9. Conclusion
In this chapter, we have looked at measures of Life History Strategy and demonstrated the degree to which they are predictive of positive and negative ethnocentrism at the group and individual level. In next chapter, we will test whether racial differences in ethnocentrism exist and explain these, primarily from the perspective of Life History Theory and Genetic Similarity Theory.
Chapter Eight
Race Differences, Cousin Marriage and Religion
1. Introduction
In last chapter, we established that ethnocentrism is partly predicted by Life History Strategy and that this is partly genetic. In this chapter, we will continue looking at the genetic explanations for differences in ethnocentrism that we commenced examining in the last chapter. We will establish that there are race differences in levels of ethnocentrism and we will then look at why these have developed by comparing the evolution of the different races. In particular, we will test the impact of cousin marriage and religion on group differences in ethnocentrism.
2. Race Differences in Ethnocentrism
With their ethnocentrism measures, Dutton et al. (2016a) classified each nation on the World Values Survey according to the largest ethnic group within their population, as African, European, East Asian, or South Asian (this included South Asians as well as those with significant South Asian admixture, such as Arab countries), excluding countries whose population is too variegated to allow one meaningful classification (e.g. Uzbekistan or Columbia). Absolute levels are relevant for this analysis, and they therefore used the population percentage that affirmed ‘Fight for country’ as the positive ethnocentrism measure, and also because national pride is known to vary widely and inconsistently across these small subgroups of countries due to tribalism and Life History. For Negative ethnicity they simply took the mean of the two ‘Would not want as a neighbour’ items: ‘someone of a different race’ and ‘an immigrant’. Effect sizes were medium to large between South Asian and other populations, but only one pairwise difference in the sequence from African to South Asian was statistically significant (p < .05), partly owing to the small numbers of African and East Asian countries. However, all differences between Caucasian and South Asian countries were both large and significant, as can be seen in Table 4.
Table 4. Differences in Negative and Positive Ethnocentrism indicators as a function of race (adapted from Dutton et al., 2016a).
N
Negative Ethnocentrism
D
‘Would fight for my country’
d
African
6
15.1
57.5
Caucasian
23
16.9
0.138
55.5
−0.160
East Asian
8
25.6
0.666*
58.0
0.154
South Asian
14
31.2
0.463
70.8
0.735
Caucasian
23
16.9
−1.141 *
55.5
−1.143*
Note. South Asian includes Arab and North African countries, as justified by genetic assay data (see Lynn, 2006). Effect sizes refer to the pairwise comparisons between adjacent race groups, i.e. with that of the row above.
* = statistically significant (p < .05), referring to pairwise differences.
An alternative source of data, specifically on racial differences in ethnocentrism, is that which has been mined from the dating website OkCupid in the year 2016 by the Danish researcher Emil Kirkegaard. OkCupid is a US-based dating website in which people take various member-created quizzes, answer direct questions posed by other members, and rank each other’s attractiveness, with a view to being able to get in contact with other members and go on dates with them. Kirkegaard provides us with a sample of roughly 68,000 people who have answered specific questions on their ‘profile’, with a view to persuading another user to go on a date with them (Kirkegaard, 5th May 2016). The findings here are very different not only — as we will see — from my own, presented in Dutton et al. (2016a) and in this broader study, but also from many other studies which hint in the same direction. The OkCupid data finds that women are more ethnocentric than men no matter what their race, (though the sex difference is very small, with a 0.12 correlation between being female and being ethnocentric), and that white people are more ethnocentric than black people.
However, there are a number of reasons why these data are more dubious than the World Values Survey, despite the very large sample. Most obviously, the people’s views are being read by potential dates and so there would be a much stronger incentive to lie in order to make yourself look good. This could potentially explain why men come out as less ethnocentric than women. They are lower in Agreeableness and Conscientiousness than women (Nettle, 2007) and so are more inclined lie. And they may also understand that women sexually select, to a greater extent than do males, on personality traits (see Buss, 1989). It has been argued that racism (and in general being illiberal) is, in part, negatively correlated with intelligence because more intelligent people better understand the benefits of not being seen as ‘racist’ in a society in which Multiculturalism is the dominant ideology (Woodley of Menie & Dunkel, 2015). This would be congruous with the OkCupid finding that more intelligent members are lower in ethnocentrism, in the context of the other results. The more intelligent people, because they are being monitored, are more inclined to give the ‘correct’ answer — that which will best enhance their reputation.
