Robb Willer, assistant director of the Sociology and Small Groups Laboratory at Cornell University, has been spending a bit of time looking at the relationship between GWBs approval rating and terrorist warnings issued by the US Government. Guess what? When there is a terrorist alert GWB's approval starts to head skyward. Not only did a terrorist alert improve his approval in national security but people also thought he was handling the economy better.

There is an demonstration of social identity theory. The way it works is that when there is an external threat communities tend to "close ranks". Part of that process is a heightened positive bias towards members of the group and, in particular, the group leadership.

Robb says

This research suggests that individuals may respond to reminders of their mortality, like terror warnings, by supporting their current leaders,

It sets The Green Man a wondering

- The Australian Federal Government Election is next Saturday

- The incumbant Howard Government has just launched a raft of new anti-terror advertisements in the Australian media,

I imagine it was just a co-incidence. Surely they would not have been trying to manipulate the level of fear in the Australian community just to get re-elected. Surely a Prime Minister would not be as pathetically desparate as to resort to those sorts of tactics.

Read more on this research here.