Measuring Attitudes Toward Acceptable and Unacceptable Parenting Practices

This study investigated the properties of a new rating instrument, the Parenting Questionnaire (PQ), designed to measure attitudes about acceptable and unacceptable parenting practices. In Study 1, subject matter experts representing culturally diverse psychologists, parents, and college students were consulted to identify 110 items receiving high endorsement. In Study 2, items were administered to 1,398 undergraduate students to examine their factor structure and the effects of ethnicity and gender differences on PQ factors. In Study 3, test–retest reliability (N = 92) and convergent validity (N = 142) of the PQ factors were examined. Exploratory factor analysis revealed three factors (total of 63 items) with high internal consistencies that accounted for a moderate amount of total variance (R ² = .38). The factors were Critical Feedback (26 items), Supportive Feedback (26 items), and Physical Discipline (11 items). Significant ethnicity and gender differences were found on the three PQ factors, as well as a significant interaction between ethnicity and gender on the Supportive Feedback factor. PQ factor scores demonstrated good temporal stability, internal consistency, and convergent validity. Overall findings suggest that the PQ is a reliable, stable, and valid measure of attitudes toward parenting with three distinct factors. Future research directions with parents are discussed.     

Throwing Away the Key: Measuring Prison Reform Attitudes1

The American prison system is larger than ever and ranks among the largest in the world. Yet, prisons have received little research attention relative to other issues in forensic psychology. In an effort to study one facet of the prison system, a scale for measuring attitudes toward prison reform was developed. The 12‐item scale has a single factor measuring whether people feel prisons should be tougher or softer on inmates. Several studies with diverse samples found that the scale has a consistent factor structure, good reliability, and a coherent pattern of relationships to other psychological variables. The scale appears to be a promising tool for studying how people want to treat those who have been officially rejected by society.     

Development and Validation of a Scale Measuring Attitudes Toward Smoking

Abstract

The authors developed the Smoking Attitudes Scale (SAS) and administered it to 2 samples of U.S. students who were smokers or nonsmokers. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis with LISREL (K. G. Jöreskog & D. Sörbom, 1989) methodology revealed that the SAS consists of 4 factors. The overall instrument possesses good internal consistency and adequate construct validity as well.     

An Empirically Keyed Scale for Measuring Managerial Attitudes Toward Women Executives

A scale (MATWES) is presented providing reliability and some validity measures regarding managerial attitudes toward women executives. Methodology used demonstrates an empirical approach to scale development through the employment of a projective test for item generation and the use of a panel of women executives who served as Q-sorters to select the items. The use of the Scale as a research instrument and its value in minimizing researcher bias in its construction are discussed.     

The Social Roles Questionnaire: A New Approach to Measuring Attitudes Toward Gender

Innovative research is constrained by instruments that assume gender to be captured by dichotomous categories. This article presents the results of two studies that document the psychometric properties of the Social Roles Questionnaire (SRQ), a new measure of gender role attitudes. A social constructivist perspective guided the development of the instrument that was designed not only to capture the diversity in people’s thinking about social roles for men and women, but also to identify attitudes that transcend binary categories. The article details the process of assessing reliability and validity based on data from 414 undergraduates. Findings revealed the SRQ is reliable and valid and that women were more likely than men to endorse egalitarian and gender transcendent beliefs. Additional possible uses of the SRQ are discussed.     

Measuring Attitudes in Test-Alien Cultures: When Illiteracy and Unfamiliarity Do Not Matter

This study reports the construction of an attitude scale called a "Shah attitude scale." This scale overcomes the problems of scale construction and attitude measurement in test-alien cultures peculiar to Western scales. The major problems with the use of these scales are the non-correspondence of the samples used in scale construction and attitude measurement, difficulty of their use with the illiterate and rural samples, unfamiliarity of their verbal character and the response modality. Our scale is simple to construct and can be easily used with every section of society. Its conceptualization and development is based upon the agreed upon bipolar definition of attitude and the ideas derived from well-known attitude scales. The scale is based upon trait adjectives and can be used easily in cross-cultural attitudinal studies.     

Two Sexes,Two Genders Only: Measuring Attitudes toward Transgender Individuals in Poland

Transphobia is an under-examined but important type of prejudice to study in Polish culture. Poland is a country where a majority of transgender people feel discriminated against. There is a need for a more evidence-based measures for researchers and practitioners to better understand transphobia. The main purpose of the present three studies (n?=?300 participants for each study) was to validate the Genderism and Transphobia Scale (GTS; Hill and Willoughby 2005) and the Transphobia Scale (TS; Nagoshi et al. 2008) in Polish culture and to identify the possible psychological and demographic factors that matter in forming attitudes toward transgender individuals. The results confirm that Polish versions of both the GTS and the TS are reliable instruments to measure attitudes toward transgender individuals. Moreover, the studies revealed that both traditional and modern homonegativity, right-wing authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, religious fundamentalism, attitudes toward gender roles, and biological and cultural beliefs about the origins of gender differences were significant predictors of transphobia. As in previous studies, men were more prejudiced toward gender nonconformists in comparison to women. These studies contribute well-adapted tools for measuring transphobia and data-driven collection of significant predictors of transphobia.

     

Do Scales Measuring Sexist Attitudes have Equivalent Meaning for Sexual Minorities and Majorities?

