Review of Right-Wing Authoritarianism.

Reviews the book, Right-Wing Authoritarianism by Bob Altemeyer (1981). This book deals with a particularly timely and troublesome social phenomenon. Rightwing authoritarianism as a political movement appears to be on the rise again in Western democracies. The author is to be commended on not only tackling a difficult and socially relevant topic, but also in being willing to delve into an area of research that has produced a plethora of ambiguous results. The major goal of the author is to provide a conceptual and operational breakthrough by first offering a critique of why previous efforts have been doomed to failure and then providing a constructive alternative program for the study of authoritarianism. In general this goal is successfully achieved. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Altemeyer replies.

Replies to commentary by J. J. Ray (see record 2007-08928-001) regarding the current author's book, Enemies of freedom: Understanding right wing authoritarianism (see record 1988-98419-000). The foremost of Ray's six criticisms is that "insofar as (I have) studied anything at all, (I have) probably studied some form of conservatism." The constructs of "right-wing authoritarianism" and "conservatism" can be defined as one wishes, and one can declare that they are the same thing. I prefer to draw several conceptual distinctions however, perhaps because one brand of "conservatism", especially visible in the United States, resents government authority. Next, Professor Ray quite correctly points out that my explanation of the development of personal authoritarianism ignored genetic possibilities. The twins-studies have caught me completely flat-footed, with my back turned, though I would find evidence for a DNA-based explanation of authoritarianism quite exciting. As for attitudes toward authorities, I suspect they do wobble some during adolescence. However, neither of the two adult studies Professor Ray cites shows "a general attitude toward authority does not exist." If anything, they suggest it does. Professor Ray says the consistency of the RWA Scale only occurs because my item selection procedures have created a distortion of the real world, a world of my own "from which the most disturbing outside information has been rigorously excluded." In fact, the covariation among items mentioning different kinds of authorities goes back to the Berkeley F Scale. Finally, Professor Ray concludes that I am studying some nonpolitical form of conservatism, because the RWA Scale gives "virtually no prediction of right-wing political preference." Data is presented to dispute this allegation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Authoritarian dynamics and unethical decision making: High social dominance orientation leaders and high right-wing authoritarianism followers.

When dilemmas require trade-offs between profits and ethics, do leaders high in social dominance orientation (SDO) and followers high in right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) make decisions that are more unethical than those made by others? This issue was explored in 4 studies with female participants performing managerial role-playing tasks. First, dyads comprising a person who was either low or high in SDO and a person who was either low or high in RWA negotiated for a leadership position. People high in SDO were more likely to obtain leader positions than to obtain follower positions. No other effects were significant. Second, leaders high in SDO partnered with an agreeable (confederate) follower made decisions that were more unethical than those of leaders low in SDO. Third, followers high in RWA were more acquiescent to and supportive of an unethical (confederate) leader than were followers low in RWA. Fourth, high SDO leader-high RWA follower dyads made decisions that were more unethical than those made in role-reversed dyads because leaders had more influence. Implications of these results for conceptualizing SDO, RWA, and authoritarian dynamics are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comment on "Right-wing authoritarianism."

Canadian scholarship has recently been honoured in that Bob Altemeyer's book, Enemies of Freedom: Understanding Right wing authoritarianism (see record 1988-98419-000) received the 1988 prize for behavioural science research, awarded by the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The book has also received a number of favourable reviews. Ray feels that some comments on the limitations of the book are needed to balance the account, and submits that, in fact, the book is a complete failure as far as achieving what it set out to achieve is concerned. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conceptualizing political orientation in Canadian political candidates: A tale of two (correlated) dimensions.

Political orientation is often operationalized as a unidimensional left–right continuum. However, some research suggests that this conceptualization might be overly simplistic. The present study examined the structure of political orientation in a sample of 190 politicians who were candidates in the 2006 Canadian federal election. Participants completed measures of attitudes toward specific political issues (social conservatism issues, economic competition issues), ideological beliefs (right-wing authoritarianism, social dominance orientation), and abstract values (conservation, self-enhancement) as indicators of political orientation. Confirmatory factor analyses demonstrated that the structure of political orientation was explained best by 2 moderately correlated dimensions: social left–right and economic left–right. Differences in the political orientation indicators between political parties are also discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Attitudes: Their structure, function, and consequences.

Reviews the book, Attitudes: Their structure, function, and consequences edited by Russell H. Fazio and Richard E. Petty (see record 2007-02438-000). Fazio and Pety developed a text of key readings on attitude structure, function, and outcomes. Indeed, the size of the literature under review led the editors to divide the work into two sections: one text targeting attitude structure and function and a second (forthcoming) volume targeting the attitudes and persuasion literature. The text we are reviewing is the first in this two-volume set. Despite the difficulty of the task Fazio and Petty set for themselves, the result is a book that is appropriate for an audience ranging from the advanced undergraduate to the professional academic. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Attitudes toward persons with disabilities.

