Acquiescent response set as a measure of acquiescence.

The degree to which acquiescent response set (ARS), as measured psychometrically, is related to behavioral acquiescence, was investigated. Performance on paper-and-pencil tests of acquiescence was found to be related to conformity and compliance in a social situation. The 2 assumed measures of "acquiescence" were not related statistically. From Psyc Abstracts 36:04:4HF55F. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Response set in the F scale.

"An attempt was made to evaluate acquiescence response-set variance in the F scale measure of authoritarian personality trends by employing reversed wordings of items. Response set is found to be an important factor in the F scale which cannot easily be corrected by the practice usual in attitude test construction of employing both positively and negatively worded items. Evidence seems to indicate in addition that the content component of the F scale is correlated with the acquiescence response set." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acquiescent response set as a measure of acquiescence: Further evidence.

This study reconfirms evidence that acquiescent response set (ARS) does not reflect an underlying personality tendency to conform or acquiesce as assumed in the literature. ARS scores derived from 3 additional types of instruments failed to correlate with acquiescence to simulated judgments of others in an Aschlike conformity situation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The relationship between response style and personality variables: I. The measurements of response acquiescence.

"This study is the first in a series of investigations designed to evaluate the currently popular hypothesis that response styles are based on personality traits, and thereby have utility in personality assessment. Responses of 218 subjects in six different scales of acquiescence, varying in degree of meaningful verbal content, were intercorrelated. The results revealed that only those scales containing similar verbal content in the items were related. Apparently verbal content is quite important, whereas the amount of structure of the items is less important in determining agreement responses, than has been previously supposed. The data are interpreted as suggesting that there is no general trait of response acquiescence independent of specific instruments used to measure it." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personality item difficulty and acquiescence.

This study deals with relations between acquiescence and 3 measures of personality item difficulty: controversiality, response latency, and confidence in accuracy of answer. Median ratings of confidence in answers to 110 MMPI items correlated -.62 with a measure of item controversiality, confirming the hypothesis that controversial items tend to be difficult to answer. Low-confidence items elicited acquiescence. In a 2nd sample of Ss, items low in confidence took longer to answer than contrasting high-confidence items. The low-confidence long-latency items were affected by acquiescence; the others were not. Results show that acquiescence occurs with difficult rather than easy inventory material. Response latency and subjective confidence seem logically superior to controversiality as measures of item difficulty. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Components of variance due to acquiescence and content in the F scale measure of authoritarianism.

"This paper presents a method for computing the amount of acquiescence response set variance and content variance in an opinion questionnaire of true false or agree-disagree format. The method is used to reanalyze the results of recently published investigations of acquiescence response set occurring in the California F Scale measure of authoritarianism. For raw data, the method uses scores on the scale as originally constituted as well as on scales of reversed items obtained from the same group of subjects." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social desirability and agreement response set.

In this paper, Edwards and Walker reanalyze the Couch and Keniston data (see 36: 3HF75C) by performing a different method of rotation on the matrix. This analysis eventuated in only 2 factors, a social desirability set and an "acquiescence factor," with OAS items heavily loaded on both factors. Edwards and Walker reconclude that OAS may be loaded with, confounded with, or misidentified with items of the social desirability set. From Psyc Abstracts 36:01:3HF80E. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Methodological considerations in the assessment of acquiescence in the MA and SD scale.

This paper cites certain limitations in making assessment of acquiescence in personality scales by the use of reversed items and the Helmstadter technique. Inadequate item reversals may have contributed to the interpretation by Adams and Kirby (1936) that the SD scale was confounded with acquiescence, a finding not supported here when original items only are used. A criterion of adequate reversal, derived from SD research, may aid in developing "balanced" scales. Precautions in making acquiescence interpretations from the Helmstadter model include the confounding of content and set scores in the formulas, the confounding of response style and trait responses, lack of evidence on what the set score measures, and the uncertainty over the nature of acquiescence and how to measure it. (27 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Anality, political aggression, acquiescence, and questionnaire construction.

A criticism of methodological deficiencies in Rabinowitz's attempt to demonstrate that Farber's "reported correlation between anality and political aggression can be explained away as a result of an acquiescence response set." From Psyc Abstracts 36:01:1HE78F. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The psychological meaning of acquiescence set for authoritarianism.

An especially constructed information test of acquiescence, Cohn's Plus Scale of acquiescence, the F scale, and the Minnesota Teacher Attitude Inventory were found to correlate significantly with each other "in directions expected on the basis of the acquiescence set." The results suggest that such inventories "are advisedly constructed primarily of 'negative' items. The psychological meaning of acquiescence resembles that of authoritarianism, conformity, low ego strength, and low intelligence." 15 references. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acquiescence and the vanishing variance component.

An experimental (reversal) group took both the MMPI and a reversed form of the MMPI. A control (reliability) group took the MMPI twice. All tests were scored on 67 scales, with keying reversed for the reversed MMPI. Only trivial proportions of the response variance were found to be attributable to acquiescence for any of the uniformly keyed scales employed. Included were the scales most often suggested as measures of acquiescence: A, R, B, Bn, Rb, Acq, At, Dy-3, Deviant True, Deviant False, and Total True. Conclusion: acquiescence is an unimportant determinant of MMPI responses, including responses to items on "acquiescence" scales. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is the F scale irreversible?

