Scott, I appreciate the time pressures you must be under, so I will understand if it takes you a while to respond to what I say below (if you find the time at all). I just want to make a couple of clarifying statements that indicate what my thinking is. I will cut to the main points directly.
On Sun, 16 Sep 2012 15:27:56 -0700, Scott O Lilienfeld wrote: [snip] >(2) Mike Palij raises the interesting question of right-wng authoritarianism >(RWA). We did not examine this variable in our analyses, although we might (?) >be able to address Mike's question in some subsidary analyses (not sure...I'll >poke around in a week or two once the dust settles, as we have a lot of >personality data on each president that might allow us extract estimates of >authoritarianism). I want to make clear that I am working within Bob Altemeyer's theoretical framework which relies on three constructs derived from Adorno et al's original work on The Authoritarian Personality (TAP) which proposed nine constructs. Altermeyer views the three constructs as either dimensions and or facets of a single latent variable. Peter Suedfeld in his review of TAP defines these three aspects as: (1) Convetionalism: Rigid adherence to conventional values (2) Auhtoritarian Submission: Uncritical submission to authorities (3) Authoritarian Agression: Vigilance and punitiveness toward those who violate conventional norms It should be emphasized that a person who is high in Right Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) would be high on each of these dimensions (Sidebar: there is a debate about whether this is a single latent variable as Altemeyer blieves or three correlated latent variables; It could be possible that one is high on two of the dimension, such as concentionalism and authoritarian submission but not on authoritarian agression -- which would suggest Quakers and the Amish might score high on the RWA but they are unlikely to go on a kill-crazy murder spree). The impression that one should perhaps have is that someone who is high on RWA would be highly submissive to people in authority and hostile to people who are unconventional. Whether such a person would use violence against "deviants" would probably depend upon whether an authority figure directed such violence and less on self-motivated violence. However, the Stanford Prison Experiment guard known as "John Wayne" appeared to be submissive not only to authority but was also self-directed in abusing prisoners. This aspect of his behavior is not really captured by RWA but does seem explainable with the construct "Social Dominance Orientation" (SDO). The SDO is a measure of the degree to which one believes in social inequality and some people deserve to dominate or control others. "John Wayne" seems like he might be a double-high. As Altemeyer details in his "The 'Other Authoritarian Pershonality' " chapter, the submissiveness implied by high RWA requires someone to have a high SDO in order to control and direct things. Consequently, people will either tend to be submissive and tend towards high RWA or tend to be dominating and tend toward high SDO. Being high on either one can make for an unpleasant person but the really dangerous person is one who is high on both RWA and SDO. Since most people will tend to be either RWA or SDO, what kind of person who is high on both RWA and SDO? As it turn out, they are a pretty nasty bunch. Altemeyer has done one study of such people which reported here: Bob Altemeyer (2004). Highly Dominating, Highly Authoritarian Personalities. The Journal of Social Psychology, 144(4), 421-448. Abstract |The author considered the small part of the population whose members |score highly on both the Social Dominance Orientation scale and the |Right-Wing Authoritarianism scale. Studies of these High SDO-High RWAs, |culled from samples of nearly 4,000 Canadian university students and over |2600 of their parents and reported in the present article, reveal that these |dominating authoritarians are among the most prejudiced persons in society. |Furthermore, they seem to combine the worst elements of each kind of personality, |being power-hungry, unsupportive of equality, manipulative, and amoral, as |social dominators are in general, while also being religiously ethnocentric |and dogmatic, as right-wing authoritarians tend to be. The author suggested |that, although they are small in number, such persons can have considerable |impact on society because they are well-positioned to become the leaders of |prejudiced right-wing political movements. Indeed, with a high need to dominate people in socially acceptable ways, one would think that double-highs would strive for position of power in society, business, and politics. John Dean was drawn to Altemeyer's research when he returned to the Washington, D.C. scene in the late 1990s and saw that the Republicans and conservatives seem to be qualitatively different from the type of conservative republican he and others of his generation practiced. This lead Dean to write "Conservatives With Conscience" in which he reviewed the history of conservative thought in the U.S. during the 20th century and how it seemed to morph into authoritarian conservatism with the ascendance of Newt Gingrich, Dick Cheney, George Bush, and others in Washington in the early 2000s. See: http://www.amazon.com/Conservatives-Without-Conscience-John-Dean/dp/B001G8WNEG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1347855210&sr=8-1&keywords=conservatives+without+conscience >My own hypothesis, however, would be that RWA is quite >different from fearless dominance, and that it would differ in its implications >for presidential success/failure. I would agree for the simple reason that being high in RWA would tend to make one submissive, not dominant. Being high in SDO would have better implication for presidential success/failure because of the competition to be the "top dog". A "double-high" would be fair more dangerous because lying, manipulating people, and winning at all costs no matter who is hurt is all that matters as long as the double-high is the last man standing. >RWA tends to load positively on the >higher-order dimension that Tellegen terms Constraint (opposite pole is often >called Disinhibition, as in Lee Anna Clark's model), whereas Fearless Dominance >tends to be weakly negatively associated with Constraint (largely due to its >inclusion of fearlessness/reversed harmavoidance, which is a potent Constraint >marker). Moreover (and consistent with the Constraint findings), data suggest >that RWAs are highly sensitive to threat cues, whereas high fearless dominance >scorers tend to be relatively insensitive to threat cues (for example, in >several published studies, they show slightly weaker fear-potentiated startle >to aversive stimuli than do other individuals). But I may be able to examine ?this question indirectly with some of our extant data; not sure. Well, it might be possible to determine who is high on RWA, high on SDO, or "double-highs" (I doubt "double-lows" would become presidents but it does make me wonder about Harry Truman and Gerald Ford and maybe Jimmy Carter). But perhaps that would be a future study. >(3) Mike also asked about the terminological and conceptual differences between >psychopathy and sociopathy. . . . So, depending on whom one >listens to, sociopathy or psychopathy are either (a) the same, (b) different in >etiology, or (c) different in that sociopathy focuses on overt >antisocial/criminal behaviors whereas psychopathy focuses largely on trait-like >dispositions (e.g., lack of guilt, lack of empathy, narcissism, low physical >fear). For these reasons, few experts in the field use the term sociopathy >today. It was my impression that psychopathy was the preferred term and I find it a little strange when someone says sociopathy. Makes me want to ask them if they are familiar with the difference and history. So, whenever you get around to it. -Mike Palij New York University m...@nyu.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=20447 or send a blank email to leave-20447-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
