AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY

[bdamomma]

just some information about Authoritarian personality

http://www.gossamer-wings.com/soc/Notes/race/tsld007.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authoritarian_Personality


http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Authoritarian_personality

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_Wing_Authoritarianism

Right Wing Authoritarianism

Right Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) is a psychological personality variable or "ideological attitude'.

It is defined as the convergence of three attitudinal clusters in an individual:

1. Authoritarian submission—a high degree of submission to the authorities who are perceived to be established and legitimate in the society in which one lives. (it is good to have a strong authoritarian leader)

2. Authoritarian aggression—a general aggressiveness, directed against various persons, that is perceived to be sanctioned by established authorities. (they believe that it is ok to be cruel to those who do not follow the rules)

3. Conventionalism—a high degree of adherence to the social conventions that are perceived to be endorsed by society and its established authorities. (traditional ways are best)

High scorers on the RWA scale tend to have a rigid, often fundamentally religious view of morality tending towards as homophobic, racist and patriarchal beliefs. High RWA scorers tend to support authority figures, such as the government, taking action to censor certain social groups (often those who are viewed as physically or morally threatening).


Significant Correlations
Altemeyer discovered a wide range of correlations over the years, which can be organized into four general categories.

1: Faulty reasoning -- RWA’s are more likely to:

Make many incorrect inferences from evidence.
Hold contradictory ideas leading them to ‘speak out of both sides of their mouths.’
Uncritically accept that many problems are ‘our most serious problem.’
Uncritically accept insufficient evidence that supports their beliefs.
Uncritically trust people who tell them what they want to hear.
Use many double standards in their thinking and judgements.

2: Hostility Toward Outgroups -- RWA’s are more likely to:

Weaken constitutional guarantees of liberty, such as the Bill of Rights.
Punish severely ‘common’ criminals in a role-playing situation.
Admit they get personal pleasure from punishing such people.
Be prejudiced against many racial, ethnic, nationalistic, and linguistic minorities.
Be hostile toward homosexuals.
Volunteer to help the government persecute almost anyone.
Be mean-spirited toward those who have made mistakes and suffered.

3: Profound Character Flaws -- RWA’s are more likely to:

Be dogmatic.
Be zealots.
Be hypocrites.
Be bullies when they have power over others.
Help cause and inflame intergroup conflict.
Seek dominance over others by being competitive and destructive in situations requiring cooperation.

4: Blindness To One’s Own Failings -- RWA’s are more likely to:

Believe they have no personal failings.
Avoid learning about their personal failings.
Be highly self-righteous.
Use religion to erase guilt over their acts and to maintain their self-righteousness.
RWA is also correlated with political conservatism—not so much at the level of ordinary voters, but with increasing strength as one moves from voters to activists to office holders, and then from lower to higher-level officeholders.

Altemeyer's own statement about this may be worth noting (From p. 239 of "Enemies of Freedom"):

"right-wing authoritarians show little preference in general for any political party".

So the type of conservatism studied by Altemeyer is a rather peculiar subset of it -- one with virtually no everyday political relevance. Like the Adorno F scale which was its ultimate inspiration, the RWA scale would seem to tap a particularly old-fashioned type of conservatism