Correlation not Causation: The Relationship between

Personality Traits and Political Ideologies

Brad Verhulst Virginia Commonwealth University
Lindon J. Eaves Virginia Commonwealth University
Peter K. Hatemi The Pennsylvania State University and University of Sydney

The assumption in the personality and politics literature is that a person’s personality motivates them to develop certain
political attitudes later in life. This assumption is founded on the simple correlation between the two constructs and the
observation that personality traits are genetically influenced and develop in infancy, whereas political preferences develop
later in life. Work in psychology, behavioral genetics, and recently political science, however, has demonstrated that political
preferences also develop in childhood and are equally influenced by genetic factors. These findings cast doubt on the assumed
causal relationship between personality and politics. Here we test the causal relationship between personality traits and
political attitudes using a direction of causation structural model on a genetically informative sample. The results suggest
that personality traits do not cause people to develop political attitudes; rather, the correlation between the two is a function
of an innate common underlying genetic factor.

T
he field of political science is witnessing a re- political attitudes has been found to be largely a function
naissance in the exploration of the relationship of latent shared genetic influences (Eaves and Eysenck
between personality traits and political prefer- 1974; Verhulst, Hatemi, and Martin 2010). These find-
ences (Gerber et al. 2010; Jost et al. 2003; Mondak and ings cast doubt on the critical foundations necessary for
Halperin 2008; Mondak et al. 2010). The belief that per- the assumed causal structure expounded throughout the
sonality traits are innate, genetically influenced, and de- extant literature (e.g., Gerber et al. 2010; Mondak et al.
velop in infancy (Bouchard et al. 1990; Eaves et al. 1999; 2010). In light of these empirical inconsistencies, it is im-
Eysenck 1967; Loehlin 1992; McRae et al. 2000), whereas portant to reconsider this basic assumption to gain a more
political attitudes develop in adulthood, has led to the accurate understanding of the complex interplay between
assumption that personality traits cause the subsequent an individual’s disposition and their political attitudes.
development of political attitudes. Recent scholarship, The recent introduction of behavioral genetic mod-
however, has demonstrated that political attitudes de- els plays a pivotal role in expanding our understanding of
velop much earlier than previously suspected (Block and the nature of the relationship between personality traits
Block 2006; Hess and Torney 1967), the precursors of and political attitudes. These models allow us to examine
which are present prior to a child’s first year in school whether the relationship is best accounted for by com-
(Persson 2010) and are also influenced by genetic factors mon genetic or environmental influences shared between
(Alford, Funk, and Hibbing 2005; Eaves, Eysenck, and the two phenotypes (e.g., Verhulst, Hatemi, and Martin
Martin 1989; Hatemi et al. 2010; Martin et al. 1986). Fur- 2010) or whether a causal relationship exists between per-
thermore, the relationship between personality traits and sonality and political attitudes (e.g., Heath et al. 1993). To

Brad Verhulst is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Virginia Commonwealth University, Virginia Institute of Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics,
Richmond, VA 23298-980003 ([email protected]). Lindon J. Eaves is Distinguished Professor of Human Genetics, Virginia Com-
monwealth University, Virginia Institute of Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Richmond, VA 23298-980003 ([email protected]).
Peter K. Hatemi is Associate Professor of Political Science and Microbiology at The Pennsylvania State University and Research Fellow at
the United States Studies Centre, University of Sydney, 307 Pond Lab, University Park, PA 16802 ([email protected]).
The data for this article were collected with the financial support of the National Institute of Health AA-06781 and MH-40828 (PI: Eaves).
Data analysis was supported by NIH Grant 5R25DA026119 (PI: Neale). To obtain a copy of the data for replication, please go to http:
//polisci.la.psu.edu/facultybios/hatemi.html. The authors would like to thank John Jost and the members of his lab for useful comments
in the preparation of this manuscript. Any errors of interpretation are, of course, our own.
American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 56, No. 1, January 2012, Pp. 34–51

C 2011, Midwest Political Science Association DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-5907.2011.00568.x

34
PERSONALITY TRAITS AND POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES 35

test the assumed causal relationship between personality situations ignoring specific situational pressures (Ban-
traits and political attitudes, we first highlight the critical dura 2001; Mischel 1968; Mischel and Shoda 1998). As
findings that both underscore and challenge the causal as- such, multiple intervening processes mediate the impact
sumption. In doing so, we evaluate recent evidence which of personality traits on observed behaviors.
has identified genetic sources of variance on attitudes Ideological orientations, on the other hand, are typi-
and personality. Then, using a series of behavioral ge- cally conceptualized as an interrelated set of attitudes that
netic analyses on data collected from a large sample of reflect an individual’s liberal or conservative preferences
twins (5,748 pairs), we partition the covariation between across a range of interrelated policies (Campbell et al.
personality traits and political attitudes into environmen- 1960), which can be clustered along multiple ideological
tal and genetic sources that are shared between the two dimensions (Conover and Feldman 1981, 1984; McClosky
traits. Finally, we conduct a direction of causation analysis and Zaller 1984; Treier and Hillygus 2009). In contrast to
which explores a variety of scenarios that may underlie personality traits, political attitudes are thought to emerge
the established association between personality traits and only after the individual begins to engage with the polit-
political attitudes (Duffy and Martin 1994; Heath et al. ical world. Thus, young voters are more susceptible to
1993; Neale and Cardon, 1992). These types of analyses al- political tides because they have relatively weak attitudes
low us to empirically test the assumption that personality that do not crystallize until their mid to late twenties
traits cause people to develop attitudes or if other possible (Alwin, Cohen, and Newcomb 1991; Jennings and Markus
avenues exist for the relationship between attitudes and 1984; Jennings and Niemi 1981). Accordingly, if the
personality. Specifically, we compare how the data fit four development of political attitudes occurs much later
possible causative models: the assumed causal structure, than personality development, it is reasonable to assume
a reverse causal structure where attitudes cause personal- that personality traits cause the development of political
ity traits, a reciprocal causal structure where personality attitudes.
traits and political attitudes both have a causal influence Such a view has been used to explain the relationship
on each other, and a correlational structure where a latent between specific attitudinal scales and specific personal-
set of genes influences both personality traits and political ity traits. In research exploring the relationship between
attitudes. these two constructs, the most common personality trait
linked to politics has been Openness to Experience and
more liberal social/moral issues (Gerber et al. 2010; Jost
The Relationship between Personality Traits et al. 2003; McCrae 1996; Mondak and Halperin 2008;
and Political Attitudes Mondak et al. 2010). Specifically, Openness to Experi-
ence has been found to be negatively related to a vari-
Before delving into the causality assumption, it is first ety of ideological measures, such as conservative political
useful to explicate both personality traits and political at- attitudes, right-wing authoritarianism, and social domi-
titudes. Personality traits are typically conceptualized as nance orientation (Adorno et al. 1950; Altemeyer 1996;
stable individual differences that, in a general sense, guide Carney et al. 2008; Duckitt 1989; Jost et al. 2003; Stenner
behavior (Cattell 1957; Winter and Barenbaum 1999). 2005; Van Hiel, Kossowska, and Mervielde 2000; Van Hiel,
Although there is no universally accepted definition of Pandelaere, and Duriez 2004). This relationship has been
personality, most research views personality traits as the attributed to the “fact” that people who are more open
culmination of life events, personal adaptations, and bi- to new experiences are less tied to the conventional ways
ological mechanisms (Buss 1999; Caprara and Cervone of doing things, and this “Openness” extends into every
2000; Eysenck 1967; for a review, see Pervin and Oliver facet of a person’s life, including political orientations.
1999). Consistent with this logic, research in develop- The relationship between political orientations and
mental psychology has established that many personality personality traits is multifaceted, however, and ex-
traits can be assessed early in life as temperaments, which tends far beyond Openness and general liberalism-
are predictive of adult personality traits (Roberts and conservatism. Research has also demonstrated a consis-
DelVecchio 2000; Young, Eaves, and Eysenck 1980). This tent, but weaker, relationship between conservative polit-
early emergence and relative stability across time insin- ical attitudes and Conscientiousness (Carney et al. 2008;
uates that personality traits precede other social disposi- Gerber et al. 2010; Jost 2006). Political conservatism
tions, such as political attitudes. In this view, personality has been associated with dogmatism (Rokeach 1960),
traits are not conceptualized as proximate causes that Eysenck’s P (Eysenck and Eysenck 1985; Verhulst, Hatemi,
can explain specific behaviors, but rather as distal causes and Martin 2010), intolerance of ambiguity or uncer-
that explain response tendencies across a wide range of tainty, a personal need to achieve order (Sanford 1973),
36 BRAD VERHULST, LINDON J. EAVES, AND PETER K. HATEMI

