Study Challenges Stereotypes: Conservatives Persuaded By Wider Range Of Moral Arguments Than Liberals

Conservatives might have a reputation for being set in their ways, but new research shows they can be persuaded by a wider range of moral arguments than liberals can. A recent study out of Stockholm found that conservative Americans respond to appeals about compassion and fairness, which are values liberals prioritize, while also being swayed by arguments about loyalty, authority, and sanctity. Liberals shifted their opinions reliably only after reading compassion-and-fairness arguments. In this experiment, arguments based on loyalty, authority, and sanctity didn’t produce clear shifts for them.

This discovery, published in Journal: Public Opinion Quarterly, may help explain why American opinions on hot-button issues have consistently shifted leftward over decades, with only a few exceptions. On many moral issues, Americans have moved in a more liberal direction over time. Swedish researchers Fredrik Jansson and Pontus Strimling wanted to know why both political groups keep moving in the same direction on these issues.

Their experiment was straightforward. They asked 375 Americans (deliberately balanced between liberals, moderates, and conservatives through initial screening) to rate their agreement with nine controversial statements covering topics from extramarital affairs to universal healthcare coverage. A week later, people answered the same questions again. But this time, some read short arguments before responding. One group saw arguments based on preventing harm and ensuring fairness. Another group saw arguments based on loyalty to groups, respecting authority, and maintaining sanctity. A third group saw no arguments at all.

How Different Arguments Work on Different People

Here’s how the two approaches looked for extramarital affairs. One argument said affairs “harm your spouse” and “impair his or her self-confidence, increase their fear of abandonment, and hurt them.” Another framed it differently: “A marriage is a devoted union where you stand together and show loyalty. By having an affair, you break a commitment and betray your closest ally.”

The study’s main findings come from patterns across all nine issues together, since individual items showed noisy results. But these examples illustrate how dramatically different the moral framings were.

Psychologists have known for years that people use different moral frameworks to make decisions. Some people judge right and wrong mainly by asking whether someone gets hurt or treated unfairly. Others also care deeply about whether actions show disloyalty to your group, disrespect for authority, or violate what they consider sacred. Surveys have consistently shown that liberals lean heavily on harm and fairness, while conservatives weigh all these values roughly equally.

But Jansson and Strimling wanted to know if these stated preferences actually predict who can be persuaded by what. After their experiment, participants filled out a detailed survey about their moral values. The questionnaire came after the arguments were presented, so the authors checked whether the treatments might have distorted the scores; but they found no evidence of that.

People who said loyalty, authority, and sanctity mattered to them showed bigger opinion shifts when reading those types of arguments. People who prioritized harm and fairness were more persuaded by those framings. Once these underlying values were accounted for, political labels became less predictive.

Why Public Opinion Keeps Moving Left

Research shows that when people argue for their own positions, they naturally use the moral framework they find compelling. Liberals craft arguments about harm and fairness because those values drive their own thinking. Conservatives often frame their positions using binding moral foundations because those values feel important to them.

In this experiment, the care-and-fairness arguments traveled farther, shifting both conservatives and liberals, while the binding arguments didn’t clearly move liberals. Over time, in a society where many types of arguments circulate, the ones that persuade more people should gradually win out.

Earlier research by Strimling and colleagues found that net support from harm-and-fairness arguments explained more than half the variation in rates of opinion change over 44 years across 74 moral issues, while binding arguments carried little explanatory value. This experiment reveals a possible mechanism: harm-and-fairness arguments work on both liberals and conservatives, creating broader opinion change.

What This Means for Political Persuasion

Understanding this asymmetry matters for anyone trying to bridge political divides. Someone advocating for progressive policies might reach conservative audiences by talking about preventing harm and ensuring fair treatment, rather than assuming conservatives won’t listen. Meanwhile, conservatives trying to build broader support might reconsider whether binding arguments help or hinder that goal.

The research also complicates the usual narrative about who’s more close-minded. Conservatives often get portrayed as rigid and unwilling to consider new ideas. But this data shows they actually accept a wider variety of moral reasoning. Liberals aren’t being stubborn. In this study, arguments emphasizing loyalty, authority, and sanctity simply didn’t shift their stated opinions the way harm-and-fairness arguments did.

The opinion shifts measured here were small, around five points on a scale from -100 to 100 after reading just a few sentences. But people encounter political arguments constantly over years, not in controlled experiments. Small effects can accumulate. Jansson and Strimling are calling for more research on whether these opinion changes stick and whether who delivers the message matters as much as what the message says.