Dissertations and Theses @ UNI
Availability
Open Access Thesis
Keywords
Authoritarianism; Authoritarianism (Personality trait); Locus of control;
Abstract
The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship among right-wing authoritarianism, traditional Western thought and the degree to which subjects tend to perceive themselves as having control over their lives (having internal or external locus of control). It was hypothesized that these three aspects of individuals' cognitive-emotional makeup are interrelated. Three questionnaires were used in the study: the Right-Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) Scale (Altemeyer, 1988), the EastWest Questionnaire (EWQ) (Gilgen & Cho, 1979), and the Locus of Control (LC) Scale (Rotter, 1966). A counterbalanced experimental design was used to control for possible order effects. Duckitt's (1989) conceptualization of authoritarianism as an aspect of group cohesiveness was used as a conceptual framework. Participants (N = 202; 72 males, 132 females) were recruited from Introduction to Psychology classes at a Midwestern university. The results of the study indicated that subjects scoring high on the Right-Wing Authoritarianism Scale tended to perceive themselves as having internal locus of control and to adhere to some of the traditional values of Western culture. It was shown that the RWA Scale, but not the East-West Questionnaire, can be used as a predictor of scores obtained by subjects on the Locus of Control Scale. Subjects' gender and major area of study were found to be significant determinants of performance on the three questionnaires and some of the relationship among the personality characteristics measured. Possible reasons for the results found were explored.
Year of Submission
1997
Degree Name
Master of Arts
Department
Department of Psychology
First Advisor
Albert Gilgen
Second Advisor
M. Shelton Smith
Third Advisor
Beverly Kopper
Date Original
1997
Object Description
1 PDF file (128 leaves)
Copyright
©1997 Nadejda Diakonova
Language
en
File Format
application/pdf
Recommended Citation
Diakonova, Nadejda, "Right-Wing Authoritarianism Relative to Traditional Western Thinking and Locus of Control" (1997). Dissertations and Theses @ UNI. 2487.
https://scholarworks.uni.edu/etd/2487
Comments
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