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"Paul Muad'Dib" <tartan_army@msn.com> wrote in message news:...
> Filip Stojanovski
> Professor Dungan
> Personality (52:334)
> Term Paper
> Graceland University
> November 30, 1999
> Authoritarian Personality and Internet (IRC)
>
> The trait approach to personality provided some very insightful results 
> when applied to its own area of interest. The core of this approach is 
> measurement and comparison of traits, personality dimensions that 
> psychologists use to describe differences among human beings. Starting 
> from 1968 (Funder, 1997), great controversy shook the area of trait 
> personality psychology: the trait-situation debate. It was initiated by 
> Walter Mischel's book Personality and Assessment, who claimed that 
> knowledge of personality traits can not help the researcher predict 
> behavior of the observed persons. This debate lead to further research 
> that confirmed the basic assumption of trait psychology: that behavior can 
> be predicted by measuring of person's traits. This article will provide an 
> example of application of these results.
>
> The focus of this article is the behavior of people with identified trait 
> called authoritarian personality, when set in a particular environment 
> (situation) - the Internet. The influence of the conditions provided by 
> the environment will be examined and conclusions will be drawn, in 
> comparison with the theoretical data.
>
> To illustrate the point, I will use a case study methodology, and 
> cumulative results from personal observations. Although I am dealing with 
> Internet from 1995, I have not conducted statistical data analysis of the 
> behavior of people there, although I could not help but take mental notes 
> of it. Thus, the results of this research should be taken with a grain of 
> salt, since they can be considered somewhat subjective, or in other words, 
> relating to my personal reality.
>
>
>
> The Authoritarian Personality
>
> The monstrosity and the scale of Holocaust that took place during World 
> War II is still puzzling the people who have enough intellectual courage 
> to think about it. Scientific research attempts to ponder into its causes 
> lead several American psychologists to production of a book called 
> Authoritarian Personality (Nevitt Stanford at all, 1950). In this book, 
> they argued that the collection of prejudices and ways of thinking that 
> lead individuals in Europe (and elsewhere) to accept the nazi (or fascist) 
> ideology and participate in accomplishments of its goals can be summed up 
> in a distinct personality trait called authoritarian personality. Causes 
> for development of authoritarian personality were explained using eclectic 
> approach, a blend of behaviorism and psychoanalysis, thus extending the 
> scope of application of this thesis. And since one of the basic approaches 
> in trait psychology is a trait, as "distinguishing quality of personality" 
> (Merriam-Webster Dictionary), can be measured according to some relative 
> scale, the F-scale was developed. F-scale uses indirect questions to gain 
> insight in the level a person is prejudiced and possesses the other 
> distinguishing characteristics of the authoritarian personality. The 
> indirectness comes from the fact that, just like some Germans claim that 
> they did not know about the concentration camps, not all persons would 
> admit their bigotry or close-mindedness.
>
> The F-scale (F stands for fascism) uses seven variables to determine the 
> level of authoritarianism in a person's personality. I will note these 
> variables together with examples from the case studies, which will serve 
> both as illustration of the variables and a sort of proof that the people 
> I talk about further in the article would score high on the F-scale. The 
> nine variables in question are:
>
>  1.. Conventionalism - submission to conventional, middle-class values: 
> "what would the neighbors say" type of behavior, as well as emphasis on 
> hard work as opposed to creativity and different ways of thinking when 
> attaining goals.
>
>  2.. Authoritarian submission - submissive, uncritical attitude toward 
> idealized moral authorities of the in-group. During discussions about 
> politics, some of these people refused to acknowledge the responsibility 
> for corruption of the high government officials, such as president or 
> prime-minister, on the grounds that they "represent the country, so if you 
> talk bad about them, you talk bad about the country". Also, these people 
> expressed deep devotion to the parental figures, even when their influence 
> was not constructive.
