Authoritarianism in California 30 Years Later—With Some Cross-Cultural Comparisons

Summary

Since the original work on authoritarianism was done in California, it was desired to compare California today both with itself 30 years ago and with other English-speaking cultures. In so doing it was also desired to incorporate the methodological improvements that have come from 30 years of research in this field. Random doorstep samples of people in Los Angeles, Sydney, London, Glasgow, and Johannesburg received, therefore, scales to measure authoritarian personality. The Los Angeles, Johannesburg, and Sydney samples also received scales to measure authoritarian attitudes and racial attitudes. Authoritarian personality was measured by a behavior inventory and authoritarian attitudes by a balanced version of the original F scale. Sample sizes were generally around 100 in each city. There were no significant cross-cultural differences in either authoritarian attitudes or authoritarian personality, but the American sample was significantly less prejudiced than the Australian or South African samples. Scores on original F items gathered in Los Angeles in 1979 were significantly higher than those tabulated by Adorno et al in 1950.