desire for structure and closure, integrative complexity, relationship. Studies assessing political attitudes in chil-
and fear of threat or loss (Jost et al. 2003). It has also been dren find that the building blocks of political attitudes
suggested that conservatism should be associated with are present quite early in life. For example, sharing, allo-
high levels of anxiety, a major component of the person- cation of resources, leadership roles in play, equity versus
ality trait Neuroticism. This link, however, has eluded em- equality, hierarchy, and organization are all present in
pirical validation (Eaves and Eysenck 1974; Fromm 1947; early childhood (Block and Block 2006; Moore 1986).
Kline and Cooper 1984; Ray 1972; Wilson 1973; Wilson Other studies focusing on explicit political attitudes have
and Brazendale 1973). Intriguingly, the empirical link be- used stories and pictures to demonstrate that children,
tween ideology and Neuroticism suggests the relationship some as young as four or five and even prior to their
is actually between certain facets of liberalism and Neu- first year of school, possess independent political attitudes
roticism (Gerber et al. 2010; Van Hiel, Pandelaere, and (Coles 1986; Hatemi et al. 2009a; Hess and Torney 1967;
Duriez 2004; Verhulst, Hatemi, and Martin 2010). These Persson 2010; Torney-Purta 2004; Torney-Purta and
empirical relationships have been replicated across time Amadeo 2003). Thus, the finding that political attitudes
and in different political contexts. also develop early in life questions the temporal causal
In the majority of studies, the causal ordering priority of personality traits.
between personality traits and political attitudes was The strongest challenge to the prevailing causality
assumed, but has yet to be empirically evaluated. Fur- assumption is the finding that genes influence political
thermore, the theoretical development connecting these attitudes. These findings suggest that even though attitu-
varied findings remains embryonic. However, more de- dinal measures cannot effectively assess political attitudes
veloped theoretical justifications are beginning to emerge. in infancy, the precursors of these attitudes are present
For example, Jost et al. (2003) suggest that exposure to nevertheless. In their landmark study, Nicholas Martin,
threat and uncertainty in the political environment evokes Lindon Eaves, and their colleagues (1986) demonstrated
fear and anxiety which heightens epistemic and existen- substantial heritability of political attitudes, a finding that
tial motivations, resulting in increased confidence in the has been replicated in a variety of different political cli-
“correctness” of one’s attitudes and bolstering one’s self- mates, countries, time periods, and by various different
concept. From this perspective, political conservatism methods (Alford, Funk, and Hibbing 2005; Bouchard
serves as a coping mechanism that allows people to man- et al. 1990; Eaves, Eysenck, and Martin 1989; Eaves and
age these threats, leaving conservatives more intolerant of Hatemi 2008; Eaves et al. 1999; Hatemi et al. 2007, 2009a;
ambiguity and desiring high levels of order, structure, and Hatemi, Hobolt, and Nørgaard 2010; Hatemi, Medland,
cognitive closure (Carney et al. 2008; Jost et al. 2003). Es- and Eaves 2009; Klemmensen et al. 2010). The fact that
sentially, fluctuations in the broad political environment both personality traits and political attitudes have sub-
create political circumstances that require adaptive atti- stantial genetic components opens the possibility that the
tudinal responses. However, even in this view, the causal relationship between the two constructs may not be as
path remains unchanged (Jost 2006); attitudinal modula- simple as commonly assumed.
tions are a function of an individual’s personality adapting Unfortunately, findings from the genetics and politics
to their political environment. literature have been poorly integrated into the personal-
ity and politics literature. For example, rather than insti-
gating a general debate on the connection between the
Questioning the Causality Assumption innate components of political attitudes and personality
traits, the extant causal assumption has only been slightly
The assumption that personality traits cause or trigger the modified to suggest that genetic factors lead to the de-
development of political attitudes is largely predicated on velopment of personality traits, which in turn “cause”
the interpretation and extension of two empirical find- people to develop political attitudes either by motivating
ings: personality traits emerge early in life and guide be- them to select environments that promote the develop-
havior, and they are genetically influenced and part of ment of these attitudes or directly by the genetic variance
one’s “fixed” disposition. According to temporal logic, in personality accounting for all of the genetic variance
the construct that develops first should guide the devel- in political attitudes (e.g., Mondak et al. 2010). However,
opment of the constructs that develop afterward. This these assumptions were never explicitly tested.
has reinforced previous assumptions that the early devel- In Figure 1 we summarize the assumed casual path-
opment of personality traits leads to the development of way and alternative relationships between personality
political preferences in a causal manner. traits and political attitudes. The assumed causality hy-
Recent findings regarding the development of politi- pothesis would follow the pathways in the left panel of
cal attitudes have begun to challenge this assumed causal Figure 1: biological factors are the primary contributors
PERSONALITY TRAITS AND POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES 37

FIGURE 1 Theoretical Models Underlying Two Hypothesized Relationships

between Personality Traits and Political Attitudes and Behaviors

The Assumed Causality Model The Common Cause Model

Biological Factors Biological Factors

Personality Environmental Political

Traits Factors Personality
Attitudes and
Traits
Behaviors

Person x
Environment
Interactions Environmental
Factors
A C B

Political Attitudes and Behaviors

Note: The left panel was re-created from recent explorations of personality and political attitudes (see Mondak
et al. 2010 for a similar figure).

