" His admiration of women goes hand in hand with his
conception
of women as weak.
Adorno-T-Authoritarian-Personality-Harper-Bros-1950
.
.
.
She was the type that didn't care much for it.
.
.
.
She never had any desire for it.
"
Although rejection of the id, in the foregoing records of high-scoring men, is manifested mainly in the choice of, and attachment to, a frigid woman, it is interesting to note that some of the men at the same time show signs of crude and unsocialized sex impulses (see below). In these cases the inability to accept genuine sexuality leads to both a frequent change of the sex object without personal involvement, and involvement without sex.
Anti-id moralism is more clearly manifest in the statements of prejudiced women, who often have very definite ideas of what is to be considered as wrong. Examples from their interviews follow.
F22: "Sex isn't uppermost in my mind by any means. . . . I'm more for having a good time with the exclusion of sex interest. (Q) I've been shocked by the conduct of my girl friends. I didn't think they were that type. "
F;z: "I think a girl should be friendly, but I don't like necking in the back of a show. A boy and a girl should be just friends. "
Fu: "When at high school was first kissed. " Subject didn't like it. She was fright- ened.
F7z. ? (Proper? ) "I don't believe in parking-no matter what you're doing. I be- lieve in kissing. I've done my share of it, but I've never parked. . . . (A girl who did) I'd stick with, but wouldn't think much of her. . . . Mother says 'a boy admires a girl who admires herself. ' "
Low-scoring subjects, on the other hand, show more acceptance of sex in general, though not without evidence of conflict.
Acceptance of instinctual tendencies is shown in the following records of low-scoring subjects:
? SEX, PEOPLE, AND SELF SEEN THROUGH INTERVIEWS 397
Ms6: (hnportance of sex in' marriage? ) "Very high. I was fortunate in being per- fectly mated to my wife, sexually, that is. "
Mss: (Sex adjustment with her? ) "Very well, took quite a long time, though. "
M16: Subject was in love several times-some of the times the girls were married or did not want to marry him. Once during the depression he had an affair with one girl for several years but did not want to get married because of financial cir- cumstances. Subject married in _ _ after living with his present wife for several years. "We get along pretty well, never quarrel. (How did you get along sexually? ) Pretty well. "
4. "PURE" VS. "BAD" WOMEN
It is probably the predominance of surface adulation of, and underlying resentment against, the mother, found in high-scoring men, that leads to what is here called their dichotomous sex attitudes as defined by the separa- tion of sex and affect, or by the sharpness of the distinction between a "bad" and a "pure" woman. On the other hand, fusion of sex and affect, a tendency to more personalized sex relations, is found more often in low-scoring men
(Category 24). The difference is significant at the 1 per cent level as de- fined at the end of Chapter IX.
In our sample of women we find the same trend, but the difference is not statistically significant.
Examples of the dichotomous conception of "good" vs. "bad" women, taken from the records of high-scoring men, follow.
M s1: (Other relations with women? ) "Well, yes, three or four, all older than me and they weren't anything but physical. "
Mp: "She taught me something that stuck with me all my life, that a woman is the most perfect thing in the world, that is, the right kind of woman. "
M6: "I like a girl who is level-headed and can talk on several topics. I don't like the Maizie and Flo type or the sex boxes. Yes, I have been out with the latter, but you have to be careful. There's always the danger of disease. "
The records of the following two high scorers show the kind of charac- teristics these men value most in the girls they would like to marry:
M 14: (What about girls? ) "Well, there is nothing definite yet, though I have known a lot. I never have found one I'd like to marry. I want a girl whose sole inter- est is in the home. I think a woman's place should not be in the business world. So many women have lost the sense of home. . . . "
M2o: "They're (Indians) a reckless lot, careless about marriages and divorce. . . . (Q) Yes, I went through high school with one girl. . . . Very religious. Got with her around the church. . . . Never took each other very seriously, more or less, just accepted one another. " The subject left and when he returned, she had gotten mar- ried. "She was more or less what I was looking for. Very religious. . . . "
The conception of marriage as a rather external affair not involving com- mon interests, and also demonstrating conventional moralism, is given by the record of the following high scorer:
M41: (What was your wife like? ) "A nice person. A nurse, before I married her.
? THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
(Q) Well, I liked her looks and manners. (In what ways were you most alike? ) Well, we weren't much alike in any way. We got along all right. . . . Her mother was Christian Science. (What about her? ) She was Christian Science. (Any chil- dren? ) No. (In what ways most different? ) \Vell, a little different in tastes about things. (Q) Most anything. I liked flowers and she didn't care much for flowers. (Main difficulties? ) I didn't have any. We got along good. I let her have her own way. Takes two to start an argument. (Have her way in what things? ) In most anything. Well, if we was going anywhere, if I went to buy a suit of clothes, I let her pick it out. If we wanted anything for the house, I let her pick it. (Childhood sex experiences? ) Well, I don't remember any. \Vhen I was a kid, such things weren't taught. . . . Such things weren't mentioned by parents or anyone else. If you met a girl on the street, you'd blush. . . . I don't think it's a very good subject to teach. They learn it soon enough. "
The lack of integration of sex and affection found in high-scoring men is likewise illustrated by some of these quotations. Quite commonly, in the girls they would like to marry, they require, above all, moral standards; often this is the only requirement. Frequently their marriages do not seem to be based on companionship or love. As far as their reports about premarital sexual relationships are concerned, they usually manifest contempt for the women involved. In both marriage and the more casual sex relationships there seems to be little concern with common interest and comradeship.
The difference in the attitude toward sexual relationships in high-scoring as compared with low-scoring men can perhaps best be exemplified by two records describing extramarital relationships. In both cases there is evidence of sexual and marital maladjustment. The differences, however, are charac- teristic of the two groups, respectively.
Ms8, a high-scoring man, reports: "And if you're not satisfied it might become uppermost in your mind, even above work, etc. . . . I believe I've seen where it is necessary for emotional stability, to relieve yourself regardless of marriage. (How do you mean? ) First thing you know you're looking around . . . find something some- where and relieve . . . then can go back and concentrate. . . . (What main difficulties have you found in your marriage? ) My wife and I have always been thoroughly compatible . . . (only trivial daily problems) . . . can't think of anything . . . only one particular thing: I got to chasing around with another woman (although my wife had nothing to do with it; there was no conflict with her) it was in me entirely alone. . . . "
Mzo, a low-scoring man: "We have not enjoyed our sexual relationships almost since the first day of our marriage. I don't want it, and we often go for months with- out coitus . . . is that the word? My wife always takes the initiative in our relation- ships; she is very passionate. So am I-I have had three affairs since my marriage. I am having one now and she knows it. "
The first of these men, a high scorer, talks about sex as though it were an ego-alien tension which has to be "relieved" for hygienic reasons. Thus, in the most intimate interpersonal relationships, he displays a utilitarian and
(pseudo-)realistic outlook. The depersonalized attitude in this subject is drastically expressed by referring to his sexual partner as "something," and
? SEX, PEOPLE, AND SELF SEEN THROUGH INTERVIEWS 399
in the phrase "find something somewhere and relieve. " On the other hand, the low-scoring subject, in a somewhat evasive, unperceptive effort to integrate his extramarital relationships into his total life-pattern, exemplifies the inhibited and at the same time impulse-ridden maladjustment sometimes
found in those scoring low on ethnocentrism.
5. EGO-ALIEN AMBIV ALENCE VS. "FONDNESS"
The isolation of sex experience in the typical high scorers is connected with an ambivalent underlying disrespect for, and resentment against, the opposite sex, often hidden behind an externalized and excessive pseudoad- miration. Low scorers, on the other hand, manifest more often genuine respect and fondness for the opposite sex (Category 25). The difference is highly significant (1 per cent level) for men, and satisfactorily significant
(5 per cent level) for women.
An example of the "High" type of ambivalence toward women is the fol-
lowing statement:
M8z: "I don't think men respect women or anything about women, the way they ought to. . . . In other words, women aren't inferior to men. If anything, they are superior. After all, they are the hands that rock the cradle.
