User:Ngyi1983/Methodology of The Authoritarian Personality

The Authoritarian Personality

Rationale for expanding on the methodology of this study:

This "rationale" section is for interested users only. It is not meant to go in the Authoritarian Personality Article!! Thank you.

This is an early study featuring the application of psychometric techniques in constructing questionnaires for tapping political attitudes and ideology. This feature renders the study distinguishingly relevant to modern political psychology. Furthermore, most of the concept under study in modern political psychology are direct conceptual descendants of this study (e.g. Social Dominance Orientation, Right-Wing Authoritarianism, Left-Wing Authoritarianism, Just-World Belief). It also features a novel for its era triangulation of projective and actuarial techniques, and exhibits an intense and impressive research schedule. As a student of the topic I was thoroughly informed by Brown's chapter on the methodology used, which was among the most helpful resources for writing a research-oriented bachelor thesis in social psychology. Thus, I consider that this particular study grants a more scrupulus presentation of its methodology and findings. This is not to say that the study was not flawed in many aspects, both methodological and conceptual. On the contrary the study was extensively criticized, which makes it more important to have a perspective of its relative strengths and weaknesses. In order to keep the presentation balanced, I try to reflect the criticism points right next to the exposition of the methodological choices and mark them with an easy-to-spot tag [Critique Point]

Based on Brown (2004)

Methodology

The study employs both quantitative and qualitative components. The first part of the research resembles a survey type of research with structured questionnaires. Based on the scores on the questionnaires, a smaller number of participants was elected for clinical interviews and administration of the Thematic Apperception Test. Interviews were coded with the techniques of content analysis.

Psychometric Scales

• Anti-Semitism Scale
• Ethnocentrism Scale
• Political & Economical Conservatism Scale

Sample

"The majority of the subjects could be characterized as white, non-Jewish, native-born, middle-class Americans and the authors guessed that their findings would hold for this population"

[Critique point]: The individuals were sampled from formal organizations. There are reasons to believe that there are systematic difference between such a sample and the aforementioned population (see section Overall Criticism).

Response Format

Likert type items ranging from -3 to +3 without a middle point.

Anti-Semitism Scale

This is a listing of the content categories featured in the items. These traits are attributed to Jewish people.

• Offensive (conceited, sensual, dirty)
• Threatening (ruthless, competitive, radical)
• Attitudes (discriminative action to be taken)
• Seclusive (clanish, keeping apart from gentiles)
• Intrusive (desire to intrude where not welcome)

All items were phrased in affirmation of the Anti-Semitic sentiment. Brown (2004, p. 48), together with many others, criticizes this choice as "unwise" .

The items were phrased in a superficially moderate language, which nonetheless conveyed the saliency of Jews to the respondent and a negative sentiment towards them

Ethnocentrism

Split-half reliability for the scale was .91 (high). The correlation between Ethnocentrism and Anti-Semitism scales was .80 (relatively high). This result is "evidence that antagonism to the culturally unlike is a generalized sentiment"

Political and Economical Conservativism

Split-half reliability for PEC scale was .73 (moderate). The scale's correlation with A-S and E was not strong, but in none of the groups was it negative. "[...] neither ethnocentrism nor Anti-Semitism ever showed a tendency to go with leftist liberal views."

F Scale

The F scale targets an authoritarian, anti-democratic personality profile that makes a person susceptible to Fascist propaganda. The items were written in accordance to fascist propaganda materials as well as priory held TAT protocol data and interviews with ethnocentric participants.

• Conventionalism: Adherence to conventional values.
• Authoritarian Submission: Towards ingroup authority figures.
• Authoritarian Aggression: Against people who violate conventional values.
• Anti-Intraception: Opposition to subjectivity and imagination.
• Superstition and Stereotypy: Belief in individual fate; thinking in rigid categories.
• Power and Toughness: Concerned with submission and domination; assertion of strength.
• Destructiveness and Cynicism: hostility against human nature.
• Projectivity: Perception of the world as dangerous; tendency to project unconscious impulses.
• Sex: Overly concerned with modern sexual practices.

Across various participant groups, the average item-total correlation was .33. Subsequent factor analysis confirmed an one dimensional structure of these content subsets of items (Eysenck 1954, p 152, ref by Brown, p. 53). The first form of the F-Scale correlated .53 with A-S, .65 to E and .54 to PEC. The scale was revised by dropping items with low item-total correlations and/or low predictive value of A-S and E scores. The revised form correlated by .75 to a combined A-S/E scale, and .57 to PEC. Ethnocentrism, anti-Semitism and potentiality for fascism were inter-related to each other, as well as to conservatism, although not as prominently.

Correlations with IQ, SES, and Education

Ethnocentrism is negatively correlated with both IQ and years of education. Subsequent analyses by Christie showed that education is the mediating factor in this set of relationships. Intelligence is not as strongly correlated to E per se if years of education are partialed out, the partial correlation being as small as -.20. Christie also estimated the expected correlation between "either IQ and F scores or years of education and F scores for a representative cross-sectional sample, range between -.50 and -.60" .

Clinical and Projective Data

Interviews

The interviewers were instructed to obtain information of the following areas. There were more specific instructions and points of emphasis within each of these areas.

