Issues Behind the Measurement of Political Orientation: A Meta-Analysis and Systematic Review

• Published in: European journal of psychological assessment : official organ of the European Association of Psychological Assessment 2024-11, Vol.40 (6), p.461-480
• Main Authors: Lee, Ahlam, Eshleman Latimer, Samuel R.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Conservatism; Economics; Environmental Effects; Human; Political Attitudes; Tests and Measures
• ISSN: 1015-5759; 2151-2426
• DOI: 10.1027/1015-5759/a000865

Given the limited research addressing the construct and content validity of single-item and multiple-item measures of political orientation (PO), we investigated the effect sizes in the relationship between PO and variables categorized into multiple dimensions using a meta-analysis of 511 independent effect sizes from 108 articles published from 2012 to 2022. Multiple-item measures of PO that included economic items had a large effect size (r = .55 ~ .75) in their association with variables in the economic, environmental, and traditionalism dimensions, whereas we found small effect sizes (r = .23 ~ .24) between single-item PO and variables in the economic and environmental dimensions and a medium effect size (r = .31) between single-item PO and variables in the traditionalism dimension. Based on the pooled data consisting of all multiple dimensions' data subsets, we found medium effect sizes (r = .35 ~ .39) for multiple-item measures of PO and a small effect size (r = .27) for single-item PO. Our content analysis of 30 multiple-item measures of PO showed that over 80% of multiple-item measures were grounded in US and/or Western countries' political contexts and samples and 50% of them did not measure economic aspects of PO. We discuss implications for future research.