7. dispositional explanation Flashcards
Adorno et al. argued that people with an Authoritarian Personality (AP) show an extreme
respect for (and submissiveness to) authority.
Such people view society as ‘weaker than it once was’, so believe we need strong and powerful leaders to enforce traditional values such as love of country and family.
Both of these characteristics make people with an Authoritarian Personality more likely to
obey orders from a source of authority.
Everything is either right or wrong and they are very uncomfortable with uncertainty.
Therefore, people who are ‘other’ (e.g. belong to a different ethnic group) are responsible for the ills of society -
these people are a convenient target for authoritarians who are
likely to obey orders from authority figures even when such orders are destructive.
People with Authoritarian Personalities also show contempt for
those of inferior social status.
ORIGINS OF THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
Adorno et al. believed the Authoritarian Personality type forms in childhood, mostly as a result of harsh parenting.
This parenting style typically features
extremely strict discipline, an expectation of absolute loyalty, impossibly high standards and severe criticism of perceived failings: parents give conditional love - that is, their love and affection for their child depends entirely on how he or she behaves (I will love you if…).
Adorno et al. argued that these childhood experiences create resentment and hostility in a child, but the child cannot express these feelings directly against their parents because they fear punishment.
Their fears are displaced onto …
others who they perceive to be weaker, in a process known as scapegoating.
This explains the hatred towards people considered to be socially inferior or who belong to other social groups, a central feature of obedience to a higher authority.
This is a psychodynamic explanation.
ADORNO ET AL.’S RESEARCH
PROCEDURE Adorno et al. studied more than 2000 middle-class, white Americans and their unconscious attitudes towards other ethnic groups.
Describe the F scale (exmple of item on it)
The researchers developed several measurement scales, including the potential-for-fascism scale (F-scale).
This scale is still used to measure Authoritarian Personality.
Two examples of items from the F-scale are: ‘Obedience and respect for authority are the most important virtues for children to learn’, and ‘There is hardly anything lower than a person who does not feel great love, gratitude, and respect for his parents’.
ADORNO’s research
FINDINGS
People with authoritarian leanings (those who scored high on the F-scale and other measures) identified with ‘strong people’ and were generally contemptuous of the ‘weak’. They were very conscious of status and showed extreme respect, deference, and servility to those of higher status - these traits are the basis of obedience.
Adorno et al. also found that authoritarian people had a certain cognitive style in which there was no ‘fuzziness’ between categories of people - they had fixed and distinctive stereotypes about other groups.
strong positive correlation between authoritarianism & prejudice.
AO3 - strength of THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
research support - Milgram & Elms (interviews)
One strength is evidence from Milgram supporting the Authoritarian Personality.
Elms and Milgram interviewed a small sample of people who had participated in the original obedience studies and been fully obedient. They all completed the F-scale (and other measures) as part of the interview. These 20 obedient participants scored significantly higher on the overall F-scale than a comparison group of 20 disobedient participants. The two groups were clearly quite different in terms of authoritarianism.
This finding supports Adorno et al.’s view that obedient people may well show similar characteristics to people who have an Authoritarian Personality.
AO3 - limitaton of THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
limited explanations (Nazi germany) - SIT better explanation
One limitation is that authoritarianism cannot explain obedient behaviour in the majority of a country’s population.
For example, in pre- war Germany, millions of individuals displayed obedient and anti-Semitic behaviour. This was despite the fact that they must have differed in their personalities in all sorts of ways. It seems extremely unlikely that they could all possess an Authoritarian Personality. An alternative view is that the majority of the German people identified with the anti-Semitic Nazi state, and scapegoated the ‘outgroup’ of Jews, a social identity theory approach.
Therefore, Adorno’s theory is limited because an alternative explanation is much more realistic.
AO3 - limitaton of THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
F scale politically biased - Jahoda & Christie
Another limitation is that the F-scale only measures the tendency towards an extreme form of right-wing ideology.
Christie and Jahoda argued that the F-scale is a politically biased interpretation of Authoritarian Personality. They point out the reality of left-wing authoritarianism in the shape of Russian Bolshevism or Chinese Maoism. In fact, extreme right-wing and left-wing ideologies have a lot in common. For example, they both emphasise the importance of complete obedience to politcal authority.
This means Adorno’s theory is not a comprehensice dispositional explanation that accounts for obedience to authority across the whole political spectrum.