" His admiration of women goes hand in hand with his conception of women as weak. Subject argues strongly at this point that restrictions should be removed on women, but still ex- presses his disapproval of women in business on the grounds that it would spoil the dependent (i. e. , the home type) woman's chances.
More open lack of appreciation is shown in the following description of his stepmother by a high scorer:
M4o: (What sort of person was your stepmother? ) "Pretty hard to describe, just another woman, I guess . . . nothing glaringly ou. tstanding. (In what ways was she like your father? ) She wasn't. (How different? ) In every way. She wasn't his equal in anything-intellectually. More matter of convenience than anything else. "
Undisguised contempt for girls is displayed by another high scorer:
M u : "But I can't stand being around a bunch of girls, a lot of senseless chatter. They are all the same. Sororities are the cliquiest and the snottiest. "
One of the high-scoring prison inmates blames his fate on his wife:
M57: "This last one I married was really a corker. . . . She just got her divorce. . . . I found out she was married all the time to another man. . . . She got me in here, I guess I got pussy-simple. "
Correspondingly, contempt for men is expressed in the following records of high-scoring women:
F24: "Of course, now if you pick a boy as a friend, right away they want to get juicy. You have to be careful about boys. "
F31: "I wouldn't want to be a factory worker, either. It's not very good to say now, when they need everybody that's working in factories, but I can't see a girl
? THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
working in jeans and around grease and putting themselves on the same level with men. "
Low-scoring subjects, on the other hand, in seeking companionship with the opposite sex, more often manifest some measure of fondness. This at- titude, shown by the following protocols, tends to increase in longer and more intimate relationships, as indicated by the statement of M42 that "a successful marriage certainly leads to familiarity but not to contempt. "
The necessity of frankness in marriage is emphasized by Msg: "When I do meet the one girl for me, I shall explain all my past life to her, because I do not believe that happiness can be based on lies. " The frankness but also the compulsive feature in this statement are characteristic of the type of low scorer with neurotic features (see below).
Another low scorer shows love and respect for a woman in spite of the fact that the marriage did not work out:
Mso: " A t that time I was too self-centered t~ be in love with anyone. . . . I did admire and respect and like her . . . but we never should have gotten married. . . . Today I think we could have a better chance of making a go of it . . . because I have grown up sufficiently. "
This record further shows the inclination toward self-blame and intra- punitiveness often found in low scorers.
Real love and common interest with her husband is stressed by:
F3o: "I thought was wonderful. He was so brilliant and his ideas and aspirations and mine were just alike. . . . W e were all good companions and chums, and and I had settled all the world's problems but we had never really talked about ourselves. "
6. EXPLOITIVE MANIPULA TION FOR POWER
In their relations to the opposite sex as in other interpersonal relationships, high scorers tend toward an exploitive-manipulative type of power orienta- tion. There is more of a warm and affectionate "love-seeking" attitude in the low scorers. Differences with respect to this pair of opposites (Category
(26) are statistically highly significant (r per cent level) for both men and women.
