The Authoritarian Personality

The Authoritarian Personality (TAP) is an influential 1950 book by Theodor W. Adorno, Else Frenkel-Brunswik, Daniel Levinson, and Nevitt Sanford, researchers working at the University of California, Berkeley, during and shortly after World War II. The personality type they identified can be defined by nine traits that were believed to cluster together as the result of childhood experiences. These traits include conventionalism, authoritarian submission, authoritarian aggression, anti-intraception, superstition and stereotypy, power and "toughness," destructiveness and cynicism, projectivity, and exaggerated concerns over sex.^[1]

A central idea of TAP is that authoritarianism is the result of a Freudian developmental model, in which excessively harsh and punitive parenting causes children to identify with and idolize authority figures. This was consistent with prevailing psychological theories of the time, and even though Frenkel-Brunswik reported some preliminary support, empirical data have generally not confirmed this prediction.^[2] Another major hypothesis of the book is that the authoritarian syndrome is predisposed to right-wing ideology and therefore receptive to fascist governments. Authoritarianism was measured by the F-scale. The "F" was short for "pre-fascist personality."

Sanford and Levinson were both psychology professors at Berkeley. They did much of the preliminary work on ethnocentrism and statistical measurement. Frenkel-Brunswik examined personality variables and family background with a series of interview studies. Adorno provided a political and sociological perspective to the book. Although Adorno's name heads the alphabetical list of authors, he arrived late to the project and made a relatively small contribution.^[3] In fact, Adorno's name is only credited in five of the 23 chapters in TAP. The book was part of a "Studies in Prejudice" series sponsored by the American Jewish Committee's Department of Scientific Research. ^[4]

The Authoritarian Personality inspired extensive research in psychology, sociology, and political science during the 1950s and early 1960s on the relation between personality traits, behavior, and political beliefs. It has been criticized for various methodological flaws, including sample bias and poor psychometric techniques.^[5] Nonetheless, TAP has been cited considerably within the social sciences and continues to inspire research interest today.^[6]

See also

• Ambiguity tolerance
• Authoritarian personality
• Right-wing authoritarianism

Notes and references

1. ^ Adorno, T. W., Frenkel-Brunswik, E., Levinson, D. J., & Sanford, R. N. (1950). The authoritarian personality. New York: Harper and Row (pp. 228).
2. ^ Altemeyer, B. (1988). Enemies of freedom: Understanding right-wing authoritarianism. 
3. ^ Stone, W. F., Lederer, G., and Christie, R. (1993). Introduction: Strength and weakness. In Stone, W. F., Lederer, G., and Christie, R. (Eds.). Strengths and weaknesses: The authoritarian personality today. New York: Springer-Verlag.
4. ^ Horkheimer, Max, Flowerman, Samuel H (1950). Foreword to Studies in Prejudice in "The Authoritarian Personality". Norton Library. pp. v-vi. 
5. ^ Christie, Richard & Jahoda, Marie (eds.) (1954). Studies in the scope and method of "The Authoritarian Personality". Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press. 
6. ^ "Political conservatism as motivated social cognition", authors John T. Jost, Jack Glaser, Arie W. Kruglanski and Frank J. Sulloway, journal title "Psychological Bulletin", 2003, Vol. 129, No. 3, pp. 339-375

Further reading

• Theodor W. Adorno, Else Frenkel-Brunswik, Daniel Levinson and Nevitt Sanford. The Authoritarian Personality, Studies in Prejudice Series, Volume 1. New York: Harper & Row, 1950. W. W. Norton & Company paperback reprint edition (1993) ISBN 0-393-31112-0.
• Altemeyer, Bob (2007). "The Authoritarians". http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/. Retrieved 2007-10-13. 
• Christie, Richard & Jahoda, Marie (eds.) (1954). Studies in the scope and method of "The Authoritarian Personality". Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press. 
• Jost, John T.; Glaser, Jack; Kruglanski, Arie W.; Sulloway, Frank J. (2003). "Political conservatism as motivated social cognition". Psychological Bulletin 129 (3): 339–375. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.129.3.339. 
• Martin, John Levi (2001). "The Authoritarian Personality, 50 Years Later: What Questions Are There for Political Psychology?". Political Psychology 22 (1): 1–26. doi:10.1111/0162-895X.00223. 
• McClosky, Herbert; Chong, Dennis (1985). "Similarities and Differences between Left-Wing and Right-Wing Radicals". British Journal of Political Science 15 (3): 329–363. doi:10.1017/S0007123400004221. 
• Shils, Edward (1954). "Authoritarianism: "Right" and "Left"". in Christie, Richard & Jahoda, Marie (eds.). Studies in the scope and method of "The Authoritarian personality". Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press. 
• Altemeyer, Robert (1988). Enemies of Freedom: Understanding Right-Wing Authoritarianism. 
• Altemeyer, Robert (1997). The Authoritarian Specter. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.