On the nature of ideological beliefs systems and how they shape the perception and reduction of context-specific threats and risks

A large body of research supports the dominant view that compared to liberals, political conservatives are generally more fearful, risk-averse, sensitive to threats; and also, much more motivated to support public policies that aim at reducing threats and dangers. The present dissertation challenges this simple, yet dominant narrative by proposing that the psychological differences and similarities between conservatives and liberals depend on the nature of the threatening stimulus and the ideology measure used to assess individual differences. Based on recommendations from stimulus sampling, the ideas developed in this dissertation demonstrate that it is necessary to assess ideological differences with a broad range of context-specific threatening stimuli and ideology measures in order to achieve deeper insights into conservatives’ and liberals’ sensitivity to threats and how they cope with them.