And now for something completely different in Presidential preference polling....

THIS is cool.

THIS is the Project Implicit Presidential Implicit Analysis Test, presented at Edge.

It's a Harvard study on your implicit, below-consciousness-level reactions to the four remaining Presidential candidates (Clinton, Huckabee, Obama, and McCain). You answer a set of demographic questions, then complete about ten minutes worth of fast-response exercises regarding your subliminal responses to the candidates.

I can't really explain the way it works, other than to say that you're given one key for "Good" terms and a candidate's photo and the another key for "Bad" terms and the photos of any other candidate. Then you go through this multiple times as fast as you can, with the "Good" candidate constantly changing. I'd guess that it is your pattern of mistakes, as you tend to select, say, Barack as Good even when you're not supposed to, or Hillary as bad when she's supposed to be Good, that gives them their material.

Once you finish that, you answer a few more questions and they rate out your responses to the candidates on a sliding scale.

What blew me away was that I could not discern myself any pattern in my hesitations or my mistakes, but the test rated me as responding, on a visceral level, to Obama, followed by McCain, followed by Clinton, with Huckabee bringing up the rear.

And in those terms--personal gut reaction, not policies or programs--that's exactly how I rate them right now.

Try it--it's worth the waste of ten minutes.

Comments

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