Obedience: Dispositional Explanations

Question 1

what is the dispositional explanation of obedience?

Answer 1

authoritarian personality

Question 2

who came up with the authoritarian personality?

Answer 2

Adorno et al

Question 3

what is Adorno et al argue that people with an authoritarian personality(AP) had?

Answer 3

• extreme respect for(and submissiveness to) authority
• view society as weaker than it was, so we need strong and powerful leaders to enforce traditional values
• both of these characteristics make people with an AP more likely to obey orders from authority
• show no respect for those of inferior social status fuelled by the black and white thinking (everything is either right or wrong they are uncomfortable with uncertainty

Question 4

what are the origins of AP?

Answer 4

• forms as a result of harsh parenting in childhood
• parents give conditional love, their love and affection for their child depends entirely on how they behave

Question 5

what is the parenting type of people with an AP like?

Answer 5

• extremely strict discipline
• expectation of absolute loyalty
• impossibly high standards
• perceived criticism of perceived failings

Question 6

what did Adorno et Al argue that these childhood experiences lead to?

Answer 6

• childhood experiences create resentment and hostility in child
• child cannot express feelings directly against parents as they fear punishment
• fears are displaced onto others who they perceive to be weaker(scapegoating)

Question 7

what is the procedure of Adorno et al’s research?

Answer 7

• studied more than 2000 middle class, white Americans and their unconscious attitudes towards ethnic groups
• developed a measurement scale called potential for fascism scale F-Scale

Question 8

what were example of two items of the F-Sacle?

Answer 8

• obedience and respect for authority are the most important virtues for children to learn
• there is hardly anything lower than a person who does not feel great love, gratitude and respect for his parents

Question 9

what were the findings of Adorno et al’s research?

Answer 9

• people with authoritarian learnings idenitified with strong people and were generally contemptuous of the weak
• they were conscious of status and showed extreme respect, deference and servility to the higher status
• AP had a certain cognitive style ‘black and white’ thinking they had fixed and distinctive stereotypes another other groups
• strong correlations between authoritarianism and prejudice