Dispositional explanations of obedience
Specification: Dispositional explanation for obedience: the Authoritarian Personality.
In addition to situational variables, psychologists have also examined dispositional (internal) factors that contribute to obedience. One particular characteristic is the authoritarian personality, which has been associated with higher levels of obedience.
Adormo et al. (1950) believed that the foundations for an authoritarian personality were laid in early childhood as a result of harsh and strict parenting, which made the child feel that the love of their parents was conditional and dependent upon how they behaved. It is argued that this then creates resentment within the child as they grow up and, since they cannot express it at the time, the feelings are displaced onto others that are seen as 'weak' or 'inferior', as a form of scapegoating.
Key Study: Adorno et al. (1950)
Aim: Adorno et al. (1950) conducted a study using over 2000 middle-class, Caucasian Americans to find out their unconscious views towards other racial groups.
Method: To do this, Adorno and his colleagues developed a number of questionnaires including one called the F-scale, which measures fascist tendencies, as fascism (an extreme right-wing ideology) is thought to be at the core of the authoritarian personality.
Examples of items from the F-scale include:
'Obedience and respect for authority are the most important virtues children should learn'
'Homosexuals are hardly better than criminals and ought to be severely punished'
'There is hardly anything lower than a person who does not feel great love, gratitude and respect for his parents'
Results: Individuals who scored highly on the F-scale and the other questionnaires self-reported identifying with ‘strong’ people and showed disrespect towards the ‘weak’. In addition, those high on the F-scale were status-conscious regarding themselves and others, showing excessing respect to those in higher power. Adorno and colleagues also found that authoritarian people had a particular cognitive style, which categorised other people into specific stereotypical categories, leading to a strong positive correlation between authoritarianism and prejudice.
Conclusion: It was concluded that individuals with an authoritarian personality were more obedient to authority figures and showed extreme submissiveness and respect. They are also uncomfortable with uncertainty, with everything being seen as either right or wrong with no ‘grey areas’ inbetween, demonstrating an inflexible attitude. They, therefore, believe that society requires strong leadership to enforce rigid, traditional views.
Evaluating the Authoritarian Personality
There is research support for the authoritarian personality as an explanation for obedience. Milgram and Elms (1966) conducted post-experimental interviews with participants who were fully obedient in Milgram’s original study, to see if there was a link between high levels of obedience and an authoritarian personality. It was found that obedient participants scored higher on the F-scale in comparison to disobedience participants. Furthermore, the obedient participants were less close to their fathers during childhood and admired the experimenter in Milgram’s study, which was quite opposite for disobedient participants. It was concluded that the obedient participants in Milgram’s original research displayed more characteristics of the authoritarian personality.
There may be individual differences that contribute to the development of the authoritarian personality. Research by Middendorp and Meleon (1990) had found that less-educated people are more likely than well-educated people to display authoritarian personality characteristics. If these claims are correct, then it is possible to conclude that it is not authoritarian personality characteristics alone that lead to obedience, but levels of education.
There may be methodological criticisms associated with the measures used to determine authoritarian personality traits. It is possible that the F-scale suffers from response bias or social desirability, where participants provide answers that are socially acceptable. For example, participants may appear more authoritarian because they believe that their answers are socially ‘correct’ and consequently they are incorrectly classified as authoritarian when they are not. This, therefore, reduced the internal validity of the questionnaire research method used in determining the degree of authoritarianism.
It is argued that the F-scale may in fact represent a political bias. Christie and Jahoda (1954) highlight a weakness in the F-scale for only measuring extreme right-wing ideologies, thus ignoring the role that authoritarianism has also played historically in left-wing politics such as Chinese Maoism and Russian Bolshevism, for example. This identifies a bias in what is believed to be at the core of the authoritarian personality and therefore poses a limitation of Adorno’s theory, since the F-scale cannot account for obedience to authority across the diverse political range.
Possible exam questions
Identify which of the following is not a characteristic of the authoritarian personality: (1 mark)
a) an inflexible viewpoint
b) intolerance of others who are weak
c) contemptuousness towards people of lower social status
d) disobedience to authority
With reference to obedience, explain what is meant by the authoritarian personality. (2 marks)
Briefly describe one dispositional explanation of obedience. (4 marks)
Explain one or more reason why people obey authority. (6 mark)
Adam’s grandmother, Evelyn, holds very old‐fashioned opinions about how children should behave today. She feels that teenagers often do as they please, rather than as they are told, and are disrespectful towards their elders.
Evelyn says to Adam: “It wasn’t like this back in my day. I would have done everything my Mum or Dad told me to without answering back”.
Using your knowledge and understanding of dispositional explanations of obedience, explain Evelyn’s attitudes. (4 marks)
Outline and evaluate the authoritarian personality as a dispositional explanation for obedience. (16 marks)
