Obedience: Dispositional Explanations

Question 1

What is the disposition at explanation of obedience

Answer 1

The Authoritarian Personality - individual factors not environment

Question 2

According to Adorno et al (1950) is unquestioning obedience a psychological disorder

Answer 2

-Yes

Question 3

Who proposed the authoritarian personality

Answer 3

Adorno et al (1950)

Question 4

Are people with an authoritarian personality highly obedient to authority or not

Answer 4

They are highly obedient to authority

Question 5

What are the traits of the authoritarian personality

Answer 5

-Highly obedient to authority/ have exaggerated respect and submissiveness for it

-Coneventionalism

-Express contempt for people of inferior social status/ hold predjudices

-view other groups who don’t show respect for authority as responsible for societies ills

Question 6

When does the authoritarian personality form

Answer 6

In childhood for those with overly strict parents.

E.G those who experienced harsh parenting, strict discipline, expectation of absolute loyalty, impossibly high standards and severe criticism.

Question 7

What parenting style is linked to the development of the authoritarian personality

Answer 7

-Harsh and strict discipline
-Expectation of absolute loyalty
-Impossibly high standards
-severe criticism/ little emotional warmth
-Conditional love- parents love depends on how their child behaves.

Question 8

What does this strict parenting in childhood lead to/ create

Answer 8

-Resentment and hostility. Cannot express these feelings directly against parents due to fear of reprisals

-They displace these feelings onto others who are weaker (scapegoating) - psychodynamic explanation.

Question 9

Aim of Adorno et al’s study into the authoritarian personality

Answer 9

-To investigate unconscious attitudes towards other ethnic groups of more than 2000 MC white Americans

Question 10

Why do authoritarian displace their hostility onto weaker targets

Answer 10

-Fear of parents means they cant express this to them and so they displace it on others
(Psychodynamic explanation)

Question 11

Procedure of Adorno ET al’s study (!950- authoritarian personality

Answer 11

-Several scales were developed. Including the F-scale (potential for fascism scale) - rated on a scale from 1-6 . In this 6=-strongly agree
E.G: - ‘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 12

Findings of Adorno’s (1950) study on authoritarian personality

Answer 12

-Authoritarians- those who scored highly on the F-scale (and others), identified with ‘strong’ people and were contemptuous of the ‘weak’.

-They were conscious of their own and others status, showing excessive respect and deference to those of higher status

-They had a cognitive style- where there was no ‘fuzziness’ between categories of people, with fixed and distinctive stereotypes (prejudices) about other groups.

Question 13

Conclusion of Adorno’s study (1950)

Answer 13

-People with authoritarian personalities are more obedient and prejudiced, likely due to strict childhood upbringing.
-Personality can explain obedience, not just the situation.

Question 14

What is the f-scale

Answer 14

Potential for fascism scale, developed by Adorno

Question 15

Evaluation of dispositional explanation of obedience

Answer 15

-Research support

-Cannot account for widespread obedience
-Political bias
-Methodological flaws

Question 16

Who provides further research support for dispositional explanations

Answer 16

-Elms and Milgram (1966)

Question 17

What did Elms and Milgram (1966) find (+ procedure) supporting dispositional explanations

Answer 17

-Conducted interviews with a subset of participants from Milgram’s obedience study.
-Thos who had been fully obedient scored significantly higher on the F-scale than those who had disobeyed.
-These people also displayed traits like respect for authority, a belief in the need for strong leadership= both key characteristics of the AP.
-Supports Adorno’s view that obedience is linked to certain personality traits.

Question 18

What did Elms and Milgram (1966) also find that doesnt support dispositional explanations

Answer 18

-A closer analysis of sub scales on the F-scale revealed that obedient participants did not show all the expected characteristics of authoritarians. E.G did not glorify their fathers/ have particularly punitive childhoods.
-Suggests there may be some link to AP and obedience but not perfect- a bit more complex

Question 19

Why does the authoritarian personality struggle to account for obedience in entire populations

Answer 19

-E.G During Nazi Germany, millions obeyed fascist orders, supported anti semantic laws and participated in or allowed persecution of minorities. It is not possible to suggest that all these individuals had an authoritarian personality.

-A more convincing alternative= people identified with the Nazi state and conformed to its norms- as the social identity theory explains. This focuses on group processes rather than individual personality and so offers a more realistic explanation of widespread obedience.

-Adorno= overly focused on individual disposition, overlooking other factors.

Question 20

Who argues that the F-scale is politically biased toward detecting only right wing authoritarianism

Answer 20

Christie and Jahoda (1954)

Question 21

How do Christie and Jahoda (1954) criticise the F-scale

Answer 21

-The scale neglects the existence of left wing authoritarianism. E.G those seen under Stalinist Russia and Chinese Maoism. Both right and left wing authoritarian regimes share key features- E.G strict obedience to authority, suppression of dissent, control of the population.

-Suggests that Adorno’s theory= not a comprehensive explanation of obedience and lacks political neutrality. This means its not a valid account as it doesnt account for authoritarian traits across the political/ ideological spectrum

Question 22

Who argues that there are methodological flaws in Adorno’s study, particularly the F-scale

Answer 22

-Greenstein (1969)

Question 23

According to Greenstein (1969) what methodological flaws are within the f-scale and how does this impact the research’s credibility

Answer 23

-The scale is a ‘comedy of methodological errors’. E.G the scale is vulnerable to response bias as agreeing with all statements (acquiescence) can result in a high authoritarian score, regardless of the respondents true beliefs.

-= weakens validity of findings based on the F-scale
-May not be measuring authoritarianism accurately at all. Participants who tend to agree with statements may be falsely classified as authoritarian.

=undermines the credibility of any correlations found between obedience and personality traits.

Question 24

How does the methodological flaw response bias within the use of the F-scale impact the research’s credibility

Answer 24

-= weakens validity of findings based on the F-scale
-May not be measuring authoritarianism accurately at all. Participants who tend to agree with statements may be falsely classified as authoritarian.

=undermines the credibility of any correlations found between obedience and personality traits.