Reviews the book, Attitudes toward persons with disabilities by Harold E. Yuker (see record 1988-97173-000). In summer, 1986, Harold E. Yuker, one of the well known pioneers of the study of attitudes toward persons with disabilities, convened some of the best scholars and experts in this field to a conference at Hofstra University. The main purpose of this book, a product of the Hofstra conference, is to provide readers with various perspectives on the different aspects of the study of attitudes toward persons with disabilities. The book includes 19 chapters organized into five parts. In Part One, Beatrice Wright presents the concept of the fundamental negative bias toward persons with physical disabilities and provides an extended analysis of the different aspects of this phenomenon in both research and clinical practice. Part Two contains six expertly written papers on the sources of attitudes. The third part of the book focuses on measurement problems. The fourth part of the book is concerned with attitudes of specific groups. Part five shifts to issues related to attitude change. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attitudes and behaviors toward lesbian and gay persons: Critical correlates and mediated relations.

With data from 255 college women and men, this study examined the relative strength of relations of right-wing authoritarianism (RWA), social dominance orientation (SDO), and traditional gender role attitudes (TGRA) with anti-lesbian and gay (LG) attitudes. This study also tested the mediating role of anti-LG attitudes in the relations of RWA, SDO, and TGRA with LG-rejecting and -affirming behaviors. Results pointed to the importance of the relations of TGRA and RWA, but not SDO, with anti-LG attitudes and LG-rejecting behaviors. Furthermore, anti-LG attitudes mediated the links of RWA and TGRA with LG-rejecting behaviors. With regard to LG-affirming behaviors, TGRA was the only unique correlate, and anti-LG attitudes did not serve as a mediator. Implications for future research and practice are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Social psychology of absenteeism.

Reviews the book, Social psychology of absenteeism by J. K. Chadwick-Jones, N. Nicholson, and C. Brown (1982). This book reports cumulative investigations of voluntary (non-medical) absenteeism in 21 English and Canadian organizations, each of which was studied for a period of one year. The organizations included blue- and white-collar occupations in manufacturing, public transport, banking, and nursing. Data were collected from the personnel records of over 6,000 employees, and job-satisfaction questionnaires were completed by over 1,500 industrial workers; 488 of these were interviewed, as were 231 white-collar employees. In short, this was a large-scale study. It was undertaken because of the authors' disenchantment with the state of the literature on absenteeism. The work of Chadwick-Jones and his colleagues has been at the cutting edge of research on absenteeism for the past fifteen years. This book enhances that record and is mandatory reading for all those who have a serious interest in absenteeism in industry. It also would make worthwhile reading for those with just a casual interest in the field. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Relative versus absolute measures of explicit attitudes: Implications for predicting diverse attitude-relevant criteria.

The authors report 4 studies exploring a self-report strategy for measuring explicit attitudes that uses "relative" ratings, in which respondents indicate how favorable or unfavorable they are compared with other people. Results consistently showed that attitudes measured with relative scales predicted relevant criterion variables (self-report of behavior, measures of knowledge, peer ratings of attitudes, peer ratings of behavior) better than did attitudes measured with more traditional "absolute" scales. The obtained pattern of differences in prediction by relative versus absolute measures of attitudes did not appear to be attributable to differential variability, social desirability effects, the clarity of scale-point meanings, the number of scale points, or overlap with subjective norms. The final study indicated that relative measures induce respondents to consider social comparison information and behavioral information when making their responses more than do absolute measures, which may explain the higher correlations between relative measures of attitudes and relevant criteria. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Social Psychology (2nd Edition).

Reviews the book, Social Psychology (2nd edition) by William W. Lambert and Wallace E. Lambert, edited by Richard Lazarus (1973). This second edition is a major updating and enlargement of the original (1964) edition, containing about 50% more pages and a good deal of new material. In essence, then, it is a new book and it deserves to be read as such. As with all volumes in this Foundations of Modern Psychology Series, the Lambert & Lambert text is intended for the introductory student. In six short chapters, the authors cover the major basic areas of enquiry--socialisation, social perception, attitudes, interaction, the individual in the group, and socio-cultural perspectives. At the risk of appearing unduly concerned with a Canadian point of view, it is of interest to note that this text is the first to pay attention to ideas and findings about social behaviour in this country. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Pure Types are Rare.

