AUTHORITARIANISM AND POLITICAL BEHAVIOR

In: Public opinion quarterly: journal of the American Association for Public Opinion Research, Band 17, Heft 2, S. 185-201

Abstract

An attempt to (a) locate the extent of the authoritarian predisposition in 2 nationwide samples, and (b) link such predispositions with certain types of political attitudes and behavior. The hypothesis was that high authoritarians would tend to participate less, and have less political self-confidence in politics than low authoritarians. The F-scale, modified by F. Sanford and the authors had been administered to 2 crosssectional, area probability samples, in addition to questions on opinions on foreign policy (N=1,470). The social profile of the authoritarian appears to be as follows: (1) younger people tended to be low, older people, high authoritarians, (2) those with limited education tend to be high, those with fuller education low authoritarian. (3) High authoritarianism occurs more frequently in Lc. (4) In the Mc the lower income group was more vulnerable, the higher income group was less vulnerable to authoritarianism. The same was true of Lc. (5) The highest concentration of authoritarians was found in the LLc and the poorly educated LMc. Analyzing the authoritarian's response to politics on the basis of the social profile it was found that (1) a signif. link exists between authoritarianism and isolationism though the isolationist is by no means always the 'reactionary.' (2) Authoritarianism is directly related to feelings of political ineffectiveness. (3) High authoritarians did not vote as frequently as the rest of the pop. (4) Authoritarianism was helpful in explaining candidate preference. L. P. Chall.