It is very strange that ‘white people’ are reported to be the most ethnocentric. One possibility is that this site — in essence — appeals to people that want a one-night stand or similar superficial relationship. Being ‘white’ is found attractive by non-whites because ‘whiteness’ is dominant in the media and simply in the history of human achievement (Murray, 2006). This makes non-whites want to have sex with whites, as it means that whites have value. Indeed, it has been shown that females (who tend to select for status more than men) who are in multicultural marriages tend to have husbands from countries wealthier and more influential than their own. By contrast, males have wives from countries that are poorer and less influential than their own is. Thus, race and nationality are clearly dimensions of status in sexual relationships (Dutton & Madison, 2016). But this does not, of course, mean that black people would necessarily be more inclined to lay down their lives for white people, show preference for white interests over those of their own race, vote for whites over members of their own race or any other behaviour of that kind that might be regarded as low in ethnocentrism.
Further examinations of OkCupid have looked not just at people’s stated preferences but at how they actually ‘rate’ other users, in terms of their attractiveness (Rudder, 14th Sept 2014). Under the OkCupid system, users were asked rate members of the opposite sex on attractiveness, so these are actual person-to-person interactions. White and East Asian men will penalize black women, while black men do not seem to care about race in terms of judging attractiveness to any significant degree. Women prefer men of their own race — they judge men of their own race to be the most attractive. But, when looking at other races, they also penalize East Asian and black men, whom they see as much less attractive than average. How can we interpret these findings? One possible interpretation relates to race differences in r/K strategy that we have already discussed. We can divide, approximately, between two dimensions to a potential mate: finding them highly sexually attractive based on appearance, and the psychological and social qualities which may make them a good mate. We would expect K-strategists to more interested in the latter dimension and, therefore, even if they were more sexually attracted to their own race it would not follow at all that they would be more ethnocentric more generally, because we would expect them to be somewhat l
ess motivated purely by sexual attractiveness. For this reason, rating the sexual attractiveness of people in photographs cannot be regarded as a very good measure of race differences in ethnocentrism as we have defined it. It is certainly interesting that black men, according to these data, do not racially discriminate, whereas white and East Asian men do discriminate against black women. In the latter case, it is likely that black women are considered unattractive because they are high in testosterone, and therefore muscular and relatively unfeminine (see Rushton, 1995). In the former case, it may be that black men are attracted to white and Asian women due to their femininity and to black women due to genetic similarity and that they also have slightly different standards of beauty. For example, Freedman et al. (2004) found differences in the evaluation of the attractiveness of female figures when comparing white and African American male evaluators. Both racial groups were the most attracted to women with average weight and a Waist to Hip Ratio (WHR) of about 0.7. However, a higher proportion of African Americans favoured an extremely low WHR. In addition, both groups were the least attracted to overweight women, preferring underweight to overweight. However, African American men were less repelled by overweight women than white men were. In that being overweight is associated with low intelligence and low impulse control, it implies that black men care less about these issues as long as the female is highly fertile. It is possible that women, as they are more K-oriented, are slightly more prepared to trade physical attractiveness for genetic similarity (within certain boundaries) — hence their greater preference for men of their own race — but they are also more interested in status than are men, hence their greater attraction to whites, whom they do not penalise.
However, it should be stressed that the extent to which these data allow us to discern race differences in ethnocentrism is unclear. There is a difference between the kind of person with whom you will strongly bond and create a relationship and the kind of person whom you will simply find sexually attractive and, often, people will be prepared to make trade-offs between these two dimensions. Indeed, we would expect those who were K-strategy to make the trade-off against pure physical attraction. If it is so, the fact that black men do not care about race in rating attractiveness tells us nothing about how likely they are to bond with, befriend or lay down their life for a white person or black person differentially. Similarly, the fact that white men seem to find black women sexually unattractive doesn’t tell us what their thoughts are about black people, or the likelihood that they would assist a black stranger over a white one. To give another example, a white man might find black women extremely sexually attractive but still regard black people as inferior to white people and be horrified by the idea of having a black family as neighbours or of marrying a black woman, where other considerations will come into play. As such, the OkCupid data, though fascinating, is not especially helpful in understanding ethnocentrism. So, we will draw upon the World Values Survey data in this study.
3. Why Are Northeast Asians More Ethnocentric than Europeans?
So, Northeast Asians really are more negatively ethnocentric than Europeans as well as non-significantly more positively ethnocentric. Why would this be the case? There are a number of interrelated possibilities.
