Attitudes Toward Authority and Authoritarian Personality Characteristics

Dissocial Personality Traits and Past Experiences Matter in How People Perceive the Police

The study investigated the contributions of dissocial traits and experience with the police to police perception. Participants (261: males = 115, females = 146, mean age = 25.87) completed psychometric measures deviant personality traits, police perception, and experience with the police. Regression analysis was used to examine relationship patterns. Results indicated that people detested the police as they got older (β = - 0.19, t = - 2.06, p = 0.04). Also, having an encounter was associated with more negative perception of the (β = - 0.16, t = - 1.97, p = 0.04). Among the dark triad traits, only narcissism predicted police perception such that higher narcissism traits was associated with higher negative perception of the police (β = - 0.46, t = - 2.21, p = 0.03). Findings seem to suggest that the police, especially in Nigeria, needs to do more to improve their connections with citizens; albeit, individual personality disposition matters, and should be a potential issue to consider when the police deals with citizens.

Conformity behavior of Afrikaans- and English-speaking adolescents in South Africa

The conformity behaviors of 50 Afrikaans- and 48 English-speaking early adolescents (ages 12 to 14 years) were measured by a modified Asch experiment and then compared. The effects of sex, self-concept (measured by the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale) and certain personality factors (measured by the High School Personality Questionnaire) were also examined. No significant differences between the conformity scores of the two groups were found, but boys and girls significantly differed with regard to their conformity scores. Although subjects with low self-concept scores did not have higher conformity scores than those with high self-concept scores, a significant difference between the self-concept scores of Afrikaans- and English-speaking adolescents was demonstrated. Low but significant correlations were found between personality factors (A, J, and Q2) and conformity scores.

Anti-Authoritarianism and Political Activism

A relationship between anti-authoritarianism and self-reported overt actions expressing resistance against authorities (demonstrations, boycotts etc.) has been proposed. In a 1985 survey of a national random sample of the Dutch population using a shortened F scale, the relationship did not appear to be particularly strong (0,34), but was nevertheless highly significant and consistent. For some subsamples such as anti-authoritarians, students and the highly educated the relationship was much stronger. Authoritarianism contributed independently to an explanation of resistance behaviour, next to education and political preference. Some 25% of the sample reported having participated in one or more acts of resistance over the previous five years. Some 63% behaved in consistency with their anti-authoritarian or authoritarian predisposition. The results are interpreted as supporting the theory of Adorno et al.

Authoritarian Dominance, Self-Esteem, and Manifest Anxiety

A mail-out questionnaire was sent to addresses selected at random from the Australian electoral rolls. There were 95 respondents. It contained the Rosenberg Self-esteem scale, the Taylor Manifest Anxiety scale, and the Ray ‘Directiveness’ scale of authoritarian dominance. Reliabilities (alpha) of 0,83, 0,87 and 0,75 were observed. Authoritarianism was found to be weakly associated with better mental health (in the sense of greater self-esteem and less anxiety). This is consistent with previous findings from South Africa but is at variance with the account given by Adorno et al. (1950). It is pointed out that dominance is also generally adaptive in animal species.