>
>  3.. Authoritarian aggression - tendency to be on the lookout for, to 
> condemn and punish people who violate conventional values. This variable 
> was mostly expressed in the fear from members of other ethnic groups, such 
> as Albanians, or people with unconventional sexual orientation: the 
> promiscuous and homosexuals. When quarreling, most insults referred to 
> some of these categories.
>
>  4.. Anti-interception - opposition to people who try to see their reality 
> more in terms of feelings, fantasies and by use of imagination, than by 
> adherence to strict rules. The anti-interceptive person is described as 
> afraid to think about this side of human nature in order to prevent 
> oneself to think "wrong thoughts". Thus, the attempts to talk about inner 
> feelings, as well as their initiators, were met with opposition starting 
> from a seemingly carefree attitude ("I do not come here to talk about hard 
> stuff. I come here to have fun."), and ending in breakdown of 
> communication with introspective people.
>
>  5.. Superstition and Stereotypy - it is acute how some of the most 
> extreme cases of suspected authoritarian personality that I met like to 
> deal with subjects such as horoscope, former lives, numerology, sometimes 
> to the extreme point of fear from black cats. The tendency to enclose 
> one's thinking by imposing "beliefs of mystical determinants of the 
> individual's fate," was often paired with use of stereotypes, such as 
> ethnic or cultural. For example, westerners were described as 
> sophisticated and cultured, while members of their own community as rude 
> or uneducated. This went to extremes such as attributing the courteous 
> traits to common U.N. soldiers stationed in Macedonia, and saying that gas 
> stoves and some basic parts of a car mechanism that are used in America do 
> not exist in Macedonia.
>
>  6.. Power and "toughness" - preoccupation with a world view in terms of 
> power and dominance-submission, strength, and identification with power 
> figures. Examples include the following: "The lover I choose will be my 
> slave", defending a obviously wrong point in an argument just to prove 
> oneself right, or "I had dinner at the same place as the president. I 
> should have walked to him and shake his hand."
>
>  7.. Destructiveness and cynicism - generalized hostility towards humans. 
> A classical example used in the F-scale was often encountered "No matter 
> how they act on the surface, men are interested in women for only one 
> reason." The theory goes that such an individual, harboring perfectly 
> human impulses suppressed by external restrictions, turns the frustration 
> into aggression.
>
>  8.. Projectivity - defined as a disposition to believe that wild and 
> dangerous things (projected emotional impulses), are committed by others. 
> This also includes putting the blame of one's own failures to communicate 
> to others, as well as projecting ones own insecurities, such as "You are 
> so stupid!".
>
>  9.. Sex - concern for sexual activity, and result of interaction of other 
> variables. Usually a supplement (reaction formation) for unsatisfied, 
> sometimes willfully denied, personal needs.
>
>
>
> Situation: Usage of Internet (IRC)
>
> The researchers who study the Internet view it as a medium that promotes 
> open mindedness, diversity, and tolerance to individual and group 
> differences. An extensive research (Katz, 1997) done by HotWired, a 
> company dealing with digital culture, concluded that people who use 
> digital technologies tend to be more optimistic, tolerant, civic-minded, 
> and that they feel unafraid and empowered to deal with changes in the 
> society. This looks like the total opposite of the authoritarian 
> personality. The assumption of these researchers is that the Internet as a 
> medium is molding the behavior and thinking of its users in that 
> direction.
>
> The observations I've done were committed mostly by using IRC (Internet 
> Relay Chat), a communication system that enables the users to send written 
> messages in real time. At a same time the users can communicate on a 
> person-to-person basis, sending private messages, but they can also talk 
> to a group of people who "inhabit" the same channel, or a chat-room at the 
> same time. This activity enables the users to meet many new acquaintances 
> from all over the world, or to strengthen or keep the relations when 
> moving or traveling.