Firstly, returning to Genetic Similarity Theory, the Northeast Asian gene pool is smaller than the European gene pool (e.g. Holtz, 1989). This small gene pool is caused by the ecology being extremely harsh, meaning you must be strongly adapted to it in order to survive. Accordingly, even if we controlled for environmental and cultural variables, we would still predict a relatively high level of ethnocentrism — both positive and negative — among Northeast Asians because there is less genetic diversity among them than there is among Europeans. This means that a random Japanese man, for example, is more closely related to another random Japanese man than two random English men would be to each other. For this reason, any act of ethnic altruism by the Japanese man would have a greater payoff in terms of inclusive fitness than would precisely the same act by an Englishman. As such, we would expect higher levels of positive ethnocentrism among Northeast Asians than among Europeans. By the same token, were a Japanese person to be confronted by a foreigner, this would potentially damage his genetic interests to a greater extent than would be the case if a European, from a larger gene pool, was confronted by a foreigner. Accordingly, it makes sense for the Northeast Asian to be more ethnocentric in both senses. This is congruous with research which we will look at below on cousin marriage, which would, of course, create a smaller gene pool by another means.
Secondly, we have observed a series of studies which imply that Northeast Asians are, in effect, less open to anything new or to change than are Europeans. Kura et al. (2015) have argued, based on these data, that Northeast Asians are simply less ‘curious’ than Europeans: they are more resistant to change, lower in Openness and more fearful of change. Eap et al. (2008) has found that second-generation Northeast Asians living in the USA are higher in Neuroticism (meaning a greater propensity to experience stress and fear) and lower in Openness than European Americans. Northeast Asians are also lower in Extraversion. A high score on this is associated with risk-taking and certain forms of intellectual creativity (Simonton, 2009). All three of these differences would lead to Europeans being more enthusiastic about new things than Northeast Asians. Openness predicts precisely this, Extraversion predicts taking risks and enjoying novel experiences, while low Neuroticism means you won’t worry about the potential downside of these new experiences. These differences would make sense because in an extremely harsh ecology, such as Northeast Asia, enthusiasm for the novel could be dangerous, high Openness would be accompanied by many impractical dreamers, and too little worry might mean insufficient planning for the future. Clearly, this could have an effect on how a group reacts to new immigrants and could lead to higher levels of negative ethnocentrism than exist among Europeans. Indirectly, however, low Openness has been found to be associated with being politically right-wing, prejudiced against the novel, and thus conservative in the face of change (Hodson et al., 2009). These ‘conservatives’ would, presumably, be less willing to trust strangers and less inclined to deviate from dominant thinking, leading to a more collectivist society and, as Kura et al. (2015) and Clark (2007) have shown, a society which tends to progress more slowly and is less likely to develop original ideas.
Thirdly, Northeast Asians can be understood to follow a slower Life History strategy than Europeans. This is most obviously evidenced in their higher scores on Agreeableness and Conscientiousness than Europeans (Rushton, 1995) and their lower levels of psychopathic personality (Lynn, 2011), a dimension of which is low Agreeableness and low Conscientiousness. But it can also clearly be seen in Table 3. It makes sense that they would follow this strategy because the extreme harshness of Northeast Asia would have necessitated greater degrees of cooperation and rule-following such that the group could survive. Such an environment would also select for a smaller gene pool for two reasons. At the individual level, the predictable nature of the environment will mean that it is possible to strongly adapt to it over generations and the harsh natural selection will ensure that only those who are strongly adapted will survive. At the group level, we would expect that the smaller gene-pool would leader to greater cooperation and general ethnocentric behaviour in situations of intergroup conflict.
As we have discussed, a slow Life History strategy would be expected to manifest itself in high positive ethnocentrism and low negative ethnocentrism. However, this is combined with a relatively high level of Neuroticism — selected for due to the dangerous nature of the environment, very low Openness, very high Conscientiousness (predicting a desire for rules and order), and a very small gene pool — meaning that foreigners will pose a particularly significant threat to the group’s genetic interests. With this being the case, depending on subtle differences in the calibration of each factor, we can start to understand why the Northeast Asi
ans would be more ethnocentric — both positively and negatively — than Europeans. It should be noted that intelligence is associated with K-strategy at the group level, though not at the individual level. As we will discuss in the next chapter, intelligence is associated with being more trusting — meaning, to some extent, more positively ethnocentric — and being less negatively ethnocentric. But, as already noted, it would be quite possible for this factor to be outweighed by other factors.
Finally, returning to Charlton’s (15th December 2015) model, it can be argued that the harsh environment of Northeast Asia would itself select for high levels of both positive and negative ethnocentrism at the group level, for reasons already explored.
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