Authoritarian Personality (lesson 7) Flashcards
A01 A03
Define an authoritarian personality
Ah authoritarian personality is a personal belief that those who hold authority have complete control and legitimacy so we should obey and respect them. This personality is brought up from parenting and childhood experiences known as socialisation. The personality also entails that those whom are lower in the social hierarchy are seen as inferior
Why did Adorno and Horkheimer come up with the study they completed
They wanted to understand the anti semitism displayed in WW2, unlike milgram who suggested we are all capable of extreme obedience, Adorno arugulas high levels of obedience was a psychological disorder linked to personality
What was the procedure of adornos study
Adorno studied more than 2000 middle class white Americans and the unconscious attitudes towards other racial groups. The researchers developed several measurement scales, including the potential for racism scale known as the f scale - this was used to measure authoritarian personality. An example from the F scale test was- how far do you agree, obedience and authority are the most important virtues a child should learn.
What were the findings of Adorno’s studies
People with authoritarian learnings (those who scored high on the F-scale) identified with strong people and were generally contemptuous of the wake- they were the most obedient in the milgram study, Adorno suggested their personality early in life was most likely strict and had hard punishments., he also suggested their anger may be displaced atom minority groups.
What key study and supporting research was there for adornos study completed by Elmes and milgram
Elms and milgram wanted to see if the obedient participants in milgram reseacrch were more likely to display authoritarian personality traits, in comparison to disobeying participants.
Their sample consisted of 20 obedient participants, who administered the full 450 volts and 20 disobedient participants who refused to continue. Reach completed several personality questionnaires, including Adorno’s F scale. Elms and milgram found that the obedient ppl scored higher on the F scale in comparison to the disobedient. Which shows their authoritarian personality. In addition, the results also revealed that the obedient were less close to their fathers during childhood. This shows that milgram results could also been the result of dispositional factors such as personality more than everyone being capable of being overly obedient.
Although the results of elms and milgram suggest a link between authoritarian personality and obedience, these results are correctional and it is therefore difficult to generalise the results of the experiment to the general public because it’s difficult to draw meaningful conclusions about the exact cause of the obedience as there are many other factors that influence the participants such as the situational factors. So we cannot summarise the results down to one cause.
(This was a reading card, move on if understood)
What supporting research was there by altemeyer
altemeyer constructed a new rating scale to measure the authoritarian personality, allied the right wing authoritarian scale. This fixed many of the f scales problems and showed a consistent correlation between high scored]s on the RWA and measures of prejudice between groups. This supports the concept of the existence of the authoritarian personality, and gives more valid evidence than Adornos work due to stronger questionnaire designing.
What was the methodological issue with the f scale.
The scale is based on a flawed methodology. Green stein goes as far to describe the f scale as a comedy of methodological errors. For example the scale has come in for severe criticism because everyone of its items are aimed in the s me direction- this means it’s possible to get a high score by just ticking the same section of boxes down the page. It measures the tendency to agree to everything so it’s easy for people to be bias and not apply the self’s truthfully
How does Adorno offer a limited explanation of obedience in pre war Germany
Millions of individuals all displayed obedient racist and anti semantic behaviour. This was despite the fact that they all must have altered personality in some ways. It’s unlikely they all had an authoritarian personality.
