Voting habits linked to IQ in childhood
Monday 3 November 2008
Childhood intelligence is linked to voting preferences and political involvement in adulthood according to a recent study.
People with a higher intelligence in childhood were more likely to vote as adults, and were more likely to vote for the Green Party and Liberal Democrats in a general election, researchers have found.
The study, funded by the UK Medical Research Council, suggests that childhood general intelligence is associated with a person’s political allegiance as much as social class – which has been studied previously as a marker of British voting habits. The research is published in the journal Intelligence.
The research analysed the voting behaviour of more than 6,000 adults, using the 1970 British Cohort Study. This wide-ranging survey included cognitive tests at age five years and ten years and questions about voting habits at age 34. The latter included how people had voted in the 2001 UK general election, how they intended to vote, and what other political activities people had taken part in.
Among the significant results the researchers, based at the University of Edinburgh Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology (partly funded by the MRC), the MRC Epidemiology Resource Centre in Southampton, the MRC Social and Public Health Unit in Glasgow, found that people who reported voting in 2001 for the Green Party and Liberal Democrats had the highest average childhood intelligence scores.
The findings also showed that people with higher childhood intelligence were more likely to take part in rallies and demonstrations, to sign petitions in adulthood, and to be more interested in politics generally.
Mean age 10 IQ scores for people voting in the 2001 general election for various parties were as follows: Green 108.3; Liberal Democrat 108.2; Conservative 103.7; Labour 103.0; Plaid Cymru 102.5; Scottish National 102.2, UK Independent 101.1, British National 98.4; Did not vote/None 99.7.
Professor Ian Deary, of the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology in the Department of Psychology, who led the research, said: “The association between measured intelligence in childhood-before any secondary education - and how people participate in the democratic process is something that needs exploring. Voting in the UK and elsewhere has been studied with respect to social class and education.
“Our new research shows that early life intelligence needs to be considered along with these factors, and might be an additional factor influencing voting habits. How one votes and to what extent one takes part in the political process are the result of thinking and decision-making, so it makes sense to address cognitive ability as a possible part of the explanation.”
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Ref: IJ Deary, GD Batty, and CR Gale (2008) Childhood intelligence predicts voter turnout, voting preferences, and political involvement in adulthood: The 1970 British Cohort Study, published in Intelligence.
