SP - Adorno F test - authoritarian

Question 1

what are characteristics of authoritarian personality

Answer 1

• submit to the authority of those in a higher position
• is authoritative toward people of a lower status
• excessive and blind obedience to authority
• conventional and conformists
• suspicious and hostile

Question 2

what does a high score on the test mean

Answer 2

high authoritarian personality = more likely to obey orders

Question 3

causes of authoritarian personality

Answer 3

• strict upbringing by critical and harsh parents
• the individual isnot able to express hostility toward their parents
• the person then transfers this aggression/hostility onto safer targets

Question 4

what is the correlation between authoritarian and prejudice

Answer 4

positive correlation between prejudice and authoritarian personality (correlation may not be causation)

Question 5

how does authoritarian personality explain Milgram’s findings

Answer 5

• majority of the behaviour is extreme by the Ps
• most Ps were blindly obedient
• cannot conclusively say the Ps had authoritarian personalities but is an explanation for their extreme behaviours

Question 6

strength of the authoritarian personality

Answer 6

• supporting research from Milgram
  -> interviewed people who did the original experiment who were blindly obedient and all 20 scored higher on the F-scale than a comparison to 20 disobedient participants

Question 7

weaknesses of the authoritarian personality

Answer 7

• limited explanation -> authoritarianism cannot explain obedient behaviour is the majority of a countries population (WW2 Germany)
• political bias -> measures tendency toward extreme right-wing ideology
  -> Christie and Jahoda argued that the F-scale is a politically biased interpretation of authoritarian personality