Beyond politics: authoritarianism and the pursuit of leisure

Psychologists know a lot about the political and ideological correlates of people scoring high on authoritarianism. However, psychologists have less knowledge about such people's everyday pursuits. In the present study, the authors examined authoritarian interest in film, live events, music, and reading. A predictable pattern of correlates emerged. For example, authoritarians enjoyed activities in which physical conflict was prominent, whereas authoritarians tended not to like entertainment that offered introspection. In general, the present results were consistent across 2 samples (N = 120, N = 90). Although men and women had significantly different preferences on over 0.5 of the leisure pursuits (e.g., men enjoyed action films more than did women), there were no significant gender differences in the magnitudes of correlates with authoritarianism. In general, leisure interests appeared to be partly manifestations or expressions of authoritarian tendencies.     

Dissociations between reaction times and temporal order judgments: a diffusion model approach

A diffusion model for simple reaction time (RT) and temporal order judgment (TOJ) tasks was developed to account for a commonly observed dissociation between these 2 tasks: Most stimulus manipulations (e.g., intensity) have larger effects in RT tasks than in TOJ tasks. The model assumes that a detection criterion determines the level of sensory evidence needed to conclude that a stimulus has been presented. Analysis of the performance that would be achieved with different possible criterion settings revealed that performance was optimal with a lower criterion setting for the TOJ task than for the RT task. In addition, the model predicts that effects of stimulus manipulations should increase with the size of the detection criterion. Thus, the model suggests that commonly observed dissociations between RT and TOJ tasks may simply be due to performance optimization in the face of conflicting task demands.     

Generativity and successful parenting: an analysis of young adult outcomes

Generativity scores were assessed in parents and correlated with offspring outcomes. The offspring were participants in a longitudinal study spanning their first and senior years of college. Generativity of parents was positively related to offspring agreeableness and conscientiousness. Parental generativity was also related to offspring scores on future time orientation and positive affect. In addition, generative parents seemed to model their political interests to offspring, and that modeling was related to children's higher scores on generativity and greater interest in politics. Parental generativity was also related to offspring religiosity. Most of these relationships remained significant after controlling for offspring scores on generativity. Generativity of parents appears to be related to successful offspring outcomes.     

Context effects in political judgement: assimilation and contrast as a function of categorization processes

Two experiments demonstrate that thinking about a given politician may result in assimilation as well as contrast effects in evolutions of the politician's party. In two experiments, assimilation effects were observed when an experimental categorization task elicited the inclusion of a highly respected politician in the representation formed of his party, whereas contrast effects were observed when the categorization task elicited his exclusion from the representation, with the control group falling in between. Hence, the same information may elicit assimilation as well as contrast effects, depending on its use in mental construal. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Authoritarianism of Parents and Offspring: Intergenerational Politics and Adjustment to College

The authoritarianism scores (RWA) of parents and their college-aged children were hypothesized to interact to affect the intergenerational transmission of political attitudes and offspring adjustment to college. Parent and offspring dyads who matched on RWA (both scored high or low) agreed about the importance of social events and on the mechanisms by which political attitudes were transmitted from parent to offspring. Disagreeing dyads (parent scored high on RWA and offspring scored low or parent scored low on RWA and offspring scored high) did not show this pattern. In addition, 2-year longitudinal data revealed that offspring who mismatched with their parents on authoritarianism had a more difficult time adjusting to college than did offspring who matched with their parents on authoritarianism. Discussion stresses the importance of examining the implications of home context on the authoritarianism of adolescent children.     

Distance discrimination in a simulated space environment

The just noticeable difference (JND) for distance was investigated by a paired-comparisons method using successive comparisons. The research utilized an optically simulated large target located in a textureless environment at distances along the saggital plane out to 12, 800 ft. The value of ΔD/D varied from less than 3% at 200 ft to about 7% at 12, 800 ft. The results confirmed a power function relationship between distance threshold and observation distance.     

System Orientation: A dilemma for the role conceptualisation of 'counsellors' in schools

A survey of the American and British literature on counselling is used to elaborate an hypothesis concerning the importance in the minds of counsellors of the organisational as well as the interpersonal relationships they make. The hypothesis is tested and confirmed by a questionnaire enquiry to counsellors, pastoral care staff, guidance staff and others in British secondary schools. It leads to an elaboration in organisational terms of the notion of 'directiveness'.