>
> IRC is highly addictive, because it is based on a both variable-ratio and 
> variable-schedule reinforcement. By using this medium, people succumb to 
> operant conditioning, because satisfaction from meeting the people of 
> interest to them does not come regularly and the intensity of pleasure 
> from conversation is not always the same, since sometimes tiredness and 
> miscommunications occur. The addictiveness of the medium leaves the people 
> with authoritarian personality feeling trapped, out of control, and since 
> their inner insecurities crave for control, they turn to aggression. The 
> aggression can take form of verbal abuse, extensive quarreling with other 
> members of the group, to damaging attacks on other person's computers by 
> hacking or nuking. This cannot always be traced to polar disease or 
> expedition choler, described by Konrad Lorenz (Lorenz, 1963) as a drive to 
> interpersonal aggression among members of small, threatened groups. 
> Although there were some cases of this reported, when Greek nationalists 
> using the same tactics attacked Macedonian channels, the pattern emerged 
> in channels non aggravated by outside threats.
>
> I was (or still am) an active member of several such channels, and a 
> pattern that emerged, is that when the channel is visited by people who 
> seem close to authoritarian personalities two things happen - either the 
> talk in the channel virtually stops (the channel dies), or such people 
> leave the channel and do not come back, except sometimes as voyeurs (the 
> IRC jargon is "leeches"). The second thing happens in channels where power 
> structures and openness are explicitly promoted by majority of visitors, 
> as well as channel "managers" who can control the access. This impression 
> was confirmed by other users, who seem to long for the good old days when 
> there was much more real talk on the channels.
>
>
>
> Conclusion
>
> Based on intuition and theoretical results and the observed situations, I 
> concluded that there is much usefulness to use the trait approach in this 
> regard. The level of my personal problems on IRC (explosive situations and 
> worry) declined significantly after I decided to accept people as they 
> are, and not what I feel that they might become if they overcome their 
> personal inhibitions and background influences, such as the ones that lead 
> to development of authoritarian personality (for example, the patriarchal 
> traditions present in the "regular" Macedonian society). Identifying a 
> person as authoritarian personality and deciding to accept him/her as s/he 
> is, can spare someone a lot of headache. On a long run, I hope that 
> exposure to the medium, and different world-views, influences such persons 
> to move in direction of bettering their lives and the lives of those 
> around them. Change does good.
>
>
>
> Right Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) is a psychological personality variable 
> or "ideological attitude".
>
> It is defined as the convergence of three attitudinal clusters in an 
> individual:
>
> 1. Authoritarian submission - a high degree of submission to the 
> authorities who are perceived to be established and legitimate in the 
> society in which one lives. "It is good to have a strong authoritarian 
> leader."
>
> 2. Authoritarian aggression - a general aggressiveness, directed against 
> various persons, that is perceived to be sanctioned by established 
> authorities. "It is acceptable to be cruel to those who do not follow the 
> rules."
>
> 3. Conventionalism - a high degree of adherence to the social conventions 
> that are perceived to be endorsed by society and its established 
> authorities. "Traditional ways are best."
>
> High scorers on the RWA scale (High RWAs) tend to have a rigid, often 
> fundamentally religious, view of morality tending toward homophobic, 
> racist and patriarchal beliefs. High RWA scorers tend to support authority 
> figures, such as the government, taking action to censor certain social 
> groups - often those they view as physically or morally threatening.
