Authoritarian personality, locus of control, social support

What is the authoritarian personality?

A type of personality that Adornoa argued is escpecially susceptoble to obeying authoruty figures- also thought to be submissive to superiors and dismissive of inferiors

What did Adorno believe?

• Wanted to understand WW2 anti-semitism- drew very different conclusions to Milhram- believed high level of obedience basically a mental health confition, causes lie in disposition

• People with an AP show extreme respect and submissiveness to authority, view society as ‘weaker’ than it was, believing need for strong and powerful leaders to enforce traditional values e.g. family/country love- characteristics make a person more likely to obey orders from authority

  • show a contempt for people with an ‘inferior’ social status- inflexible outlook on world- black and white- discomfort at uncertainty- belief that the ‘other’ is responsible for societal ills- convenient target for authoritarians who are likely to obey even destructive authority (e.g. Nazi Germany)

What is the origin of the AP?

• Adorno believed formed in childhood- largely due to harsh parenting featuring v. strict discipline, exp[ectation of absolute loyality, impossibly high standatds and severe criticism- conditional lov

  • experiences create resentment and hostility that cannot be expressed to parent- displaced onto ‘inferiors’- scapegoting- explains why central feature of AP is hatred towards societal ‘other’

What was Adorno et al. (1950)’s baseline procedure?

Studied more than 2000 middle class white Americans and their unconscious attitudes towards minotitu ethnic groups- developed several measurements e.g. F-scale 

What were Adorno’s findings?

• People with authoritarian leanings (high on the F-scale etc) identified with ‘strong’ people, generally hated ‘weak’- v. conscious of the status of themselves and others, showed extreme respect, deference and servility to those of higher status- basic traits of obedience

• authoritarian people- certain cognitive style, no ‘fuzziness’ between categories of people- fixed and distinctive stereotypes- strong positive correlation between authoritarianism and prejudice

What are the strengths of the AP?

• research support- evidence from Milgram supporting AP- (Elms and Milgram 1966)- interviewed small sample of original fully obedient pps- completed F-scale and other measures- 20 obedient pps scored significantly higher on the overall F-scale than 20 disobedient pps- clearly differed in terms of authoritarianism- supports Adorno’s view that obedient people may show similar characteristics to people with an AP

  • CP- researchers analysed individual subscale- obedient participants had a number of characteristics unusual for authoritarians e.g. generally did not glorify their fathers, experience unusual levels of punishment in childhood or have particularly hostile attitudes towards their mothers

    •  Complex link between obedience and authoritarianism- obedience participants too unlike authoritarianism to be a useful predictor of obedience

What are the limitations of the AP?

• AP cannot explain obedience in the majority of a country’s population all differing in their personalities- extremely unlike all possess an AP- alternative view- majority of German people identified  with the antisemitic Nazi state and scapegoated Jewish people (social identity theory approach)- much more realistic

• Incomplete explanation- only captures one type of authoritarianism- Mallians et al. (2020)- F-scale measures tendency towards extreme right-wing measures submission and traditionalism, whereas only submission is strong in extreme left-wing e.g. Mao- ‘submission’ is the key element in authoritarian behaviour- Adorno’s theory cannot explain all historical incidents of destructive obedience

• Greenstein (1969)- F-scale seriously flawed- can get a high score just by clicking agree- anyone with this response bias is assessed as having an AP- BUT F-scale provided basis of explanation of obedience based on AP

What is social support?

The presence of people who resist pressures to conform or obey can help others to do the same- act as ‘models’ to show others that resistance to social influence is possible

How can we resist conformity?

Other people present who are not conforming, even if they are not doing the ‘right’ things (e.g Asch’s research)- someone not following the majority acts as social support- enables naive pp to feel free to follow own conscience- confederate acts as ‘model’ of independent behaviour- dissent gives rise to more dissent, majority no longer unanimous

How can we resist obedience?

Another person seen to disobey- Milgram's variations- obedience down from 65% to 10% when genuine pp joined by disobedient confederate- pp may not follow the disobedient person’s behaviour but disobedience acts as a ‘model’ of dissent for the participant to copy- frees him to act from his own conscience- disobedient model challenging legitimacy of authority, easier for others to disobey

What are the characteristics/ implications of an internal LoC?

• Taking personal resposnibility for own decisions, achievement oriented, self confident, intelligent

• More able to resist social influence- base decisions on their own beliefs, less reliance on social approval

What are the properties and implications of an external LoC?

• Believe consequences out of their control, determined by e.g. fate, destiny, bad luck

• More likely to conform and obey- feel less personal responsibility for thir actions, more relaint on others, less able to resist pressure

What are the srengths of LoC?

• Holland (1967)- 37% internals refused to obey to maximum vs 23% of externals- link between internal LOC and resistance to obedience, but despite difference between internal and external, other factors also clearly acting- shows LOC is a FACTOR

• Gamson et al (1982)- oil smear campaign- higher level or resistance- 88%- pps in a group so could discuss instructions- peer support can lead to disobedience by undermining legitimacy of an authority figure

• research evidence of positive effects of social support- Albrecht et al (2006)- Teen Fresh Start USA- eight week programme to help pregnant adolescents 14-19 resist peer pressure to smoke- special support from slightly older ‘buddy’- participants w. A buddy significantly less likely to smoke than control group with no buddy

• Social support explanation- Allen and Levine (1971)- social support can help individuals resist influence of a group- Asch-type task- dissenter was someone with apparently good eyesight, 64% refused to conform, but with no supporter only 3% resisted

  • HOWEVER study also showed that social support doesn’t always help- when the dissenter obviously had poor eyesight (thick glasses), resistance was only 36%

• Research evidence link between LOC and RSI- Murphy et al (2021)- investigation of social and psychological differences in vaccine hesitant/ resistant/ accepting people in the UK and Ireland- Internal LOC higher in hesitant or resistant people- more disobedient, maybe partly explained by reduced perception in personal risk

  • Shows RSI related to LOC increases validity of LOC as explanation for disobedience

What are the limitations of LoC?

• Evidence challenging link between ROC and resistance- Twenge et al (2004)- analysed data from LOC studies in US over 42 year period (1960-2002)- over time span, people became more resistant to obedience but also more external- surprising outcome, would have expected more internal

  • This suggests LOC is not a valid explanation for why people resist social influence, as if LOC was a valid explanation, you would expect to see a correlation between increasing internal loci of control and increasing resistance to obedience. Indicates the role of other factors and/or mitigating factors

• Limited role of LOC- Rotter (1982) points out that LOC’s role depends on the situation- LOC only significantly affects behavior in new situations- if you have conformed or obeyed in a specific situation in the past, you are likely to do so in that situation again regardless of high internal or high external LOC

• Oliner & Oliner (1988)-  suggests that LOC is useful in explaining resistance to social influence, as those with a highe internal LOC were less likely to follow orders- HOWEVER- other factors may have also caused obedience in WW2, cannot prove LOC only factor- difficult to exclude confounding factors but very important real world applicatyions as internal LOC contributes to resisting destructive authority.