Reviews the book, Pure Types Are Rare by Irwin Silverman. This is a provocative book. In it, Silverman, with ambitious abandon, sets out to denude the "medical model of mental illness" of its Emperor's Clothing. Unceremoniously, Silverman strips away the clothing of the medical model: psychiatric diagnoses are unreliable and invalid, labels are applied at the whim of the psychodiagnostician; mental illness bears no resemblance to physical disease, mental "illness" is a myth; biological causes of mental illness do not exist; biological treatments serve only to mask the real social and psychological causes of madness; psychotherapy is no treatment at all, there are no "treatment" principles or methods. What remains after Silverman's assault on the medical model? The medical model as Emperor remains, albeit naked. Silverman views the medical model and the entire mental health enterprise as an Emperor indeed: it is a political ideology that serves to control the socially and economically impoverished. Silverman goes on to offer an alternative to the medical model, a social psychological perspective on madness. He favours a view of madness as a social role which may be adopted by a person in the process of coping with life conflict. Silverman attacks practically all of the important assumptions and practices of psychiatry and clinical psychology. His radical social perspective on mental illness is at such odds with the common psychological perspective that, obviously, most psychologists, be they practitioners or researchers, will not like this book. Silverman insists on too radical a departure from our common beliefs. Despite the reviewer's disagreement with Silverman's radical social perspective on mental illness, he thinks that this is a worthwhile book. While the reviewer disagrees with his premise that clinical practices are exclusively or primarily political in essence, the reviewer does agree that there are essential social and political functions served by our practices. Silverman relentlessly and effectively uncovers important social and political meanings of diagnostic and treatment practices. This, according to the reviewer, is the strength of the book. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Understanding knowledge effects on attitude-behavior consistency: The role of relevance, complexity, and amount of knowledge.

The role of properties of attitude-relevant knowledge in attitude- behavior consistency was explored in 3 experiments. In Experiment 1, attitudes based on behaviorally relevant knowledge predicted behavior better than attitudes based on low-relevance knowledge, especially when people had time to deliberate. Relevance, complexity, and amount of knowledge were investigated in Experiment 2. It was found that complexity increased attitude- behavior consistency when knowledge was of low-behavioral relevance. Under high-behavioral relevance, attitudes predicted behavior well regardless of complexity. Amount of knowledge had no effect on attitude- behavior consistency. In Experiment 3, the findings of Experiment 2 were replicated, and the complexity effect was extended to behaviors of ambiguous relevance. Together, these experiments support an attitude inference perspective, which holds that under high deliberation conditions, people consider the behavioral relevance and dimensional complexity of knowledge underlying their attitudes before deciding to act on them. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

“Predicting student attitudes about racial diversity and gender equity”: Correction to Cokley et al. (2010).

Reports an error in "Predicting student attitudes about racial diversity and gender equity" by Kevin O. Cokley, Kimberly Tran, Brittany Hall-Clark, Collette Chapman, Luana Bessa, Angela Finley and Michael Martinez (Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, 2010[Sep], Vol 3[3], 187-199). There are two errors in Table 2 under the RWA heading and the Cog-gender heading. The necessary changes are provided in the erratum. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2010-18201-006.) Factors related to attitudes about racial diversity and gender equity were examined in an ethnically diverse sample of 432 college students (167 European Americans, 83 African Americans, 81 Asian Americans, and 82 Hispanic Americans). In addition to variables of self-interest (i.e., ethnicity, gender, and political views), social ideology (i.e., social dominance orientation, right-wing authoritarianism) and personality traits (openness to experience) were uniquely predictive of attitudes about racial diversity and gender equity. Hierarchical regressions revealed that social dominance orientation most strongly predicted racial attitudes, while right-wing authoritarianism most strongly predicted gender attitudes. Implications for diversity education efforts related to prejudice reduction are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Understanding and using the Implicit Association Test: III. Meta-analysis of predictive validity.

This review of 122 research reports (184 independent samples, 14,900 subjects) found average r = .274 for prediction of behavioral, judgment, and physiological measures by Implicit Association Test (IAT) measures. Parallel explicit (i.e., self-report) measures, available in 156 of these samples (13,068 subjects), also predicted effectively (average r = .361), but with much greater variability of effect size. Predictive validity of self-report was impaired for socially sensitive topics, for which impression management may distort self-report responses. For 32 samples with criterion measures involving Black–White interracial behavior, predictive validity of IAT measures significantly exceeded that of self-report measures. Both IAT and self-report measures displayed incremental validity, with each measure predicting criterion variance beyond that predicted by the other. The more highly IAT and self-report measures were intercorrelated, the greater was the predictive validity of each. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of The Social Context of Premarital Sexual Permissiveness.