to an individual’s personality, and an individual’s per- So far this has also not been the case at all. Rather, as
sonality then either directly causes them to develop their depicted in the right panel of Figure 1, Verhulst, Hatemi,
political attitudes (pathway A), motivates them to select and Martin (2010) expanded on the earlier formulations
into a specific environment which then shapes their atti- by Eaves and Eysenck (1974) and found that the vast ma-
tudes (pathway B), or interacts with the environment to jority of the covariance between personality traits and
produce their attitudes (pathway C). attitudes was a function of a shared latent genetic fac-
Complete mediation (pathway A) would be entirely tor, and the majority of genetic variance within attitudes
plausible if all of the genetic variance in attitudes is ac- was not explained by the genetic variance on personality
counted for by the genetic variance in personality traits. traits.
That is, if the genetic component of personality traits The fact that both personality traits and political at-
directly causes people to develop political attitudes, we titudes have nontrivial genetic components and that the
would expect the genetic variance in personality to ac- genetic variance in attitudes remains largely independent
count for the majority of the genetic variance in political suggests an alternative hypothesis: a latent genetic trait
attitudes. Alternatively, if political attitudes were over- mutually influences both personality and attitudes. This
whelmingly environmental and had virtually no genetic view is more consistent with a modern understanding
component, genetic factors would promote the develop- of genetics: there are no specific genes for a given po-
ment of personality traits, which in turn would motivate litical attitude or personality trait. Genes encode protein
individuals to select into environments (pathway B). On messengers that execute a series of physiological processes
the other hand, if the genetic component of an individ- culminating in behaviors, personality traits, and attitudes
ual’s personality moderates the impact of the environ-
ment (pathway C) on the development of either liberal interactions, if the latent genetic component interacts with the
or conservative political attitudes, we would expect the common environment, the additive genetic component will be in-
majority of the shared variance between personality traits flated. Alternatively, if the latent genetic component interacts with
the common environment, the unique environmental component
and attitudes to be shared at the environmental level.1
will be inflated. In general, personality traits have little common
environmental variance (Bouchard and McGue 2003); thus, gene-
1
Selection into an environment is called gene-environment co- environment interactions would inflate estimates of the unique en-
variation. If the latent genetic component is correlated with the vironmental component. See Keller, Medland, and Duncan (2009)
shared (unique) environment, estimates of the shared (unique) en- for a detailed explanation of biases in the twin model under nonzero
vironmental component will be inflated. As for gene-environment gene-environment interactions and correlations.
38 BRAD VERHULST, LINDON J. EAVES, AND PETER K. HATEMI

in conjunction with environmental stimuli. Thus, the knowledged that both “constructs and theories should be
same set of genes may result in myriad distinct behav- seen, not as mutually contradictory, but as complemen-
ioral phenotypes, two of which are political attitudes and tary and mutually supportive” (1984, 336). Both theories
personality traits. In genetics, this is called pleiotropy (see include Extraversion and Neuroticism as core traits and
Carey 2003). This common cause model—pleiotropy—is define them in a virtually equivalent manner. The theories
depicted in the right panel of Figure 1. According to this differ in that Eysenck’s “Big 3” amalgamates the remaining
hypothesis, the relationship between personality traits variability of personality into Psychoticism and subscales
and political attitudes is not causal in nature. Specifi- such as Social Desirability, whereas the FFM segregates
cally, if the majority of the covariance between personality the remaining variability into three separate core person-
and political orientations is the result of shared genetic ality traits: Openness to Experience, Agreeableness, and
variance, but the majority of genetic variance in political Conscientiousness (Eysenck 1992; Goldberg and Roso-
attitudes is unique, then the blanket assumption that per- lack 1992; McRae and Costa 1985).
sonality is driving political orientations is untenable. In Eysenck’s Psychoticism measure was poorly labeled.
such a case, a latent genetic variable would be a common Hence, going forward, we use the less pejorative, abbrevi-
cause of both personality traits and political attitudes, ated label P, which was also adopted by Eysenck. Having
leaving the resulting relationship between the two traits a high Psychoticism score is not a diagnosis of being clini-
a function of genetic covariation and not causation. To cally psychotic or psychopathic. Rather, P is positively cor-
discriminate between these alternatives, we conduct a se- related with tough-mindedness, risk-taking, sensation-
ries of genetic analyses using a very large twin dataset that seeking, impulsivity, and authoritarianism (Adorno et al.
contained both personality and attitudinal items. 1950; Altemeyer 1996; Eysenck and Eysenck 1985, Mc-
Court et al. 1999). In social situations, those who score
high on P are more uncooperative, hostile, troublesome,
and socially withdrawn, but lack feelings of inferiority and
Data, Methods, and Results have an absence of anxiety. At the extremes, those scoring
high on P are manipulative, tough-minded, and practical
Respondents. The sample is derived from the Mid At- (Eysenck 1954). By contrast, people low on P are more
lantic Twin Registry (MATR) based on a survey conducted likely to be more altruistic, well socialized, empathic, and
in the late 1980s, dubbed the Virginia 30,000. Approxi- conventional (Eysenck and Eysenck 1985; Howarth 1986).
mately 40% of the sample was recruited from the larger As such, we expect higher P scores to be related to more
Virginia area, and the remaining were solicited through a conservative political attitudes, particularly for militarism
national AARP mailer. At the time, both groups favored and social conservatism.
slightly more conservative political attitudes. The sample Eysenck’s P has a complex relationship to the FFM.
contains 28,877 individuals who are all familial relatives Specifically, the Openness to Experience dimension,
of the core population of roughly 12,000 twins. For more which has received the majority of the attention within
detail on the sample structure, ascertainment, and ques- personality and politics studies, is not well captured by
tionnaire, see Eaves et al. (1999). Eysenck’s taxonomy (McCrae 1987; McCrae and Costa
1985). While P predicts conservative political attitudes
Personality Traits. There is no general agreement on in a similar manner as Openness predicts liberal political
the “best” way to measure personality; however, the Five- attitudes (Eysenck 1954; McCrae 1995), and limited ev-
Factor Model (FFM) has arguably become the most pop- idence finds P moderately negatively correlated with the
ular. In this article, we focus on an older, but equally valid greater Openness to Experience dimension (Eysenck and
measure of personality, the Eysenck Personality Ques- Eysenck 1985; Larstone et al. 2002), P also correlates pos-
tionnaire (EPQ Eysenck and Eysenck 1985, 1991). The itively with certain subfacets of Openness, such as creativ-
underlying theory for the FFM is lexical, whereas the un- ity and originality (Eysenck and Eysenck 1985; Rawlings
derlying theory for EPQ is biological and pathological. et al. 1998). Furthermore, P is negatively correlated with
However, both are highly related in their measurement Conscientiousness (McCrae and Costa 1985; Zuckerman
and are composed of similar constructs (Avia et al. 1995; et al. 1993), even though both traits correlate positively
Costa and McRae 1995b; Saggino 2000). Debates about with political conservatism (Carney et al. 2008; Verhulst,
the “best” measure of personality obscure the fact that the Hatemi, and Martin 2010). The remaining relationship,
FFM and Eysenck’s theories were in great agreement re- P being negatively correlated to Agreeableness, is perhaps
garding human personality structure. Indeed, regarding the least complex, as measures of Agreeableness are part
Cattell’s (1957) theory of personality, which is regarded of the measure of P with regard to tough-mindedness and
as the foundation for modern FFM theories, Eysenck ac- being uncooperative.
PERSONALITY TRAITS AND POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES 39

