Research suggests conservatives are happier than liberals

The Freakanomics blog has an interesting article today which claims that Conservatives are generally happier than Liberals. Although the research is based on samples from the American population, Westmonster couldn't help but wonder whether or not the same could be said of the English...

Despite research suggesting that Conservatives tend to be more sensitive and prone to tears than Liberals as babies, the research conducted by Arthur C. Brooks of the Freakanomics team argues that Conservatives become the happiest during adulthood. A basic breakdown for the reasons behind this belief seems to be as follows:

1. For the past three decades, research carried out by the General Social Survey has produced results in which 44 percent of respondents who said they were Conservative or very conservative・said they were very happy, versus just 25 percent of people who called themselves Liberal or very liberal.

2. Liberals said that they were more likely to say that they are disatisfied with themselves, feel like failures, be pessemistic about the future, or simply not feel good enough.

The self-esteem issues of some Lefties has been noted before. When tending to be more concerned about society as a whole, it is only to be expected that a person would occasionally feel helpless. Conservatives on the other hand do sometimes seem better equipped at dealing with issues of personal happiness because, fundamentally, that's what their politics tends to concern itself with.

The obvious examples of this duality at the moment would be Boris Johson vs. Ken Livingstone. Bojo is constantly criticised for the media for his overtly jolly outlook on life, whereas Red Ken and his negativity are held by many media institutions as being more virtuous. Similarily, Gordon Brown seems a little down in the dumps of recent when compared to the florid brio of opposition leader David Cameron.

Perhaps it all boils down to the old adage of innocence being bliss? Whatever it means, it's interesting to note the direction current opinion polls say about the next general election. If it looks like the Conservatives are going to get through does that mean that, after years under Labour, the English are ready to bury their heads in the sand for a few more years so that they can pretend to be happy again. Or does it simply mean that they are genuinely happier?

Written by Oli Anderson on 24 Apr 2008 3:18 PM. Permalink