1. C H R I S M A R T I N
A P R I L 2 4 , 2 0 1 3
Why Sociology Needs More
Ideological Diversity

2. Sociology is Partisan

3. This is Not News
Ladd (1969) examined a list of scholars who signed an
anti-Vietnam war ad in the New York Times.
More of them came from sociology than any other field.
-Lipset (2001) in The State of American Sociology

4. It Raises Issues of Discrimination
Evidence for and against discrimination: self-selection,
social exclusion

5. For Example…
“[At graduate school] people were really,
really intolerant of any other view besides
their own--meaning specifically far left-
wing academic was the only way to think.
And anyone who thought differently … was
shut up immediately.
And it just drove me nuts to see people so
closed-minded in graduate school. “
Christian Lander

6. Christian Lander Built This

7. But More Importantly, It is Bad for Science
Because it keeps social scientists from relevant information.
The relevance paradox: An attempt to gather relevant
information fails, because seeming irrelevant information
turns out to be critical.

9. Limitations on the Data We Use

10. Data Censoring: A Familiar Graph

11. An Unfamiliar Graph: Asians Since 1987

12. Confirmation Bias
The tendency to ask questions, look for evidence, filter data, interpret
findings to confirm one’s preferred viewpoint.
Found correlation between anti-Black racist web
searches and drop in Obama vote
-Seth Stephens-Davidowitz
Ignored this Gallup Poll:
About 6 percent [of Americans] they were less likely
to vote for Obama because of his race. However,
they also found that 9 percent said they were
more likely to vote for Obama because of his
race; and that 6 percent said they were less likely to
vote for McCain because of his race (they also found
that 7 percent said they were more likely to vote for
McCain because of his race).
-Lee Jussim

13. Confirmation Bias: Cheney
I really do believe that we will be greeted as
liberators [by the Iraqi people]. – Dick
Cheney

14. Confirmation Bias: Marx
Bakunin: And from the heights of the state
[the rulers] begin to look down upon the
whole common world of the workers. From
that time on they represent not the people
but themselves and their own claims to
govern the people. Those who can doubt this
know nothing at all about human nature.
Marx: If Mr Bakunin were familiar just
with the position of a manager in a workers’
co-operative, he could send all his
nightmares about authority to the devil. He
should have asked himself: what form can
administrative functions take, on the basis of
this workers’ state – if he wants to call it
that?

15. Limited Understanding of Ideologies

16. The Curse of Knowledge
The difficulty of knowing the perspective of someone who does not know
something you know…more broadly the difficulty of taking a different
perspective despite one’s best efforts.
Claimed that the economic policies of Republicans
do not benefit Kansans, but Kansas is majority
Republican.
Thus something is the matter with Kansas.
--
But perhaps Kansans are not strange. Rather they
are merely basing their decisions on a different data.

17. Actor/Observer Bias & Reductionism
The tendency to attribute one’s own behavior to circumstances, but the
behavior of another person to an internal motive
Is there an internal trait called social dominance?
Or is SDO along with other social attitudes
explained by social identity and conflict?

18. Framing Effects
The main difference between liberals and conservatives is that liberals
focus on progress towards egalitarianism whereas conservatives show
resistance to change and tolerate inequality (Jost, 2006; Jost et al.,
2003).
The main difference between liberals and conservatives is that
conservatives show respect for inherited wisdom whereas liberals show a
preference for social volatility and tolerate profligacy.
Can be framed as…
In general, liberals are more open-minded, creative, curious, and novelty
seeking, whereas conservatives are more orderly, conventional, and
better organized (Gosling et al.)

19. Framing Metaphors: Social Issue Literature
Structure and constraints are metaphorical.
Suggest a hindrance to modern ideas of liberty and the pursuit of
happiness.
Implication: constraints should be removed.
Thus
Fixed constraints are taboo: genes, ancestry, sex, age.
Threats to individuality are taboo: stereotype accuracy.
However other metaphors are possible. And metaphors impose order
where order is absent.

20. Limitations on the Topics We Choose

21. Limited Moral Dimensions
People from one particular
culture are outliers: people
from societies that are Western,
Educated, Industrialized, Rich,
and Democratic (WEIRD): they
think more analytically than
holistically.
Liberals are also WEIRDer
than conservatives.
-Talhelm, Haidt, Oishi et al
(2012)
“Morality binds and blinds.” – Haidt
(2011)

22. Marginalization of Taboo Topics
When people form a tribal, moral community, they form
taboos. These are non-negotiable.
The problem of "tribalism" affects research only in areas
related to sacred values, such as race and gender, and also
moral and political psychology.

24. Alternative Arguments
A. Liberals are more intelligent than conservatives
Response: The evidence is mixed. Social conservatives
seem to be less intelligent than liberals, whereas
libertarians seem more intelligent.
In any case, these traits are normally distributed, so one
would expect a higher percentage of liberals, but not to the
current degree
B. People are mostly accurate, not biased.
Response: This does not fix the problem of data censoring.