Finally, the Social Desirability scale measures the ten- cial Desirability) and three political ideology factors (an
dency to overestimate one’s perceived positive character- economic, a social, and a military/defense dimension).
istics and underestimate perceived negative ones. High The specific items and factor loadings are banished to
scores indicate a propensity for social acquiescence and online Appendix 2. In general, our CFA model fits the
conformity, or a lack of self-insight (Francis, Brown, and data well. The root mean square error of approximation
Pearson 1991). The conformity component is related to (RMSEA) of 0.045 suggests that our model accurately
individual self-presentation concerns, while the second captures the intricacies of the data despite the fact that
component captures an overestimation of desirable but the model is very complex and the sample size is very
unlikely behaviors and an underestimation of undesirable large.
but likely behaviors. Social Desirability has only sparingly
been explored as it relates to ideological orientations.
This is likely due, in part, to its having a more complex
structure than other traits and its inherent contextual
component. Analyses. We present our analyses in four stages. First,
While Eysenck’s measures have been used less fre- we estimate the correlations between the latent personal-
quently than the FFM in the last decade, there are some ity traits and the ideological dimensions using the latent
unique benefits of using the EPQ. There is a wealth of factor correlations estimated in the CFA model to identify
both psychological and behavior genetic work on the the moderate to strong phenotypic relationships between
EPQ (Bouchard et al. 1990; Eysenck and Eysenck 1985). personality traits and political attitudes. Next, we use a
And, the EPQ is relatively untainted by explicitly political maximum likelihood-based structural equation model to
items—as is the case with several facets of the FFM. For partition the variance into additive genetic, common en-
example, Costa and McCrae’s (1995a) FFM was originally vironment, and unique environmental variance (Neale
designed to include a political values dimension and in- and Cardon 1992). Then, we use a multivariate genetic
cludes politically charged questions such as “I don’t take model (Cholesky decomposition) to identify the mag-
civic duties like voting very seriously,” “I believe that laws nitude of shared genetic or environmental covariation
and social policies should change to reflect the needs of a between the personality traits and the ideological dimen-
changing world,” or “I believe that the ‘new morality’ of sions. The Cholesky decomposition is a completely sat-
permissiveness is no morality at all.” urated model that serves two separate purposes. First, it
identifies the level on which personality traits and politi-
Measuring Political Attitudes. Consistent with our
cal attitudes covary. Second, it serves as a baseline model
conceptualization of ideology as a set of interrelated atti-
that can be used in hypothesis testing for more parsimo-
tudes, we specified a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA)
nious models. Finally, we conduct a direction of causation
to capture three latent attitudinal dimensions from a
(DoC) analysis to explicitly test whether the covariance
Wilson-Patterson (1968) inventory: social attitudes (e.g.,
between the personality traits and the political attitudes
Gay Rights, Abortion), economic attitudes (e.g., For-
is best captured by a model where personality traits cause
eign Aid, Federal Housing), and defense/military atti-
political attitudes, where political attitudes cause person-
tudes (e.g., The Draft, Military Drill; see online Appendix
ality traits, where reciprocal causation between the two
1), with higher scores indicating the more conservative re-
constructs exists, or where a correlational relationship
sponse. These dimensions loosely reflect the classic social,
provides the best fit to the data.
fiscal, and foreign policy ideological dimensions of the
We restrict our analyses to the substantively mean-
American electorate (Converse 1964; Conover and Feld-
ingful relationships identified in the previous stages. This
man 1981, 1984; McClosky and Zaller 1982). As political
stage of the analysis uses only the 2,665 pairs of monozy-
ideology has a multifaceted structure that can be obscured
gotic (MZ) twins and 3,083 pairs of dizygotic (DZ) twins,
by focusing on a unitary Left-Right dimension (Treier and
with the knowledge that more extensive extended kinship
Hillygus 2009), this measurement strategy allows us to ex-
models have provided similar estimates to twin-only de-
amine the specific ideological subfactors rather than over-
signs with regard to political attitudes (Eaves and Hatemi
whelm the reader with the relationship between the per-
2008; Hatemi et al. 2010) and personality traits (Eaves
sonality traits and all of the individual political attitudes.
et al. 1999). Due to known sex differences in both vari-
ance components models (Hatemi, Medland, and Eaves
Confirmatory Factor Analysis Model Fit Indices. A 2009) and phenotypic assessments (Shapiro and Mahajan
CFA was used to estimate seven latent factors: four per- 1986) for political attitudes, we estimate models for males
sonality factors (P, Extraversion, Neuroticism, and So- and females separately.
40 BRAD VERHULST, LINDON J. EAVES, AND PETER K. HATEMI

TABLE 1 Correlations between Personality Variables and Political Attitudes for Females and Males
Neuroticism P Extraversion Social Desirability
Females Military 0.101 0.302 −0.069 −0.074
Social −0.016 0.383 0.136 −0.335
Economic −0.242 −0.142 0.074 −0.205
Males Military 0.141 0.388 −0.070 −0.062
Social −0.050 0.292 0.095 −0.255
Economic −0.239 −0.253 0.080 −0.143
Note: The boldfaced correlations are those large enough for further consideration. Correlations are taken from the full structural model
with all twins and relatives (N = 28,877). Respondents were excluded if they had a nonresponse rate of 20% or higher.

Correlations between Personality Traits or more “liberal” economic policies rather than “liberal”
and Ideological Dimensions social policies.2
There is also a substantively interesting relationship
The correlations between the latent personality traits and between Social Desirability and social ideology, which is
ideological dimensions are presented in Table 1. It is im- larger for females (r females = −0.335; r males = −0.255).
portant to note that there are only a few substantively This facet of personality is highly context dependent,
significant correlations. Based on the inherent difficultly and therefore we can only speculate on this relationship,
in reliably disentangling variance components if the phe- though our results are consistent with other conceptually
notypic relationship between traits is small, we pursue similar findings. During the same time period in nation-
the connection between personality traits and ideological ally representative samples, in several other attitude do-
dimensions if the effect size is in the medium to large mains, liberal responses were also seen as more socially
range for both sexes (if the correlation for both sexes is desirable (Kinder and Sears 1981). Thus, it appears that
above 0.20; Cohen 1988). people who are motivated to present themselves in a so-
There are several correlations that merit further at- cially desirable light also present themselves as socially
tention. First, in line with our expectations, higher P liberal. This is only the second study we are aware of
scores correlate with more conservative military atti- to explore the relationship between any ideological di-
tudes and more socially conservative beliefs for both fe- mension and social desirability, yet the findings replicate
males and males. For males, the relationship between the Verhulst, Hatemi, and Martin (2010) study on an
P and military attitudes (r = 0.388) is larger than Australian population.
the relationship between P and social attitudes (r = The analysis above extends the existing personal-
0.292). Alternatively, for females, social attitudes correlate ity and politics literature in several important ways. In
more highly with P (r = 0.383) than military attitudes line with our expectations, P (positively related to tough-
(r = 0.302). mindedness and authoritarianism) is associated with so-
Further, we find a negative relationship between Neu- cial conservatism and conservative military attitudes. In-
roticism and economic conservatism (r females = −0.242, triguingly, the strength of the relationship between P and
r males = −0.239). People higher in Neuroticism tend to political ideology differs across sexes. P’s link with so-
be more economically liberal. What is intriguing about cial conservatism is stronger for females while its link
this relationship is that it is in the opposite direction of with military attitudes is stronger for males. We also find
what past theories would predict (Fromm 1947; Wilson individuals higher in Neuroticism are more likely to be
1973), but consistent with more recent evidence (Gerber
et al. 2010; Van Hiel, Pandelaere, and Duriez 2004; Ver- 2
Evidence from the authoritarianism literature suggests that so-
hulst, Hatemi, and Martin 2010). That is, neurotic people cial threats activate latent authoritarian predispositions, resulting
in more conservative behaviors and preferences in those high in
are more likely to support public policies that provide authoritarianism when they are threatened (Duckitt 1989; Stenner
aid to the economically disadvantaged (public housing, 2005). The person-situation interaction cannot be tested with our
foreign aid, immigration, etc). Moreover, Neuroticism is data. However, our findings are not necessarily inconsistent with
unrelated to social ideology (r female = −0.016, r male = this expectation as they suggest an interaction between a person
and his or her immediate environment. Specifically, filling out a
−0.050). This finding suggests that neurotic individuals survey is unlikely to create the levels of anxiety necessary to activate
cope with their anxiety by supporting a “social safety net” any latent predisposition.
PERSONALITY TRAITS AND POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES 41

