{"title":"意识形态就像财产","authors":"A. Molnár, G. Loewenstein","doi":"10.1080/1047840X.2022.2065129","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Gries, M€ uller, & Jost (this issue) address a topic of great theoretical and practical importance: the origin of the ideologies that shape—and increasingly define—the current political and social climate. Adopting an economist’s perspective on ideologies, they seek to understand what purpose belief systems serve and why specific ideologies are embraced by individuals. Their answer, in a nutshell, is that people assess how well different ideologies would satisfy their psychological needs (and consumption) and choose the belief system that addresses their needs the most (subject to constraints such as limited information about ideologies and limited supply of ideologies in the “market” of belief systems). At a time when beliefs about, and behavior toward, ostensibly scientific issues such as climate change and vaccination, have become polarized as a result of being viewed through the lens of political ideologies, these questions are of existential importance. As advocates of a new wave in economics commonly referred to as “belief-based utility,” we applaud Gries et al.’s effort to apply an economic framework to understanding how people adopt, update, and abandon their belief systems. Belief-based utility is the idea that the main sources of utility are not material consumption, as economists generally assume, but rather people’s beliefs—about the world, and especially about themselves (e.g., whether they are virtuous, smart, attractive, likeable; see Loewenstein & Molnar, 2018; Molnar and Loewenstein, in press). The idea that people care about what is in their mind, and not just about material consumption, goes way back to classical economists (see Loewenstein, 1992). For example, Jeremy Bentham, who first proposed the notion of utility that became the backbone of economics, listed only a handful of material determinants of utility in his seminal work on hedonics and utility (Bentham, 1789), but a wide range of immaterial, nonphysical concepts, such as reputation, memory, imagination, or expectations—the majority of which can be labeled as beliefs. Adam Smith, likewise, made a case for the role of beliefs driving human behavior: “To what purpose is all the toil and bustle of this world?” Smith asked, and answered: “To be observed, to be attended to, to be taken notice of with sympathy, complacency, and approbation, are all the advantages we can propose to derive from it” (Smith, 1759, pp. 108–110). Although these ideas were largely sidelined during the early to mid-20th century as a result of the ordinalist revolution in economics, behaviorism in psychology, and the ensuing exclusive focus on directly measurable goods and outcomes, economists began to re-incorporate these insights in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s. For example, Thomas Schelling (1984), in a brilliant paper titled “The Mind as a Consuming Organ,” discussed how little of what we “consume” is actually observable, physical, goods (what standard economics would conceptualize as “consumption”), and how much of it takes place entirely in our minds. 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Adopting an economist’s perspective on ideologies, they seek to understand what purpose belief systems serve and why specific ideologies are embraced by individuals. Their answer, in a nutshell, is that people assess how well different ideologies would satisfy their psychological needs (and consumption) and choose the belief system that addresses their needs the most (subject to constraints such as limited information about ideologies and limited supply of ideologies in the “market” of belief systems). At a time when beliefs about, and behavior toward, ostensibly scientific issues such as climate change and vaccination, have become polarized as a result of being viewed through the lens of political ideologies, these questions are of existential importance. As advocates of a new wave in economics commonly referred to as “belief-based utility,” we applaud Gries et al.’s effort to apply an economic framework to understanding how people adopt, update, and abandon their belief systems. Belief-based utility is the idea that the main sources of utility are not material consumption, as economists generally assume, but rather people’s beliefs—about the world, and especially about themselves (e.g., whether they are virtuous, smart, attractive, likeable; see Loewenstein & Molnar, 2018; Molnar and Loewenstein, in press). The idea that people care about what is in their mind, and not just about material consumption, goes way back to classical economists (see Loewenstein, 1992). For example, Jeremy Bentham, who first proposed the notion of utility that became the backbone of economics, listed only a handful of material determinants of utility in his seminal work on hedonics and utility (Bentham, 1789), but a wide range of immaterial, nonphysical concepts, such as reputation, memory, imagination, or expectations—the majority of which can be labeled as beliefs. 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引用次数: 2
