Part of the research also found a link between greater levels of disgust – as measured by attitudes to unpleasant body odours – and support for Donald Trump.
The study, carried out by a team based at Stockholm University, adds to a body of evidence linking sensory functions with people’s broader social attitudes.
Specifically, as disgust can lead to the avoidance of certain places and people, the researchers in this study thought that people who are more easily disgusted might also be more authoritarian – as in authoritarian societies interactions between groups are more limited.
“Scholars assume that this relationship between disgust and socially conservative attitudes, especially when it comes to prejudice or fear of out-groups, might be related to fearing a threat, including a pathogen [harmful microbe] threat,” study leader Dr Marco Tullio Liuzza told The Independent.
Disgust is an important emotion, and one that is essential for survival. It allows us to avoid things that could cause us harm by giving us diseases.
In their study, Dr Liuzza and his colleagues wanted to assess how this deep-rooted evolutionary protective mechanism was linked to political attitudes.
“There was a solid connection between how strongly someone was disgusted by smells and their desire to have a dictator-like leader who can suppress radical protest movements and ensure that different groups ‘stay in their places’,” said Dr Jonas Olofsson, a team member who researches scent and psychology.
“That type of society reduces contact among different groups and, at least in theory, decreases the chance of becoming ill.”
The results of this research were published in the journal Royal Society Open Science.
To arrive at these conclusions researchers developed a scale so that participants in online surveys could rate their levels of disgust for various body odours.
Participants from around the world were asked to rate themselves using this scale, while also being asked questions about their political views.
To assess social attitudes, the scientists used the Right-Wing Authoritarianism scale – a well-established tool for measuring authoritarian dispositions.
In a further study, questions were added for US participants about how they intended to vote in the 2016 presidential election, which was underway at the time of the study.
'It showed that people who were more disgusted by smells were also more likely to vote for Donald Trump than those who were less sensitive. We thought that was interesting because Donald Trump talks frequently about how different people disgust him,”
“It fits with our hypothesis that his supporters would be more easily disgusted themselves.”
At the time of their research, the scientists noted, Mr Trump "was a presidential candidate with an agenda described as resonating with authoritarian attitudes".
Dr Liuzza noted that as their study only looked at correlations, their results do not demonstrate that disgust leads to certain political preferences. However, he suggested it sets the stage for further research in this area.
“These are the first steps to further develop these ideas and maybe test it with experimental manipulations in the future,” he said.
He also pointed out that the relationship between primitive emotions like disgust and social attitudes is far from the most important factor when exploring political preferences
“Nonetheless, I think it is a surprising relationship,” he said.