TABLE 2 Univariate Variance Components Analyses for Personality Traits and Ideological
Dimensions
Males Females

a2 c2 e2 a2 c2 e2
P 0.379 0.094 0.527 0.395 0.102 0.503
(0.21, 0.52) (0.00, 0.24) (0.48, 0.58) (0.28, 0.51) (0.00, 0.20) (0.47, 0.54)
Extraversion 0.455 0.000 0.545 0.512 0.000 0.488
(0.35, 0.50) (0.00, 0.09) (0.50, 0.60) (0.48, 0.54) (0.00, 0.02) (0.46, 0.52)
Neuroticism 0.377 0.000 0.623 0.366 0.008 0.550
(0.22, 0.43) (0.00, 0.133) (0.57, 0.68) (0.25, 0.48) (0.00, 0.19) (0.52, 0.59)
Social Desirability 0.265 0.200 0.535 0.401 0.140 0.459
(0.09, 0.44) (0.04, 0.35) (0.49, 0.59) (0.29, 0.51) (0.04, 0.24) (0.43, 0.49)
Social 0.352 0.232 0.417 0.320 0.363 0.317
(0.21, 0.50) (0.10, 0.36) (0.38, 0.46) (0.24, 0.41) (0.28, 0.44) (0.30, 0.34)
Economic 0.322 0.228 0.450 0.401 0.167 0.432
(0.17, 0.48) (0.09, 0.36) (0.41, 0.50) (0.30, 0.51) (0.07, 0.26) (0.40, 0.46)
Military 0.443 0.031 0.526 0.302 0.082 0.616
(0.27, 0.52) (0.00, 0.18) (0.48, 0.58) (0.18, 0.42) (0.00, 0.19) (0.58, 0.65)
Notes: Maximum likelihood-based 95% confidence intervals are presented in parentheses. Italicized entries are not statistically significant
at conventional levels.

economically liberal. Furthermore, Neuroticism is com- components models were estimated in OpenMx (Boker
pletely unrelated to social ideology, which has been the et al. 2010) using a maximum-likelihood estimator. We
focus of many in the field. Finally, those higher in Social estimate the full model with all three components (ACE)
Desirability are also more likely to express socially liberal and allow the variance components to differ across the
attitudes. sexes. The model-fitting results are presented in online
Appendix 3.
Consistent with our expectations and nearly all other
Variance Components Analysis behavior genetic studies of personality traits, the best
model for Extraversion, Neuroticism, and P is one that
In the second stage of our analysis, we decompose the partitions the variance into additive genetic and unique
variance of the individual personality traits and ideolog- environment components for both sexes. The common
ical dimensions into three separate sources of variance: environment is not significant in any of these variables
additive genetic, common environment, and unique en- (Table 2). This reduced model is typically referred to as
vironment. The additive genetic factor (A) is the sum of an AE model, as the C parameter drops out of the model
the linear additive influence of all individual genes on due to a lack of statistical significance.
the dimensions. The common or shared environmental The only personality trait that deviates from this
factor (C) accounts for systematic attempts at socializa- trend is Social Desirability. Social Desirability is character-
tion, within-family similarity in environment, and com- ized by large genetic and unique environmental variance
mon social background (e.g., family income, neighbor- components; however, there is also a significant, though
hood, etc). The unique environment factor (E) represents more subtle, common environmental influence.
unique, random, idiosyncratic environment influences For political attitudes, the results are notably dif-
that are not shared by members of the same family (for ferent. For the social and economic dimensions, the
a detailed explanation of the methodology and theory, best-fitting model is the full model of additive genetic,
along with limitations and criticisms, see Medland and common environmental, and unique environmental
Hatemi 2009). influences (ACE). There are sizable additive genetic
The results of the variance components estimates components and substantial common environmental
for the individual personality traits and ideological di- components to the attitudes, suggesting that individual
mensions are presented in Table 2. All of the variance differences in these attitude constructs are a mixture of
42 BRAD VERHULST, LINDON J. EAVES, AND PETER K. HATEMI

genetic, shared, and unique environmental components. We first examine the relationship between P and the
In contrast, military attitudes display a pattern of trans- social ideology dimension. The standardized path coeffi-
mission similar to that of personality traits (AE), suggest- cients are presented in the top-left panel of Figure 2. As
ing that attitudes toward the military are a function of can be seen, the relationship between P and social ideol-
what is learned through unique environmental (nonfa- ogy is primarily a function of a common latent additive
milial) influences and genetic transmission, more so than genetic factor. Specifically, the path from A1 to social at-
any common environmental influences. titudes is significantly larger than the path from E1 to
social attitudes. Importantly, the vast majority of the ge-
netic variance in social ideology is not shared with P, as
Cholesky Decomposition can be seen by the large path coefficient from A2 to social
ideology. Accordingly, although the relationship between
The preceding steps lay the foundation for the exami- P and social ideology is primarily a function of a common
nation of the relationships between the specific variance additive genetic variance, the majority of the additive ge-
components of personality traits and political ideologies. netic variance in social ideology remains unaccounted for
Specifically, we seek to identify what part of the relation- after accounting for the covariance with P. Moreover, ap-
ship between personality and political attitude dimen- proximately two-thirds of the phenotypic correlation is a
sions are due to shared genes or shared environments and function of common genetic variance.
by doing so, gain insight into the potential for, or lack of, As can be seen in the top-right panel of Figure 2,
a causal relationship between the two constructs. a similar pattern of findings emerges for P and military
To explore this relationship, we utilize a common attitudes. There is a meaningful path between A1 and
multivariate genetic technique called the Cholesky de- military attitudes and a smaller path from E1 to military
composition.3 The Cholesky builds on the univariate ACE attitudes, suggesting the majority of the relationship be-
model by simultaneously decomposing the variance of tween the two dimensions is a function of additive genetic
multiple traits into additive genetic, common environ- variance shared between the two traits. Importantly, there
ment, and unique environment variances and explores are very strong residual paths from A2 and E2 to military
the amount of the relationship between the personality attitudes, again suggesting a large amount of indepen-
trait and the political attitude factor that can be accounted dence between the traits. Thus, approximately 60% of the
for by each level of variance. The bivariate Cholesky de- relationship between P and military attitudes is driven by
composition estimates six latent factors (A1 , C1 , and E1 , common genetic factors.
and A2 , C2 , and E2 ). The estimation procedure ensures The bottom-left panel of Figure 2 presents the anal-
that all variance in the personality trait as well as all of the ysis for Social Desirability and social ideology. In this
covariance between the personality trait and the political analysis, the paths from A1 and E1 to social ideology are
attitude dimension loads on the first factor (e.g., A1 , C1 , relatively small, suggesting the genetic and unique en-
or E1 ), and the residual variance in the political attitude vironmental influences are not significantly shared for
loads on the second factor (e.g., A2 , C2 , or E2 ). Thus, the these traits. Thus, the relationship between Social Desir-
cross-over pathways, A12 , C12 , or E12, determine the extent ability and social ideology seems to be primarily a func-
to which the correlation between the personality traits and tion of the common environmental variance shared be-
the political attitude is a function of common additive ge- tween these two traits. This is compatible with theoretical
netic variance, common shared environmental variance, implications of Social Desirability, as it is not generally
or common unique environmental variance. A relatively considered a core personality trait. This is an important
large coefficient for the crossover pathways would suggest finding, as it differs from any other result on personality
that the correlation between a personality trait and an at- and political preferences.
titude is primarily a function of additive genetic variance, Finally, the relationship between Neuroticism and
shared environmental, or unique environmental variance, economic ideology is very similar to the relationship for
respectively.4 P and ideological dimensions. The A1 cross-path is sub-
3
The Cholesky decomposition is a saturated model and can be stantively meaningful while the E1 cross-path is not, sug-
mathematically transformed in a number of different ways that gesting that the relationship between Neuroticism and
may be easier to interpret for some readers. Two transformations economic liberalism is primarily a function of shared
are presented in online Appendix 4: the proportion of variance
accounted for by genetic and environmental components and the genetic variance, with approximately two-thirds of the
genetic and environmental correlations.
4
For multivariate Cholesky decompositions, the ordering of items concern for bivariate analyses, as the model fit and covariance are
can be important (Loehlin 1996). The order of variables is less of a equivalent regardless.
PERSONALITY TRAITS AND POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES 43

