TEMPORAL OPINION ORIENTATION: AN ADAPTIVE PROCESS.

The article presents a discussion related to temporal opinion orientation. The current liberal and conservative renaissances, manifest over the nation, stimulate the psychologist to study political and economic predispositions in the context of personality needs, traits, and adjustment patterns. Results of the study reported above contribute evidence that a temporal element may be a relatively enduring factor in the individual's ideology and attitude network. This propensity seems to transcend content area. The attempt to isolate each temporal group as a cue to distinct adjustment patterns produced mixed results. The most salient correlates were optimism-pessimism and satisfaction with the mass media. Generalizing these reactions describes a condition of contentment and hope for the forward-oriented individual and a less happy state for the backward-oriented person. Direction of causality cannot be inferred from the results. The findings point to the necessity of further investigation, not only to corroborate the results, but to test the relationship between forward opinion orientation and a healthy adjustment state as suggested in this article.