• Vocation
• Income
• Religion
• Clinical Data
  • Family Background: Sociological Aspects
  • Family Figures: Personal Aspects
  • Childhood
  • Sex
  • Social Relationships
  • School
• Politics
• Minorities and Race

[Critique Point] Interviewers (but not coders) were aware of the participants responses and were instructed to study them before interview. This choice was also "severely criticized"

"In considerable degree, [...], the projective data confirm the covariation of implicit antidemocratic trends with prejudice which was demonstrated by the questionnaire data".

Construction of Personality

• Self Glorification vs Objecive Self Appraisal
• Conventional Idealization of Parents vs Objective Appraisal
• Family status-concerned vs Family status-relaxed

Additional: Coping with Ambivalence about Self and Others, Lack of acceptance of aggressive feelings towards the parents, Projection of sexual and aggressive impulses to minorities, and its psychological function. "Repression of impulses leads to projection which functions as rationalization for an expression.'

[Critique Point]: Coding and Interpretation is informed by psychoanalytic theory.

Cognitive Style

• Rigidity vs Flexibility
• Intolerance of Ambiguity 'vs Tolerance of Ambiguity

(see Jaensch's Typology)

[Critique Point] Due to the coders having access to the protocols, the dependency between prejudice and rigidity may be biased .

Overall Criticism

Sampling

Participants were recruited through formal organizations. Christie reports though that people belonging to at least one organization differ significantly from people that do not belong to organizations at all. Thus the sample taken was not representative of white, non-Jewish, middle-class, Americans. The correlations between A-S, E and F vary in different samples, subsequent studies showed. However, a negative correlation was never found between those scales.

Acquiscence Response Set

Couch and Keniston (1960) addressed the problem of the items being all phrased in an affirmative direction towards anti-Semitism. In a large number of psychometric instruments, they showed that the tendency to respond affirmatively (Yeasayers) or negatively (Naysayers) is a relevant psychological factor despite the content of specific questionnaires.

It is now accepted that a greater proportion of variance can be attributed to individual response patterns rather than the targetted Anti-Semitic attitude. This poses a validity problem: The scale may not accurately record the variable it is intended to measure.

Cronbach -TODO! Kohn - TODO! Bass !! .20 correlation between F-scale and item-by-item reversed version. (expected correlation if the phrasing played no role would be -1.00) Christie - more elaborate reversal of items accounting for linguistic and psychological subtleties preserving the original rationale of the items preparation.

Criticisms of Content Analyses

• Interviewer Knowledge of Questionnaire Responses
• Examination of Data in Advance of Coding
• Coding Multiple Variables from the Same Content
• Reporting Inter-rater Reliability for Too General Coding Categories

Explanation in terms of SES rather than repression

"We can easily imagine plausible reasons for the association of each authoritarian trait with the cluster that includes low IQ, little education, and low SES and so the explanation of covariation among the traits is simply their several particular ties to the same underlying factors. [...][However][...] Norms are not put together at random or incidentally. When they stabilize into a particular combination it must be because that is a combination that works for human personalities" (Brown, p. 75)

Left Wing Authoritarianism

A number of studies have examined the external criterion validity of F scale, with various demographic and political groups. Such groups included: German cosmetic factory workers (Cohn and Carsch, 1954); English fascists and communists, compared to 'politically neutral' soldiers (Coulter, 1953). Both studies found high scores (>5) in F-Scale.

However, the Coulter study also found the Communists scored higher in F-Scale than the politically neutral group. Eysenck (1954, ref. by Brown, p. 80) commented that Coulter's results indicate that the F-Scale actually measures general authoritarianism, rather than fascist tendencies in particular. (see Left-Wing Authoritarianism)

Christie (1956) attributed Coulter's findings to sampling fluctuation, pointing out the politically neutral group was unusually low in F-Scale, compared to 50 known group means at the time. Rokeach (1960) obtained F-Scle scores from 13 Communist college students in England. Their mean was the lowest of all known groups.

Brown, (2004, p. 80) states: "... the Berkley researchers seem to have been correct in their belief that the F-Scale is a measure of fascism."

Concluding Remarks

Hyman and Sheatsley 1954

"Our major criticisms lead us inevitably to conclude that the authors' theory has not been proved by the data they cite"

Brown 2004

"The most serious defects in the questionnaire work are the inadewuate sampling methods and the operation of response sets. [In spite of that] there is a substantial residual probability that the chief conclusion of the questionnaire work is correct: attitudes of Anti-Semitism, ethnocentrism, and authoritarianism do generally go together. [...] some of the findings of the questionnaire study were replicated in the projectives study, and while this latter work has its own deficiencies, some account must be taken for the convergence in the two sets of data."

"Perhaps the least well supported of all the findings in the Berkley study are those concerning the genesis of authoritarianism in childhood. [...] However, Frenkel-Brunswik has directly studied prejudice in childhood and adolescence. She reports confirmation of most of the original findings."

Christie and Cook 1958

Christie and Cook (1958) cite 230 titles relating to The Authoritarian Personality and they conclude that:

"...the overall picture shows consistency of findings in many of the most intensively studied areas. The E and F scales are found to be significntly correlated in a wide array of samples and predictions of relationships with attitudinal measures are almost invariably confirmed"