Ambivalent Sexism Theory (Glick & Fiske, 1996) has revolutionised understanding of sexism and generated a new way of examining sexist attitudes using the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI). One key goal in sexism research is to compare sexist attitudes across different groups, including people with different genders and sexual identities. Before doing so, researchers must be confident that the construct(s) they are comparing are invariant across groups. Given assumptions of heterosexuality, and the central role of heterosexual interdependence, we expected the ASI would be variant across people with different genders and sexual orientations. We conducted multigroup measurement invariance tests between heterosexual women, heterosexual men, lesbian women, and gay men (total N?=?1614). Results indicated that hostile sexism and benevolent sexism emerged as separate, related, forms of sexism across groups (i.e., configural invariance was met), but item loadings and intercepts were not equivalent (i.e., loading and intercept invariance was not met). Accordingly, the ASI is not a suitable measurement tool to compare sexist attitudes across sexual minorities (lesbian women and gay men) and majorities (heterosexual women and men). We discuss implications for the centrality of heterosexual interdependence in ambivalent sexism, practical implications for the use of ASI, and we encourage researchers to develop new scales to assess sexism across diverse gender and sexual identities.

     

Measuring Religious Attitudes in Secularized Western European Context: A Psychometric Analysis of the Post-Critical Belief Scale

Wulff's two-dimensional model of approaches to religion was an inspiration for the development of the Post-Critical Belief Scale (PCBS), an instrument measuring religious attitudes, that is, “paradigms of religious belief structure” in a secularized Western European context. The scale has been frequently used in psychological studies, has undergone psychometric analyses and modifications, and has been translated into several languages. The current study shows results of a psychometric analysis of the component structure of PCBS in different age groups over time using Clusterwise Simultaneous Component Analysis-Equal Cross-Product (SCA-ECP). The analysis was based on samples collected in Flanders (Belgium; N = 14,599). The one-cluster and two-cluster models yielded three components: Literal Affirmation, Literal Disaffirmation, and Symbolic Attitude, and there were no differences between age groups. In the two-cluster model, subtle differences between samples collected before and after 2002 were found, and these were related to two PCBS items referring to interpretation of Biblical stories. Our finding of a generalized Symbolic Attitude might be related to the changes in the approaches to religion in secularized Western Europe, and might capture the religious (dis-)belief of individuals who are open and tolerant to other religious systems, or alternatively, have become indifferent to them. Further cross-cultural and longitudinal studies are needed to better understand the religious attitudes in a secularized context, and the development of a new scale based on the paradigm of personal meaning systems is suggested     

Measuring Team Performance in Complex and Dynamic Military Environments: The SPOTLITE Method

The Scenario-based Performance Observation Tool for Learning In Team Environments (SPOTLITE) provides a systematic method for developing team performance measurement instruments comprised of behaviorally anchored rating scales that are tied to observable behaviors that tap critical knowledge and skills and can be assessed at specific intervals during a training scenario. We developed a measurement instrument for four-person teams of F-16 pilots training for air-to-air combat in a high-fidelity simulation environment and implemented it in a handheld computer to support fast and accurate data entry as a team executes a scenario. An experiment demonstrated the sensitivity, reliability, and validity of the instrument.     

Measuring sex-role stereotypes: Attitudes among Hong Kong Chinese adolescents and the development of the Chinese sex-role inventory

A cross-cultural study of adolescent sex-role stereotypes illustrates possible methodological solutions to problems in measuring sex-role identification. A study was conducted with a sample of Hong Kong Chinese adolescents to develop a rating scale that would (1) define the sex-role stereotypes held by adolescents in Hong Kong and (2) serve as a measure of identification with sex-role stereotypes valid for use with Hong Kong samples. The Chinese Sex-Role Inventory (CSRI) was constructed, therefore, following the procedures of Bem in the creation of the Bem Sex Role Inventory. Creation of the CSRI illustrates the feasibility and value of using such procedures in research with adolescents in any society.This report is based on a doctoral dissertation submitted to the faculty of Harvard University. The research was supported by a National Research Service Award, National Institutes of Health Grant 5-T32-MH14088, awarded to Beatrice and John Whiting to support graduate research in cross-cultural child development.     

Imaginative Attitudes

The point of this paper is to reveal a dogma in the ordinary conception of sensory imagination, and to suggest another way forward. The dogma springs from two main sources: a too close comparison of mental imagery to perceptual experience, and a too strong division between mental imagery and the traditional propositional attitudes (such as belief and desire). The result is an unworkable conception of the correctness conditions of sensory imaginings—one lacking any link between the conditions under which an imagining aids human action and inference and the conditions under which it is veridical. The proposed solution is, first, to posit a variety of imaginative attitudes—akin to the traditional propositional attitudes—which have different associated correctness (or satisfaction) conditions. The second part of the solution is to allow for imaginings with “hybrid” contents, in the sense that both mental images and representations with language‐like constituent structure contribute to the content of imaginings.     

Fluency and Attitudes

The goal of this article is to review how, when, and why fluency, or processing ease, affects attitudes. The current article first defines fluency and then discusses its direct impact on attitudes, noting that fluency usually makes attitudes more positive and that it does so for a wide array of attitude objects. Mechanisms and moderators of these direct effects are also described. The article then summarizes how fluency can affect attitudes indirectly, through its impact on other judgments (like perceptions of confidence or truth) and on cognitive operations (like information processing). The article ends by highlighting a few areas where additional research is likely to reap impressive benefits.