Personality correlates of sociopolitical attitudes in the Big Five and Eysenckian models

Contemporary accounts of the psychological correlates of political differences tend to characterize those on the left as typically more disinhibited and willing to violate social conventions, and those on the right as more restrained and obedient to social norms and dictates. This contrasts with an account present in some previous theoretical work which suggested that those on the right (especially authoritarians) were hostile individuals with destructive impulses. A series of four recent papers by a single research team used very large samples to claim support for this latter conception. We present support for the contemporary view with a conceptual review and a new large internet sample. In response to our demonstration of a likely coding error in the research claiming opposing results, the research team presenting opposing results has now issued errata concerning their work.