Tag: Authoritarianism

Authoritarianism and anti-gay prejudice

Right-wing authoritarianism predicts prejudice equally toward “gay men and lesbians” and “homosexuals”

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Author: Crawford, Jarret T.; Brandt, Mark J.; Inbar, Yoel; Mallinas, Stephanie R. Description: Two recent experiments found evidence for what we term the social category label (SCL) effect-that the relationship between right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) and prejudice against gay men and lesbians can be reduced or even eliminated when the target group is labeled “gay men and lesbians” rather than “homosexuals”. Although this appears a promising approach to reduce self-reported sexual prejudice, with both theoretical implications for the meaning of RWA itself and practical implications for question wording for assessing these…

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When Authoritarians Confront Prejudice

When Authoritarians Confront Prejudice. Differential Effects of SDO and RWA on Support for Hate-Speech Prohibition

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Author: Bilewicz, Michal; Soral, Wiktor; Marchlewska, Marta; Winiewski, Mikolaj Description: Two nationwide representative studies (N=653 adolescents; N=1007 adults) investigated the psychological correlates of the intention to penalize public expressions of prejudice in the form of support for hate-speech prohibition. We presented participants with preselected examples of hate speech from the Internet and other mass media and assessed their willingness to support the prohibition of public expressions of such remarks. Both studies found that social dominance orientation and right-wing authoritarianism are positively correlated with outgroup prejudice, but they have differential effects…

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Cognitive ability and authoritarianism: Understanding support for Trump and Clinton

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Author: Choma, Becky L.; Hanoch, Yaniv Description: With Donald Trump the Republican nominee and Hillary Clinton the Democratic nominee for the 2016 U.S. Presidential election, speculations of why Trump resonates with many Americans are widespread – as are suppositions of whether, independent of party identification, people might vote for Hillary Clinton. The present study, using a sample of American adults (n=406), investigated whether two ideological beliefs, namely, right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) and social dominance orientation (SDO) uniquely predicted Trump support and voting intentions for Clinton. Cognitive ability as a predictor of…

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Authoritarianism and Social Dominance Predict Annual Increases in Generalized Prejudice

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Author: Osborne, Danny; Satherley, Nicole; Little, Todd D.; Sibley, Chris G. Description: Although right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) and social dominance orientation (SDO) are the two most studied individual difference correlates of prejudice, debate remains over their status as enduring constructs that precede generalized prejudice. We contribute to this discussion using 10 annual waves of longitudinal data from a nationwide random sample of adults to investigate the stability and temporal precedence of RWA, SDO, and prejudice among members of an ethnic majority group (Ns = 23,383-47,217). Results reveal high wave-to-wave rank-order stability…

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The psychological causes and societal consequences of authoritarianism

The psychological causes and societal consequences of authoritarianism

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Author: Osborne, Danny; Costello, Thomas H.; Duckitt, John; Sibley, Chris G. Description: Over the past two decades, citizens’ political rights and civil liberties have declined globally. Psychological science can play an instrumental role in both explaining and combating the authoritarian impulses that underlie these attacks on personal autonomy. In this Review, we describe the psychological processes and situational factors that foster authoritarianism, as well as the societal consequences of its apparent resurgence within the general population. First, we summarize the dual process motivational model of ideology and prejudice, which suggests…

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Conspiracy beliefs and democracy

Conspiracy beliefs and democratic backsliding: Longitudinal effects of election conspiracy beliefs on criticism of democracy and support for authoritarianism during political contests

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Author: Thomas, Emma F.; O’Donnell, Alexander; Osborne, Danny; Bird, Lucy; Yip, Lisette; Buonaiuto, Eliana; Lizzio-Wilson, Morgana; Skitka, Linda; Wenzel, Michael Description: There are widespread concerns that conspiracy theories undermine democracies. But do conspiracy beliefs increase criticism of democracy and/or support for authoritarianism? Or are antidemocratic people more likely to endorse conspiracy beliefs? To answer these important questions, we collected longitudinal data during two concurrent democratic elections–the 2020 US Presidential Election (N = 609) and the 2020 General Election in New Zealand (N = 603). Random intercept cross-lagged panel models tested…

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The Autocrat’s Corruption Dilemma

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Author: Carothers, Christopher Description: A large body of scholarship shows that autocrats can use corruption strategically to strengthen their political hold, such as by distributing rents to their supporters. However, this scholarship often overlooks how corruption may also politically damage autocrats. I argue that corruption often brings substantial political costs alongside its advantages, resulting in a “corruption dilemma” for autocrats. I show that in recent years, public anger over corruption has led to numerous anti-government protests and has been a major cause of autocrats being ousted from power. How politically…

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Sources of Corruption in Authoritarian Regimes

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Author: Chang, Eric C. C.; Golden, Miriam A. Description: We study the determinants of corruption in a sample of 40-odd authoritarian polities at the turn of the 21st century. Recent studies have proposed several parallel mechanisms potentially relevant for variations in the extent of corruption in authoritarian regimes. We put these various theories into a unified empirical model in order to investigate the wide range of corruption observed in non-democratic political systems. We investigate the importance to variations in corruption in authoritarian countries of the type of group in power,…

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