摘要
Gries、M€uller和Jost(本期)探讨了一个具有重大理论和实践意义的话题:塑造并日益定义当前政治和社会气候的意识形态的起源。采用经济学家对意识形态的观点,他们试图理解信仰体系的目的是什么,以及为什么特定的意识形态会被个人所接受。简言之,他们的答案是,人们评估不同的意识形态在多大程度上能满足他们的心理需求(和消费),并选择最能满足他们需求的信仰体系(受制于诸如意识形态信息有限和信仰体系“市场”中意识形态供应有限等限制)。当人们从政治意识形态的角度看待气候变化和疫苗接种等表面上的科学问题时,人们对这些问题的信念和行为变得两极分化,这些问题具有生存的重要性。作为经济学新浪潮(通常被称为“基于信仰的效用”)的倡导者,我们赞扬Gries等人努力应用经济框架来理解人们如何采纳、更新和放弃他们的信仰体系。基于信念的效用是指效用的主要来源不是经济学家通常认为的物质消费,而是人们对世界的信念,尤其是对自己的信念(例如,他们是否善良、聪明、有吸引力、讨人喜欢;见Loewenstein&Molnar,2018;Molnar和Loewensstein,出版)。人们关心自己的想法,而不仅仅是物质消费,这种想法可以追溯到古典经济学家(见Loewenstein,1992)。例如,杰里米·边沁(Jeremy Bentham)首先提出了效用的概念,这一概念成为经济学的支柱,他在关于享乐主义和效用的开创性著作中只列出了效用的少数物质决定因素(边沁,1789),但列出了广泛的非物质、非物质概念,如声誉、记忆、想象力或期望,其中大多数可以被标记为信仰。同样,亚当·斯密也为信仰驱动人类行为的作用提出了一个理由:“这个世界上所有的辛劳和忙碌是为了什么目的?”史密斯问道,并回答道:“被观察、被关注、被同情、自满和认可所关注,都是我们可以从中获得的优势”(Smith,1759,pp.108-110)。尽管在20世纪初至中期,由于经济学中的普通主义革命、心理学中的行为主义,以及随之而来的对直接可测量的商品和结果的专注,这些观点在很大程度上被边缘化了,但经济学家在20世纪70年代末和80年代初开始重新纳入这些见解。例如,托马斯·谢林(Thomas Schelling,1984)在一篇题为《作为消费器官的心灵》(The Mind as a Consuming Organ)的精彩论文中,讨论了我们“消费”中有多少是可观察的实物(标准经济学将其概念化为“消费”),以及其中有多少完全发生在我们的脑海中。到目前为止,基于信念的效用的各种来源的理论和模型已经被开发并应用于许多背景,如金融、医疗保健、政治或组织行为(见Molnar和Loewenstein,出版)。
Gries, M€ uller, & Jost (this issue) address a topic of great theoretical and practical importance: the origin of the ideologies that shape—and increasingly define—the current political and social climate. Adopting an economist’s perspective on ideologies, they seek to understand what purpose belief systems serve and why specific ideologies are embraced by individuals. Their answer, in a nutshell, is that people assess how well different ideologies would satisfy their psychological needs (and consumption) and choose the belief system that addresses their needs the most (subject to constraints such as limited information about ideologies and limited supply of ideologies in the “market” of belief systems). At a time when beliefs about, and behavior toward, ostensibly scientific issues such as climate change and vaccination, have become polarized as a result of being viewed through the lens of political ideologies, these questions are of existential importance. As advocates of a new wave in economics commonly referred to as “belief-based utility,” we applaud Gries et al.’s effort to apply an economic framework to understanding how people adopt, update, and abandon their belief systems. Belief-based utility is the idea that the main sources of utility are not material consumption, as economists generally assume, but rather people’s beliefs—about the world, and especially about themselves (e.g., whether they are virtuous, smart, attractive, likeable; see Loewenstein & Molnar, 2018; Molnar and Loewenstein, in press). The idea that people care about what is in their mind, and not just about material consumption, goes way back to classical economists (see Loewenstein, 1992). For example, Jeremy Bentham, who first proposed the notion of utility that became the backbone of economics, listed only a handful of material determinants of utility in his seminal work on hedonics and utility (Bentham, 1789), but a wide range of immaterial, nonphysical concepts, such as reputation, memory, imagination, or expectations—the majority of which can be labeled as beliefs. Adam Smith, likewise, made a case for the role of beliefs driving human behavior: “To what purpose is all the toil and bustle of this world?” Smith asked, and answered: “To be observed, to be attended to, to be taken notice of with sympathy, complacency, and approbation, are all the advantages we can propose to derive from it” (Smith, 1759, pp. 108–110). Although these ideas were largely sidelined during the early to mid-20th century as a result of the ordinalist revolution in economics, behaviorism in psychology, and the ensuing exclusive focus on directly measurable goods and outcomes, economists began to re-incorporate these insights in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s. For example, Thomas Schelling (1984), in a brilliant paper titled “The Mind as a Consuming Organ,” discussed how little of what we “consume” is actually observable, physical, goods (what standard economics would conceptualize as “consumption”), and how much of it takes place entirely in our minds. By now, theories and models of various sources of belief-based utility have been developed and applied to numerous contexts, such as finance, healthcare, politics, or organizational behavior (see Molnar & Loewenstein, in press).
期刊介绍:
Psychological Inquiry serves as an international journal dedicated to the advancement of psychological theory. Each edition features an extensive target article exploring a controversial or provocative topic, accompanied by peer commentaries and a response from the target author(s). Proposals for target articles must be submitted using the Target Article Proposal Form, and only approved proposals undergo peer review by at least three reviewers. Authors are invited to submit their full articles after the proposal has received approval from the Editor.