>
> It is not an ideological measure, but a social psychological one. The 
> nature of the RWA scale leads to predictions that High RWAs will tend to 
> support the current political authority, regardless of the ideology 
> expounded by those in power. For example, it was predicted, and confirmed 
> that in the old Soviet Union, high RWAs were supporters of the Communist 
> Party because it represented the established authority. (The Authoritarian 
> Specter)
>
>
>
> History of the RWA Theory
> The RWA construct was developed by Robert Altemeyer, drawing on Adorno's 
> post-WWII research on the concept of an authoritarian personality - based 
> on Freudian theory - which contained conservative, pro-fascist, prejudiced 
> and ethnocentric beliefs. Taking an empirical approach based on 
> statistical analysis and disregarding the theoretical construct, Altemeyer 
> found that just three facets of this authoritarian personality were 
> statistically significant and cross-correlated: conventionalism, 
> authoritarian aggression and authoritarian submission. Conventionalism is 
> the tendency to accept and obey social conventions and the rules of 
> authority figures. Authoritarian aggression is characterised by an 
> aggressive attitude towards individuals or groups disliked by authorities, 
> and authoritarian submission is submission to authorities and authority 
> figures. (The Authoritarian Specter)
>
> Altemeyer developed the RWA scale to measure this cluster of beliefs, 
> asking subjects to rate their agreement (or disagreement) with statements 
> such as "Our country will be great if we honor the ways of our 
> forefathers, do what the authorities tell us to do, and get rid of the 
> 'rotten apples' who are ruining everything." This example contains all 
> three facets of RWA:
>
>  a.. "honor the ways of our forefathers" - conventionalism/traditional 
> values
>  b.. "do what the authorities tell us to do" - authoritarian submission
>  c.. "get rid of the 'rotten apples' who are ruining everything" - 
> authoritarian aggression
> Although he made some minor adjustments to the scale, the original 
> construct has not been changed. However, its relationship to other 
> attitudinal scales and theories has been the subject of empirical 
> research, and theorizing about how different attitudinal factors interact.
>
> [edit]
>
> Significant Correlations
> Altemeyer discovered a wide range of correlations over the years, which 
> can be organized into four general categories. (The Authoritarian Specter)
>
> 1: Faulty reasoning - RWAs are more likely to:
>
>  a.. Make many incorrect inferences from evidence.
>  b.. Hold contradictory ideas leading them to 'speak out of both sides of 
> their mouths.'
>  c.. Uncritically accept that many problems are 'our most serious 
> problem.'
>  d.. Uncritically accept insufficient evidence that supports their 
> beliefs.
>  e.. Uncritically trust people who tell them what they want to hear.
>  f.. Use many double standards in their thinking and judgements.
> 2: Hostility Toward Outgroups - RWAs are more likely to:
>
>  a.. Weaken constitutional guarantees of liberty such as the Bill of 
> Rights.
>  b.. Severely punish 'common' criminals in a role-playing situation.
>  c.. Admit they obtain personal pleasure from punishing such people.
>  d.. Be prejudiced against racial, ethnic, nationalistic, and linguistic 
> minorities.
>  e.. Be hostile toward homosexuals.
>  f.. Volunteer to help the government persecute almost anyone.
>  g.. Be mean-spirited toward those who have made mistakes and suffered.
> 3: Profound Character Flaws - RWAs are more likely to:
>
>  a.. Be dogmatic.
>  b.. Be zealots.
>  c.. Be hypocrites.
>  d.. Be bullies when they have power over others.
>  e.. Help cause and inflame intergroup conflict.
>  f.. Seek dominance over others by being competitive and destructive in 
> situations requiring cooperation.
> 4: Blindness To One's Own Failings And To The Failings Of Authority 
> Figures whom They Respect- RWAs are more likely to:
>
>  a.. Believe they have no personal failings.
>  b.. Avoid learning about their personal failings.
>  c.. Be highly self-righteous.
>  d.. Use religion to erase guilt over their acts and to maintain their 
> self-righteousness.