Reviews the book, The Social Context of Premarital Sexual Permissiveness by Ira L. Reiss (1967). There seems little doubt that Reiss' sociological study has made an important contribution to the understanding of sexual attitudes in America today. The study does not investigate sexual behavior itself, although one stated purpose of the project was to examine the sociocultural correlates of premarital permissiveness. Reiss investigated attitudes toward premarital permissiveness and, as he himself mentions at one point, the relation between attitudes and actual behavior on this, as on other topics, may be inconsistent. Reiss grouped his data under seven propositions to elucidate the relationship between attitudes toward sexual permissiveness and sociocultural correlates. These seven propositions are then integrated into a theory: Two main factors are thought to contribute to premarital permissiveness--the influence of the family, and the influence of peers during the courtship period. While this theory falls short of adequately explaining premarital permissive behavior, it does suggest a framework for the future testing of specific hypotheses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Consistency in Social Behavior: The Ontario Symposium (Vol. 2).

Reviews the book, Consistency in Social Behavior: The Ontario Symposium (Vol. 2), edited by Mark P. Zanna, E. Tory Higgins, and C. Peter Herman (1982). The volume has two major foci: the consistency of the individual's behaviour in different situations, and the consistency between people's attitudes and their behaviour. These issues have been classic concerns, respectively, of personality and social psychologists. Once upon a time, we as psychologists naively assumed the existence of both forms of consistency. But in the last two decades our faith has been shaken. For the most part, the participants in the Second Ontario Symposium help to restore our faith. But, in doing so, they provide a more sophisticated, qualified view of consistency. In conclusion, this set of papers is a record of, and a testimonial to, the success of the Second Ontario Symposium on Personality and Social Psychology. It is the present reviewer's hope that this biannual event will be continued in the years ahead. Clearly, the Second Symposium was worth the effort involved! (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Predicting student attitudes about racial diversity and gender equity.

[Correction Notice: An erratum for this article was reported in Vol 4(3) of Journal of Diversity in Higher Education (see record 2011-16523-001). There are two errors in Table 2 under the RWA heading and the Cog-gender heading. The necessary changes are provided in the erratum.] [Correction Notice: An erratum for this article was reported in Journal of Diversity in Higher Education on August 1 2011 (see record 2011-16523-001). There are two errors in Table 2. Under the RWA heading, the SDO row should have indicated a positive correlation of .266**, not -.266**. Under the Cog-gender heading, the SDO row should have indicated a negative correlation of -.438**, not .438**.] Factors related to attitudes about racial diversity and gender equity were examined in an ethnically diverse sample of 432 college students (167 European Americans, 83 African Americans, 81 Asian Americans, and 82 Hispanic Americans). In addition to variables of self-interest (i.e., ethnicity, gender, and political views), social ideology (i.e., social dominance orientation, right-wing authoritarianism) and personality traits (openness to experience) were uniquely predictive of attitudes about racial diversity and gender equity. Hierarchical regressions revealed that social dominance orientation most strongly predicted racial attitudes, while right-wing authoritarianism most strongly predicted gender attitudes. Implications for diversity education efforts related to prejudice reduction are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Social psychology.

Reviews the book, Social psychology by Daniel Perlman and P. Chris Cozby (1983). In agreeing to co-edit a text sponsored by The Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues, Daniel Perlman and P. Chris Cozby accepted the challenge of producing a non-traditional text aimed at a very traditional market. Their self-described "most salient goal" was "to focus attention on social issues and problems." They recognized, however, that that goal could only be achieved by meeting "the needs of students." The co-editors additionally accepted the implicit task of counterbalancing social psychology's tradition of presenting the discipline as being almost exclusively laboratory-based. As a result, Social Psychology--in its accuracy and completeness of the literature surveyed--represents on of the better books in the field. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Free and unequal: The biological basis of individual liberty.

Reviews the book "Free and unequal: The biological basis of individual liberty" by Roger J. Williams (see record 1954-01800-000). The authors thesis of this book is that given the undoubted fact of great human variability, what is needed to insure a good social order is individual freedom. "There is no middle ground: distinctiveness, individual worth, and freedom rise or jail together." An eminent chemist, the author has contributed to extend the study of genetics into the significant field of biochemistry. As a teacher and a nutritionist, he is by no means neglectful of the importance of environmental factors in development and well-being. But he insists that nutrition and education should be adjusted to the needs of each individual. The author detects a current trend toward assembly-line methods and away from due recognition of individuality. Overall though, the reviewer notes that the book is not heavy reading, and has been enjoyed by those who have read it thus far. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)