Social Influence : Authoritarian Personality Flashcards
What’s the dispositional explanation?
Highlights the importance of the individual characteristics and personalities
What is an authoritarian personality?
An individual who is susceptible to obeying people in authority - submissive to those with a higher status and dismissive of inferiors
Adorno’s Fascism Scale - Aim
To understand what leads to people developing authoritarian personalities (obedience due to disposition all variables)
Adorno’s Fascism Scale - Procedure
• 2000+ middle class, white Americans
• studied their subconscious attitudes towards other racial groups with several scales used to measure authoritarian personalities (the F scale)
Adorno’s Fascism Scale - Findings
• people with authoritarian personalities (high F scores) identified with “strong people” and were contemptuous of the weak
• they were very conscious of their own + others status
• they have a cognitive style (clear opinions on characteristics)
Adorno’s Fascism Scale - Conclusion
There is a strong correlation between an authoritarian personality and prejudice
Authoritarian personality origins
- result of harsh parenting in childhood
- experiences create resentment and hostility that cannot be expressed
- fears displaced onto others who’re perceived as weaker (scapegoating)
- explains dislike for those ‘inferior’
- idea comes from ‘Freudian Psychodynamic’
Disadvantage of the F-scale : Methodology
Greenstein (1969) said the F-scale was a ‘comedy of methodological errors’ as all the questions are worded in the same direction, meaning some Ps may have displayed demand characteristics and chose answers in either a please-you or screw-you manner. Jackson created a reversed version and gave both versions too a group of Ps and found a strong correlation between results (opposite of what was expected) meaning the methodology is high and results are valid.
Advantage of the F-scale : Supportive evidence
Milgram and Elms studied 20 obedient Ps and 20 disobedient. Each were given several personality questionnaires to measure their level of authoritarian personality. They found a correlation between obedience and the authoritarian personality (suggesting a relationship as those who were obedient scores higher).
Additionally, Ps were asked open ended questions about their relationship with their parents and with the experimenter. Obedient Ps scored higher on the F-scale and were less close to their fathers during childhood (all Ps were male) and admired the experimenter.
Milgram and Elms concluded that obedient Ps displayed higher levels of the authoritarian personality.
Disadvantage of the F-scale : Limited explanation
In pre-war Germany, millions of individuals displayed obedience despite having varied personalities (not all were authoritarian). This is a limitation as it suggests an alternative explanation may be more realistic → social identity theory. The majority of Germans identified with the anti-Semitic Nazi state and scapegoated the ‘outgroup’ → Jews.
Disadvantage of the F-scale : Alternate explanation
There’s a difficulty establishing s causality between parenting styles/ authoritarianism and obedience as there are situational variables that may of mad am affect of the results. Milgram also investigated obedience post WW2 (electric shock) which is a weakness of the authoritarian personality as Milgram research showed situational variables do have an affect on obedience but as dispositional variables weren’t tested for, they may have impacted the research.
Disadvantage of F-scale : Political bias
Christie and Jahoda (1954) highlighted the F-scale only measures extremes right-wing ideologies, ignoring the role that authoritarianism played in left-wing politics like Chinese Maoism and Russian Bolshevism. This is a bias at the core of the authoritarian personality and poses a limitation of Adornos theory since the F-scale can’t account for obedience across the diverse political range.