"Four recent studies which have found a lack of positive correlations between the F scale and scales of reversed items were examined. It was argued that the attempts at reversals were often characterized by items that were not psychologically opposed to the original items… . A new set of items designed to overcome some of our objections was developed… . A method for determining the significance of response set was developed and data from an additional representative nation-wide sample of adults with a college background indicated no significant degree of acquiescence… . It is concluded that the data do not support the identification of acquiescence with authoritarianism." (26 ref.) From Psyc Abstracts 36:01:1HF43C. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social desirability and acquiescence in response to personality items.

Acquiescence has been defined in 2 ways. Either this response set operates only when items are ambiguous, or acquiescent tendencies operate independently of item content. These 2 definitions were related to the social desirability variable. 10 independent 40-item scales were constructed from MMPI items, systematically varying the social desirability content and the True-False keying. Responses were obtained from 227 Ss. Of the 35 intercorrelations which were predicted to be different by the 2 hypotheses, 21 supported the social desirability hypothesis and 14 supported the acquiescence hypothesis. A tendency to say False rather than True was noted. This response set to deny appeared relatively weak compared to the tendency to respond in a socially desirable manner. (21 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development and evaluation of a scale for measuring social acquiescence.

"A 56-item scale of social acquiescence has been developed by internal consistency item analysis. It has a reliability above .90 and correlates .95 with the tendency to accept or reject 300 proverbs, aphorisms, and similar statements. According to population differences and correlations between scales and various personality and intelligence measures, one who earns a high Social Acquiescence score resembles Sinclair Lewis' 'Babbitt'—an unquestioning conformer to social demands." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Acquiescence and the MMPI: An item reversal approach.

An item-reversal technique was employed to assess acquiescence on the MMPI. Reverse items were constructed for 12 MMPI scales and the 2 forms, standard and reverse, were administered in counterbalanced order to 54 psychiatric patients and 35 normal Ss. True-keyed and false-keyed subscales were scored separately to highlight acquiescence effects. The correlations between true and false subscales and their reverse forms tended, with few exceptions, to approximate the test-retest reliabilities of these scales particularly for the normal Ss. The results were interpreted to indicate that factor analytic techniques have exaggerated the role of acquiescence on the MMPI. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Authoritarianism or acquiescence?

The hypothesis that scores on the F scale and similarly constructed inventories are primarily measures of acquiescence rather than authoritarianism is tested by testing subjects on a G scale composed of opposite statements to those of the F scale. Response set to acquiescence was measured by obtaining each individual's tendency to support both F and G scale statements. If individual fluctuations from one scale to another are ignored, they tend to differ significantly from each other in tendency to acquiesce. Response set to acquiescence increased as items became more ambivalent. It is suggested that a much more parsimonious explanation can be given to account for the positive relations between authoritarianism, misanthropy, xenophobia, and ethnocentrism. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Relationship between probability of item endorsement and Social Desirability scale value for high and low groups on Edwards' SD scale.

The SD scale and a set of 150 items from the EPPS were administered to 237 college students. Ss were divided into 3 groups on the basis of their scores on the SD scale. For each group the regression line of probability of endorsement on social desirability scale values of the EPPS items was obtained. The form of the regression lines was that predicted by the social desirability interpretation of the SD scale, rather than that predicted by the acquiescence interpretaton. Contrary to the acquiescence interpretation, the mean probability of a True response to the EPPS items was not greater for the Low SD group than for the High SD group. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Set and content scores for personality scales and response styles in the MMPI.

Set and content scores from 3 MMPI scales, Edwards SD scale, the Manifest Anxiety scale (MA), and the Masculinity-Femininity (Mf) scale, were derived by an adaptation of the Helmstadter technique for obtaining separate (acquiescence) set and content scores from personality scales. In a factor analysis of scores for 150 male college Ss on 54 variables, the MA-Set and SD-Set variables defined a common factor, but only the Mf-Set variable loaded the 2nd, or acquiescence, factor. The inconsistency of these results indicated that the set formula was not consistently measuring, or reflecting, acquiescence, or any other construct, and furthermore suggested the need for caution in making acquiescence interpretations based on the Helmstadter procedure. Some speculations were advanced to account for the disparate results of the set variables, such as the degree of true-false and SD-SUD keying in the "parent" scales. A systematic variation of such scale keying in future research may indicate what the set procedure is measuring and have potential implications for the clarification of the nature of acquiescence in personality scales. (34 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Delay of gratification, need for achievement, and acquiescence in another culture.

The present research extends the knowledge of that found in other investigations (Levine, et al, 1957, 1959; Singer, et al, 1956; Spivack, et al, 1959) regarding the capacity to delay gratification and the implication for ego psychology. The present research utilizes direct measures of approach to delay or not immediate gratification, as gleaned from a conflict situation, and relates this to need for achievement (as measured from fantasy material as described by McClelland, et al, 1953) and acquiescence (Bass, 1956). Trinidadian Ss were utilized; the postulated positive relationship between the capacity for delay and the need for achievement, and the inverse relationship between capacity to delay and acquiescence, were found. The study also points up a methodologically simple way of getting at capacity for delay which may be used cross-culturally. From Psyc Abstracts 36:04:4HJ43M. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)