The original authoritarian personality studies suffered from systematic methodological flaws.

Evidence

Because Adorno et al. failed to write a succinct, thorough summary of their work, which was enormous in size (23 chapters and over 1,000 pages), we have chosen to introduce students to this tradition of research by reprinting Roger Brown’s outstanding and influential (1965) review of the strengths and weaknesses of early research on the authoritarian personality. Criticisms of the work include all of the following: (a) the use of nonrepresentative samples in drawing general, far-reaching conclusions, (b) reliance on poorly constructed attitude surveys that allowed for the intrusion of response bias, (c) failure to establish controlled procedures for content analyses of the clinical interviews, and (d) reluctance to seriously consider alternative explanations for their empirical findings. For example, it seems plausible that correlations among authoritarianism, ethnocentrism, education, and socio-economic status could arise from cultural associations rather than personality dynamics per se (see Pettigrew, 1959). And even if one were to accept the validity of the authoritarian syndrome, the original researchers were never able to make a convincing case that it was caused by authoritarian childrearing practices. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 399

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s existing work on how social-scientific claims get accepted or dismissed — the Adorno et al. case is a classic example of hugely influential but methodologically shaky research.
• SEED: Angle: how a deeply flawed 1,000-page study became foundational — the sociology of canonization in social psychology.