> RWA is also correlated with political conservatism - not so much at the 
> level of ordinary voters, but with increasing strength as one moves from 
> voters to activists to office holders, and then from lower to higher-level 
> officeholders. (The Authoritarian Specter)
>
> In one part of his summation, Altemeyer wrote that RWAs are more likely 
> to: "Be conservative/Reform party (Canada) or Republican Party (United 
> States) lawmakers who (1) have a conservative economic philosophy; (2) 
> believe in social dominance; (3) are ethnocentric; (4) are highly 
> nationalistic; (5) oppose abortion; (6) support capital punishment; (7) 
> oppose gun-control legislation; (8) say they value freedom but actually 
> want to undermine the Bill of Rights; (9) do not value equality very 
> highly and oppose measures to increase it; (10) are not likely to rise in 
> the Democratic party, but do so among Republicans." (The Authoritarian 
> Specter)
>
> Altemeyer's own statement about this may be worth noting (From p. 239 of 
> "Enemies of Freedom"): "right-wing authoritarians show little preference 
> in general for any political party" and their prevalence in the Republican 
> party reflects the long term effects of point (10) above.
>
> [edit]
>
> Early Development of RWA
> Duckitt has suggested a model of attitude development for RWA in which 
> punitive socialisation causes social conformity. This leads to a view of 
> the world as a dangerous, dog-eat-dog place. This fits with RWA beliefs, 
> which influence ingroup and outgroup attitudes.
>
> [edit]
>
> Connection with Social Dominance Orientation
> RWA has been found to correlate moderately with Social Dominance 
> Orientation (SDO). Together they are strong predictors of a variety of 
> prejudiced beliefs such as sexism, racism and anti-homosexual attitudes. 
> The two measures can be thought of as two sides of the same coin: RWA 
> provides submissive followers, and SDO provides power-seeking leaders. 
> ("The other 'authoritarian personality.'")
>
> [edit]
>
> Further reading
>  a.. Altemeyer, Robert (1996). The Authoritarian Specter. Harvard 
> University Press. ISBN 0-674-05305-2.
>  b.. Altemeyer, B. (1998). "The other 'authoritarian personality.'" In M. 
> Zanna (Ed.) Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 30 (pp. 47-92). 
> San Diego: Academic Press.
>  c.. Martin, John Levi (2005). "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.
>  d.. Dean, John W. (2006). Conservatives without Conscience. Viking Adult. 
> ISBN 0-670-03774-5.
> Works Cited
>
> Funder, D. The Personality Puzzle (pp. 59+). New York: W. W. Norton & 
> Company
>
> Katz, J. (1997) The Digital Citizen [Online]. HotWired. Retreived November 
> 30, 1999 from the World Wide Web.
>
> Lorenz, K. (1963) On Aggression. (pp. 55-56) San Diego: Harvest/HBJ
>
> Neill, A. S. (1960) Sumerhill: A Radical Approach to Child Rearing. New 
> York City: Hart Publishing Company
>
> Newit Sanford, R., & Adorno T. W., & Frenkel-Brunswik, E., & Levinson, D. 
> J. (1950, 1997) The Measurement of Implicit Antidemocratic Trends. In 
> Funder. D. C., & Ozer, D. J. (Ed), Pieces of The Personality Puzzle (pp. 
> 89-114). New York: W. W. Norton & Company
>
> Weiten, W. (1997) Psychology: Themes and Variations (3rd ed., briefer 
> version). (pp. 165-167). Pacific Grove: Brooks/Cole Publishing Company
>
> The Merriam-Webster Dictionary. (1997) Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, 
> Incorporated
>
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> Who is Keyser Soze? He is supposed to be Turkish. Some say his father was
> German. Nobody believed he was real. Nobody ever saw him or knew anybody
> that ever worked directly for him, but to hear Kobayashi tell it, anybody
> could have worked for Soze. You never knew. That was his power. The 
> greatest
> trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist.
> Keaton always said, "I don't believe in God, but I'm afraid of him." Well 
> I
> believe in God, and the only thing that scares me is Keyser Soze. - Verbal
> Kint
>
> "They seek him here, they seek him there,
> "those Frenchies seek him everywhere.
> "Is he in heaven or is he in hell?
> "That damned elusive Pimpernel."
>
>
> "How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the
> impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?"
>
>
> The little things are infinitely more important."
>
>
> "I am an omnivorous reader with a strangely retentive memory for
> trifles."
>
>
>