In the text you read about the Right-wing Authoritarianism items. But what is the RWA scale, and what does authoritarianism have to do with prejudice?

Several points are worth making on this topic. First, it is an excellent example of how psychological research can be closely tied to current events. Hitler’s barbarous slaughter of millions of Jews provided a major stimulus for the study of authoritarianism. Second, the study of anti-Semitism quickly expanded to the study of ethnocentrism, because those who were hostile to Jews also expressed antagonism toward all groups other than their own. One researcher found that those scoring high on the F-scale tended to be intolerant of even (fictitious groups of) Danerians, Pireaneans, and Wallonians. Third, the study of ethnocentrism expanded to the study of personality in general. The existence of ethnocentrism suggests that attitudes may result from some characteristic of the people holding them rather than characteristics of the people toward whom they are directed. Finally, Adorno’s The Authoritarian Personality is recognized as a classic work in social psychology in that it attempted to relate personality to ideology (i.e., to one’s social, political, and economic attitudes).

To find out more about RWA and to learn more about Bob Altemeyer’s work on the topic, you might want to check out the Wikipedia entry on RWA at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-wing_authoritarianism