Jonathan Haidt, a psychology professor at University of Virginia, describes how political affiliation relates to five universal core values: care, fairness, loyalty to an ingroup, respect for authority and tradition, and purity. His research shows that liberals value care and fairness more than respect, loyalty, and purity. In comparison to liberals, conservatives value care and fairness less, but appreciate tradition, loyalty, and purity more. While care came in first place for both groups, purity was last for liberals and fairness was last for conservatives.

Haidt’s gives the following advice for dealing with differences:

“If you want to change other people, you can’t just go storming in saying I’m right you’re wrong…because everybody thinks they are right. A lot of the problems we have to solve are problems that require us to change other people, and if you want to change other people, a much better way to do it is to first understand who we are, understand our moral psychology, understand that we all think we are right, step out of the moral matrix…everybody has some reasons, even if you disagree with them, for what they are doing.”