Henry Ryals

Craig/Cummings
Work of Art
4/19/2016
Introduction
This study tested the hypothesis that individuals with more liberal
political views will have more liberal views on what counts as art. We felt this
was an important topic for study because politics and art are heavily
intertwined, and this could have possible ramifications in terms of policymaking. We conducted this study using online surveys that were filled out
only once per-participant.
Participants
The sample for the current quantitative study consists of 26 students enrolled
in courses at Portland State University. Our youngest participant is 18, our oldest is
31. Of the 26 participants, 17 were female, 9 were male. The racial composition was
80.8% Caucasian, 7.7% African American Multi-Racial 3.8%.

Independent Sample t-test

An independent-samples t-test was conducted to evaluate the hypothesis that We believe that
individuals with more liberal political leanings will be more generous in their view of what
counts as art. Contrary to this hypothesis, individuals who were more liberal (M = 149.43, SD =
46.658) were not significantly more generous in their views of art than those who were less
liberal. (M = 150.13, SD = 42.412), t(23) = -.035, p = .972

Discussion
We found no significant difference in opinions on art between different
political ideologies. This is significant because it disproves our initial
hypothesis, that liberals will have a more liberal view of art. Our study was
however limited by its size and scope. Our sample size was very small and
predominantly liberal, which may have heavily skewed our statistics. As well,
the survey was only a momentary snapshot of each participants views, it
was not administered over a long enough period to adequately record their
views. In future research, it would be best to have a much larger sample size
and to have repeat-survey-takers.