Allport’s threat-based account of authoritarianism beat Adorno’s repressed-aggression account empirically

Evidence

Still, Allport’s ideas (compared to Adorno et al.’s) better captured the complexity revealed by later research. Most centrally, Allport’s view that fearfulness and a threat orientation are the motivational core of the authoritarian syndrome has been substantially confirmed, whereas Adorno et al.’s hypothesis of repressed aggression has not. Allport’s emphasis on fearfulness and insecurity also led him correctly to view a restricted, limited cognitive style as an essential aspect of this syndrome, whereas Adorno et al. did not. Allport also identified the “philosophy of life” of the social world as dangerous and threatening as an important component of the authoritarian syndrome, while Adorno et al. did not. And finally, Allport emphasized that social environmental uncertainties and threats interact with authoritarianism to elicit hostility toward particular groups and to activate support for authoritarian policies, while Adorno et al. largely ignored social environmental influences. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 2487

Categorization

• XREF: Directly adjudicates the Allport vs. Adorno debate that threads through the Frankfurt School book in this vault’s psychology thread.
• QUESTION: Worth chasing the cited empirical work that confirmed threat orientation over repressed aggression — a core finding for the prejudice-psychology section.