, etc.
 Questions such as, why is Estrada very popular among the poor?
 Behaviouralism, more on the demographic, age, sex, PP more on the personal, beliefs, traits
 Behaviouralism, more on the empirical facts in explaining why phenomena occur, PP more on
the individual personalities, motivations, beliefs, etc.

PP
 Is the empirical study of human factors shaping political behaviour
 Dissects the personalities (beliefs, traits, motivations); the most eventful political stances aand
choice, and; the life histories and careers of key politicians, bureaucrats, and activists.

Where the political psych has been employed:

 In studies concerning personalities (beliefs, traits, motivations) of political elites, political leaders
 In providing new insights, into the
 In studies concerning leader-follower relation, rhetoric, political persuasion and communication
collective mobilization (in studying the connection between elite and mass behaviour)

Central Axiom (proposition that is regarded to true)

 That political structures and actions are shaped and channelled by people’s personalities.

A wide river with two directions

 Psychologists who want to study the political

 Political scientists who want to borrow from the discipline of Psychology (Why do some political
scientists turn to psychology?)
 One must be able to understand the jargons of the two disciplines
 Hard to distinguish if the study performed is for political scientists, psychologists

Claims of the Approach

 Political processes and outcomes are shaped by the preferences…

 Why focus on personal characteristics? Political Psychologists are interested in explaining
behaviours and choices that surprise, startle or dismay (difficult to explain)
  Events such as the shooting in Colorado (Dark Knight Rises) – Political Psychologists would focus
more on what is going on in the mind of the shooter.

3 Approaches to personality

 Cognitive Approach – the focus is on the way people view the world and the situations, they are
in as products of their beliefs, experiences, info-processing
 Motivational Approach – the focus is on the nature, origin, and effects of people’s drives, values
and styles.
 Social Approach – the focus is on the interpersonal relations, group dynamics and inter-group
relations of the collectives in which actors operate

The differences

 The cognitive approach (how beliefs and perceptions shape political action): use of historical
analogies that act as “filters” that political actors evoke to interpret reality. (Analyse the mind.
Factor in the past events that were used by the individual in making a decision)
 The motivational approach: use of personality and political style, personal qualities (the
character, psychological development and psychological disorders of individual leaders) +
backgrounds = political style. (focuses more on the backgrounds of the individual rather than the
past events)
 The social dimension: use of groups and intergroup relations (“groupthink” leads to policy
disaster) (Janis: “under certain conditions and when the group engages in stressful decisional
tasks, strong group cohesion can in fact contribute to defective decision-making”)