1.1.6 Individual differences in obedience/prejudice

Question 1

Obedience is affected by personality

AO1 x 3

Answer 1

• Adorno et al Suggested that the authoritarian personality was developed in childhood. Harsh parenting used to ensure obedience leads to a love hate relationship between child and parents
• the hate and resentment towards a parent is repressed and displaced onto weaker members of SoC, such as minorities, while those with this type of personality maintain respect for authority
• Adorno argued that people with authoritarian personalities are very submissive to authority and obedient to those in positions of power

Question 2

Obedience is affected by personality

AO3 x 1 (strength)

Answer 2

Supported by studies that show that those with the opposite traits are more resistant to obedience eg elms noted from exit interviews in milgram’s study that those in ‘caring’ jobs, such as teachers showed less obedience than those in tech jobs eg engineers. they also showed those who were more obedient tended to have authoritarian personality eg find experimenter admirable. therefore people are more likely to obey orders given by those considered with a higher status

Question 3

Obedience is affected by personality

AO3 x 2 (weaknesses)

Answer 3

• however Milgram and others have used many participants in obedience studies and have consistently found a great deal of obedience across many cultures. Therefore suggests the theory is too simplistic as it is unlikely that a personality alone causes increased levels of obedience
• also been found that Catholics show increased obedience than other religion groups and those with more years in education tend to obey less. Therefore this suggests there are other factors eg upbringing, rather than personality, affects degree to which people are obedient to authority figures

Question 4

Prejudice can have an explanation linked to
personality

AO1 x 2

Answer 4

• Adorno et al Suggested that the authoritarian personality was developed in childhood. Harsh parenting used to ensure obedience leads to a love hate relationship between child and parents
• the hate and resentment towards a parent is repressed and displaced onto weaker members of SoC, such as prejudice towards minorities who are members of the out-group

Question 5

Prejudice can have an explanation linked to
personality

AO3 x 1 (Strength)

Answer 5

Supported by later studies which have found dimensions of personality that link with authoritarianism and that right wing authoritarianism, referring to someone that has rigid thinking and like SoC to have rules, does correlate with increased levels of prejudice. Eg Cohrs has found a relationship between RW-A and personality traits, eg neuroticism, extraversion and openness to experience. Therefore suggesting links between personality and prejudice are strong and levels of prejudice can be accurately predicted from peoples personality traits

Question 6

Prejudice can have an explanation linked to
personality

AO3 x 3 (weaknesses)

Answer 6

• Guimond Has suggested that the power of the situation can override personalities in terms of causing prejudice eg they showed how prejudice can increase and decrease overtime, eg levels of prejudice towards Jews and other groups in Germany during World War Two. Therefore suggests prejudice cannot be down to personality alone as it would not explain such variations. Equally personality is seen as stable and so sudden changes to prejudice must be affected by situation
• Individual differences ignore the role of social norms and situational factors eg Louis et al found that the majority of people in their study (72%) strongly disagree with the statement the white race is the best race, but agreed with the exclusion of asylum seekers. Therefore suggests it’s important to understand the social and individual factors to address consequences of prejudice effectively
• Akrami et al suggests that personality characteristics are present in situations where there is prejudice, even if it doesn’t seem to wholly account for such prejudice. Eg not all Germans were Anti-Semitic in World War Two. Therefore whilst there can be a strong influence from situational factors, this doesn’t mean personality doesn’t also affect prejudice