FIGURE 2 Cholesky Decompositions for the Moderate and Strong Relationships between
Personality Traits and Attitudes

A1 E1 A1 E1 A1 E1 A1 E1

18 68 63 28 52 67
69 69
20 69 53 24 53 74
70 71
3 72 46
72 45 33
71 71

P Social P Military
Ideology Attitudes

Proporon of the Correlaon shared by Proporon of the Correlaon shared by

Correlaon A C E Correlaon A C E
Males .36 .64 .36 Males .52 .62 .38
Females .46 .69 .31 Females .40 .59 .41

A1 C1 E1 A1 C1 E1 A1 E1 A1 E1

11 65 24 65 13 68 65
54 62
11 51 45 15 71
27 57 63
63 42 68
73 40 79 33
14
37 27
68 24 73

Social Social Neuroticism Economic

Desirability Ideology Ideology

Proporon of the Correlaon shared by Proporon of the Correlaon shared by

Correlaon A C E Correlaon A C E
Males -.27 .29 .42 .29 Males -.31 .66 .34
Females -.37 .41 .40 .19 Females -.29 .63 .37

Note: To simplify the path diagrams, models are presented for one twin only, with the standard CTD assumptions. The coefficients
presented in the path diagram are standardized coefficients and the coefficients for females are in bold. An ns indicates that the path
is not significant. Variances of the latent variables are constrained to unity. The embedded tables indicate the phenotypic correlations
and the proportions of the correlation that are accounted for by the additive genetic (A), common (C), and unique environmental (E)
variance components, respectively.

correlation being a function of additive genetic covari- the environment is moderating the impact of personality
ance in both sexes. Again, the loadings of A2 and E2 to on their political attitudes (pathway C), as these path-
economic ideology are strong and consistent for both ways imply that the predominant source of covariance
males and females, suggesting that the constructs are sub- between personality and attitudes would be localized in
stantively distinct. the environmental variance components.
Overall, the Cholesky decompositions provide sev- The results so far suggest that the relationship be-
eral important insights into the broad understanding of tween personality traits and political attitudes is more
the relationship between personality traits and political likely a function of a common set of genes shared between
attitudes. First, the vast majority of genetic variance in po- the personality traits and the political attitudes (depicted
litical attitudes is not accounted for by the covariance with in the right panel of Figure 1). These results imply that
the personality dimensions, underscoring the distinctive- the current understanding of the relationship between
ness between the constructs. This suggests pathway A in personality and political attitudes needs revision. Strictly
Figure 1 is unlikely to be true. Second, because the major- speaking, however, the Cholesky decomposition does not
ity of the relationship between attitudes and personality is test causation. Rather, the Cholesky decomposition is a
localized in the additive genetic variance component, it is fully saturated model and cannot disentangle whether the
also unlikely that people are selecting into environments phenotypic relationship between the personality traits
based on their personality which subsequently foster the and the political attitudes is causal or what direction
development of political attitudes (pathway B) or that that causality flows, should it be present. It remains
44 BRAD VERHULST, LINDON J. EAVES, AND PETER K. HATEMI

possible, though implausible, that personality traits could DoC model compares the cross-twin cross-trait covari-
cause people to develop political attitudes, even though ance with the two products of the cross-twin within-
the variance between the personality traits and the so- trait covariance with the within-person cross-trait. If
cial attitudes was primarily shared at the additive genetic the pattern of cross-twin cross-trait covariance mimics
level. To examine the causal structure that exists between the product of cross-twin personality covariance and the
personality traits and political attitudes, therefore, we es- within-person personality and attitudes covariance, then
timate a direction of causation (DoC) model. the best-fitting model will suggest that personality causes
people to develop their political attitudes. If the cross-
twin cross-trait covariance corresponds with the product
The Direction of Causation Model of cross-twin attitudes covariance and the within-person
The final analyses explicitly test the possibility of causal personality and attitudes covariance, then the best-fitting
relationships between the personality traits and politi- model will suggest that attitudes cause people to develop
cal attitudes. The DoC model explores the four scenarios their personality. If both products correspond with the
which may underlie the association between personality cross-twin cross-trait covariance, causality cannot be de-
traits and political attitudes. The first possibility is the uni- termined, suggesting a correlation rather than causation
directional causal model where the variation in personal- (Heath et al. 1993). As such, the DoC model has the most
ity traits drives the variation in political attitudes. This is power to detect causality when the pattern of phenotypic
what is implied by the causality assumption. The second transmission is clearly distinct and becomes more diffi-
possibility points the causal arrow in exactly the opposite cult as the pattern of transmission becomes more similar.
direction: the set of genes that influence variation in po- Figure 3 presents the best-fitting DoC models for
litical attitudes in turn leads to variation in personality each of the relationships discussed above, with the com-
traits. The third possibility is reciprocal causation, where plete model-fitting results presented in Table 3. As can be
personality traits and political attitudes have a nonrecur- seen in Figure 3, the model that best captures the covari-
sive causal structure. The final possibility is pleiotropy or ance structure of the data for both P and social ideology
a common set of genes that influences both personality and Neuroticism and economic ideology is the reverse
traits and political attitudes. This is essentially what is causation model where the political attitude causes the
suggested by the Cholesky results presented above (Neale personality trait. Thus, in direct contrast with the exist-
and Cardon 1992). To evaluate the models, we compare ing assumption regarding the causal ordering of political
the model fit of the two unidirectional DoC models and attitudes and personality traits, across two completely in-
the reciprocal causation model against the fully saturated dependent analyses, the causal ordering appears to be the
Cholesky models. To satisfy both the explanatory and complete opposite of what is typically assumed.
parsimony criteria, each DoC model is compared with The relationship between Social Desirability and so-
the saturated Cholesky using a Likelihood Ratio test. Ac- cial ideology is more complex. In this case, the best-fitting
cordingly, the model that fits the data best is the model model is the reciprocal causation model with a nega-
where the exclusion of an additional parameter does not tive feedback loop. Because the phenotypic correlation is
decrease the overall fit of the model (and therefore does negative, the product of the two pathways must also be
not fit the data worse than the saturated model). negative, which is precisely what we find. Here, socially
To determine which causal direction best fits the liberal attitudes causally result in more social desirability
data, the DoC model leverages the genetic relatedness of responses, as can be seen with the strong negative causal
individuals within the same family to parse the causal pathway. This strong negative causal effect is dampened by
structure between personality traits and political atti- a weaker, though significant, positive causal effect flowing
tudes by utilizing the cross-twin cross-trait covariance in the opposite direction.
to determine the causal direction.5 Mathematically, the The DoC analysis for the relationship between P and
military attitudes supports a correlational, not causal, re-
5
To identify the model, it must be specified in terms of phenotypic lationship. Specifically, because both constructs have an
causality. Thus, strictly speaking, we cannot directly test whether AE structure, the reciprocal causality DoC model and the
the genetic components of personality traits cause the genetic com-
ponents of the political attitudes, or vice versa, but rather whether
Cholesky have the same degrees of freedom, and the DoC
personality traits at the phenotypic level cause political attitudes at model is unable to accurately estimate a reciprocal causa-
the phenotypic level or the reverse. Because the previous analyses tion model. In this case, both of the unidirectional models
suggest that relationships between the personality traits and the fit the data significantly worse than the Cholesky. There-
political attitudes are primarily a function of additive genetic vari-
ance, it is reasonable to suggest that what causality may be found fore, the model that most accurately fits the data is one
is primarily a function of additive genetic variance as well. with a common latent additive genetic factor accounting
PERSONALITY TRAITS AND POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES 45

FIGURE 3 Best-Fitting Direction of Causation Models for the Moderate and Strong Relationships
between Personality Traits and Attitudes

A1 C1 E1 A2 C2 E2 A1 E1 A2 E2

.56 .32 .73 .66 .37 .65 .70 .28

.52 .66
.61 .19 .72 .56 .59 .58 .71 .24
.53 .74

.72 .46
.71 .33

P .37 .50
Social P Military
Ideology Attitudes

A1 C1 E1 A2 C2 E2 A1 C1 E1 A2 C2 E2

.58 .30 .75 .67 .45 .69 .57 .00 .80 .55 .49 .67

.58 .31 .72 .60 .61 .59 .61 .22 .74 .63 .40 .66

.35 .25
Social Social Neuroticism -.31 -.29
Economic
Desirability -.64 -.68 Ideology Ideology

Note: The path diagrams are for the best-fitting models. To simplify the path diagrams, models are presented for one twin only, with
the standard CTD assumptions. The coefficients presented in the path diagram are standardized coefficients, and the coefficients for
females are in bold. An ns indicates that the path is not significant at the 95% level.

for the relationship between the two constructs. In other from any personality theory (Bouchard et al. 1990). Thus,
words, it is more plausible that the relationship between it seems reasonable that the pattern of genetic and envi-
P and military attitudes is indicative of a common causal ronmental relationships between political attitudes and
mechanism, or pleiotropy, rather than a sequential chain other personality traits will likely mimic the relationships
of causality. presented here.
The final criticism of the current analyses is that all
the traits we have utilized have some level of measure-
Limitations ment error and if the errors in measurement are larger in
One potential criticism is the focus on Eysenck’s per- one variable, the results may be biased (as is the case with
sonality traits, instead of the more common Five-Factor measurement error in predictor variable in an ordinary
Model. Eysenck’s personality theory, however, has been least squares regression). In the DoC model, the causal
examined in tandem with a variety of other personality pathway from the variable with more measurement er-
theories, and the relationships between Eysenck’s con- ror to the variable with less measurement error will be
structs and the core constructs of the Five-Factor Model of attenuated. We have attempted to minimize the impact
personality is well established (Eysenck 1992). Eysenck’s of measurement error on our results by using confirma-
Neuroticism and Extraversion are effectively the same as tory factor analysis to predict factor scores rather than
those in the FFM, while P is a complex combination of constructing simple additive scales or individual items.
the remaining three FFM personality traits. More im- Although the use of factor scores minimizes errors in
portantly, the transmission of Eysenck’s core personality measurement, it does not negate the problem of mea-
traits is essentially the same as nearly all other constructs surement error entirely.
46 BRAD VERHULST, LINDON J. EAVES, AND PETER K. HATEMI

TABLE 3 Direction of Causation Model-Fitting Results

Males Females

Estimated LR Test LR Test

Model Parameters Statistic df Probability Statistic df Probability
P and Social Atts Cholesky 11 – – – – – –
Reciprocal Causation 10 1.14 1 0.29 0 1 0.94
Personality Causes Attitudes 9 13.06 2 0 104.76 2 0
Attitudes Cause Personality 9 2.97 2 0.23 0.15 2 0.93

P and Military Cholesky 11 – – – – – –

Attitudesaa Personality Causes Attitudes 9 20.34 2 0 13.04 2 0
Attitudes Cause Personality 9 21.26 2 0 49.86 2 0

Social Cholesky 11 – – – – – –
Desirability Reciprocal Causation 10 1.64 1 0.2 1.91 1 0.17
and Social Personality Causes Attitudes 9 19.64 2 0 126.39 2 0
Attitudes Attitudes Cause Personality 9 9.87 2 0.01 37.49 2 0

Neuroticism and Cholesky 11 – – – – – –

Economic Reciprocal Causation 10 1.82 1 0.18 1.06 1 0.3
Attitudes Personality Causes Attitudes 9 25.24 2 0 21.02 2 0
Attitudes Cause Personality 9 3.79 2 0.15 3.74 2 0.15
Note: The best models are presented in bold. LR test denotes the likelihood ratio test, df indicate degrees of freedom, and probability
is the probability of improved model fit as a function of the inclusion of an additional parameter. a The reciprocal causation model has
psychoticism and military attitudes as fatal identification issues because both variables have AE modes of transmission. This results in the
reciprocal causation model having the same number of estimated parameters as the Cholesky.

Discussion cal attitude dimensions, but expands on the literature

by grouping the individual attitudes into ideological di-
Although the causal relationship between personality and mensions which roughly reflect those established in the
political ideology has been assumed by many, and the literature. Although the common environment was gen-
heritability of both personality traits and political orien- erally unimportant for personality traits, it did account
tations has been established, to our knowledge this is the for a significant amount of variance in the social and
first attempt to systematically examine the casual relation- economic ideological dimensions.
ship between the genetic influences on political ideology These analyses provide the backdrop for the more
and personality traits as we have done here. pivotal third and fourth sets of analyses: the examination
In the first stage of our analysis, we demonstrated of the relationship between personality traits and political
that there are several substantively significant relation- attitudes. These analyses show that the majority of covari-
ships between the personality traits and political ideology ance between personality and attitudes was due to shared
dimensions. Most notably, P is substantially correlated genetic variance, while the relationship between the id-
with conservative military and social attitudes, while So- iosyncratic environmental components of politics and
cial Desirability is related to liberal social attitudes, and personality was notably smaller. Furthermore, the major-
Neuroticism is related to liberal economic attitudes. Our ity of genetic influence on attitudes was not explained by
findings at the phenotypic level are highly consistent the genetic influence on personality traits. In total, the
with similar explorations in an Australian population Cholesky analyses validate the possibility of an alterna-
(Verhulst, Hatemi, and Martin 2010). tive relationship between personality traits and political
The second stage of our analyses replicates the find- attitudes, whereby a latent common genetic factor drives
ings of substantial genetic and unique environmental the development of both personality traits and political
influence on personality traits as well as the ideologi- attitudes.
PERSONALITY TRAITS AND POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES 47

The fourth and final analysis explicitly tests the di- ness has been described as the readiness to re-examine
rection of the causal arrows. In two situations, the causal traditional social, religious, and political values (Moutafi,
arrow flows from political attitudes to personality traits, Furnham, and Crump 2006; Zimprich, Allemand, and
contrary to the assumed causal hypothesis. In another, Dellenbach 2009). That is, personality psychologists con-
there is reciprocal causation with the dominant arrow sider political values part of one’s personality, and not
again flowing from attitudes to personality. In the last sit- independent constructs. However, this understanding is
uation, the relationship is correlational. In no case does often missing in the current literature. This might be due
the data support that the direction of causation (DoC) in part to the use of abbreviated scales. The values di-
flows from personality traits to political attitudes. mension in the original 244-item NEO-PI-R explicitly
These findings directly challenge the causal pathway measures political values (McRae and Costa 1987). Due
assumed in the extant literature (e.g., Gerber et al. 2010; to the length of the scale and copyrights placed on it,
Mondak et al. 2010). Rather than personality traits other personality psychologists have reduced the factors
causing people to develop liberal or conservative political into scales that do not include all the subfactors theorized
attitudes, the current results suggest two alternative by McCrae and Costa. However, the reduced measures
relationships. First, the combined Cholesky and DoC of Openness were designed to capture the variance in
analyses suggest that a common set of genes mutually the original Openness super-factor, which contained the
influences personality traits and political attitudes, explicit political values subdimension. As such, because
implying the relationship between personality and political values are viewed as a subcomponent of Open-
politics is a function of an innate common genetic factor ness and not as an independent factor, political attitudes
rather than a sequential personality to politics model (see should be viewed as part and parcel of the same latent
the right panel of Figure 1). The results from the DoC construct. From this perspective, when it comes to Open-
analysis also suggest an alternative causal model. That is, ness predicting political attitudes, researchers have been
the latent set of genes shared between political attitudes not only comparing apples to apples, but predicting an
and personality traits directly influences attitudes and apple with the same apple.
indirectly influences personality traits. In other words, We believe that while ideological and attitudinal di-
the genetic component of political attitudes partially mensions are correlated with personality traits and share
mediates the genetic influence on personality traits. This certain elements, the two constructs are also conceptually
finding is completely opposite from the basic assumption and statistically distinct. The correlations between the
in the most recent literature (e.g., Gerber et al. 2010; items within the ideological or trait dimensions are much
Mondak et al. 2010). Thus, it appears the genetic higher than the correlations between the items across the
component of political attitudes measured relatively later dimensions. Furthermore, the majority of the variance on
in an individual’s life contributes to the development of every level was not shared between the personality traits
an individual’s personality along the way. In this view, and the political attitudes (the residual variance compo-
attitudes are more than what is expressed in adulthood, nents in Figures 2 and 3 were very large), suggesting that
but part of one’s disposition which guides behavior and each construct is unique. Thus, the two constructs are
selection into environments, which later are recognized undeniably related, but not necessarily in the assumed
and measured as attitudes in adulthood. Regardless causal manner. Rather, what is shared between person-
of whether the final analysis supports a latent genetic ality traits and attitudes is most likely due to a common
source of covariance or a mutual causal structure, both underlying genetic influence.
perspectives require a major revision to the prevailing as- Based on the current results, the claim that personal-
sumptions about political attitudes and personality traits. ity traits lead to political orientations should no longer be
assumed, but explicitly tested for each personality and
political trait prior to making any claims about their
Implications relationship. We recognize that no single analysis can
provide a definitive answer to such a complex question,
Personality psychologists have long held the view that and our analysis did not include the Agreeableness, Con-
political attitudes are part of a person’s personality. The scientiousness, and Openness Five-Factor Model mea-
Openness dimension of the Five-Factor Model was ex- sures. Future studies which use different personality mea-
plicitly designed to include a values dimension to capture sures, or other methodological designs, including panel
moral beliefs and include attitudinal content that resem- studies that examine the developmental trajectories of
bles political conservatism (Costa and McCrae 1995a; Van personality and attitudes from childhood to adulthood,
Heil, Kossowska, and Mervielde 2000). This part of Open- would be invaluable for investigating more nuanced
48 BRAD VERHULST, LINDON J. EAVES, AND PETER K. HATEMI

relationships between personality traits and political at- Timothy Brick, and Michael Spiegel. 2010. OpenMx: The
titudes. These would also include models which capture OpenMx Statistical Modeling Package. R package version
1.0.3.
the nonrandom selection into environments that foster
the development of more liberal or conservative political Bouchard, Thomas J., Jr, David T. Lykken, Matthew McGue,
Nancy L. Segal, and Auke Tellegen. 1990. “Sources of Human
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Buss, David M. 1999. “Human Nature and Individual Differ-
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Campbell, Angus, Philip E. Converse, Warren E. Miller, and
Researchers in personality and politics have assumed Donald E. Stokes. 1960. The American Voter. New York: John
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minants, Dynamics and Potentials. Cambridge: Cambridge
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PERSONALITY TRAITS AND POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES 51

Zuckerman, Marvin, D. Michael Kuhlman, Jeffrey Joireman, Table A1: Tests of Model Fit
Paul Teta, and Michael Kraft. 1993. “A Comparison of Three Table A2: Confirmatory Factor Analysis for Eysenck
Structural Models for Personality: The Big Three, the Big
Personality Traits
Five, and the Alternative Five.” Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology 65(4): 757–68. Table A3: Standardized Factor Loadings for the Di-
mensions of Political Ideology
Table A4: Univariate Variance Components Model-
Supporting Information Fitting Results for Personality Traits
Table A5: Univariate Variance Components Model-
Additional Supporting Information may be found in the Fitting Results for the Ideological Dimensions
online version of this article:
Please note: Wiley-Blackwell is not responsible for the
Online Appendix 1: Wilson-Patterson Attitude In- content or functionality of any supporting materials sup-
ventory plied by the authors. Any queries (other than missing
Online Appendix 2: Confirmatory Factor Analysis material) should be directed to the corresponding author
Online Appendix 3: Univariate Model-Fitting Re- for the article.
sults