Thus, the traits which high-scoring men tend to emphasize in women are the giving of material benefits and submissiveness ("sweet," "kind and gen- erous"), along with purity ("wholesome") and conventionality. They ex- pect to get something from women often without giving much in return. As in the attitude toward their parents, it is again a dependence oriented primarily toward material benefits rather than a dependence stemming from the wish to give or to receive love, although the latter tendencies are by no means completely squelched. Examples are:
M4o: (What sort of woman would you like to marry? ) "Wealthy woman? . Other
? SEX, PEOPLE, AND SELF SEEN THROUGH INTERVIEWS 40I
requirements? ) Well, I'd like . her to be maximum 35, preferably anywhere between 28 and 30. (Any other specifications? ) I'll take that as it comes. "
M45: "Was married three times. The first time in _ _ at eighteen. It lasted six weeks. My panner in a dance walkathon. Married on the floor, no love, but received money for it from the spectators. . . . Sex relationship was more enjoyable than with either of my other wives. "
In line with this, the traits which the typical high-scoring woman tends to desire in men are likewise primarily instrumental in getting the things she wants. They are: hard-working, "go-getting," energetic, "a good per- sonality," (conventionally) moral, "clean-cut," deferent toward women. The next record shows clearly the two-sided nature of the demands high-scoring women tend to make upon a man. On the one hand, he must have a strong drive in order to get things for her; on the other, he must be deferent and "thoughtful. "
F7z: (Q) "Fine boy. Father a writer; grandfather secretary of Canal; very wealthy family but he doesn't have the drive and ambition that I want; I just have to have more drive; somebody who doesn't have to lean on me. I had the feel- ing that if I walked away he would collapse. (War changed him? ) He has more ambition but not the drive-l haven't seen him for a long time; that's why I haven't
made any decision. Here you mingle with boys who have so much push and drive; another boy here has everything except that he isn't thoughtful like. . . . I've got to have someone who isn't selfish. I'm not critical-! know I'm not. "
This as well as the next two records of other high-scoring women illus- trate the inherently opportunistic point of view, the looking at men from the standpoint, above all, of social status and the ability to furnish support:
F22: "I'm going to look (among other things) for the fellow's views on support- ing me. I'd like to marry someone, for instance, who is going into a profession- maybe a doctor. (Engagement? ) It didn't take me long to get over it. His father died when he was 3; his mother was 40 when he was born. Father left mother lots of money. He was a playboy, worked but borrowed money from his mother. He was pretty much attached to his mother's apron strings. W e were engaged 7 or 8 months. I'm not demanding, but he was selfish. We argued more and more, broke up by mutual consent. I learned a lot from it-not to go into things blindly. "
F31: "But there is one thing that is bothering me. Saturday night I had a blind date, and I liked him a lot; only he is a sailor and my boy friend is an officer. It's not that I'm conscious of gold braid. . . . (Marriage? ) Well, I'd like someone . . . with a good personality who mixes well with people. Someone who at the same time is serious about the future. My boy friend is an engineer. "
By contrast, low-scoring subjects tend to emphasize as desired traits com- panionship, common interest, warmth, sociability, sexual love, understand- ing, presence of liberal values. Sometimes their quest for love is so intense and unrealistic that it becomes a source of disappointment to them. This search for the "great romantic love" seems to be based on a wish to restore a successful early relation with a parent, based on nurturance and succor-
? THE AUTHORIT ARIAN PERSONALITY
ance. As they were found to be for parents, expressions of passionate love for sex partners are generally infrequent in our interview material, however. Two records may suffice to illustrate, each in its own way, the different quality of what low-scoring subjects expect from their partners as well as a
certain pervasive tendency toward self-blame.
F34: She talks of looking forward to marriage and children eventually, but she has modest financial requirements for a husband. She has had many boy friends and is the "romantic type. " "I always want to feel this is my great love-and then it isn't. That sort of thing is all right when you are in school. But nowadays when your boy friend goes away to war and you write letters and build up a lot of things that may not even be there-it isn't fair to either person. " She has been "sort of engaged" for two years to a boy she knew in school. He has been overseas in the navy and they have written regularly-romantic letters. She goes out with other boys and he knows this and doesn't object. She hasn't fallen in love with anyone else, but her worry is that her feeling for him is not love. He came home on furlough, and his family, who live in now, had her come down to their home and stay there for several days while he was there. She feels that he sensed that she did not feel the same, and yet she could not bring herself to say anything. She believes this was very cowardly of her and shows an absence of character. She thinks it is quite possible the boy's feelings have changed too, "but why can't people be honest about things like that? And now he is gone and nothing is settled. "
M44: Subject says that in visiting someone at the hospital, his wife seems to know naturally just how to act toward the person, or, at a public meeting1mows just what kind of questions to ask to draw the person out further instead of shutting him up. "And she is a helper, she is the helpingest person, the most willing and helping person that I've ever known. "
7. CONVENTIONALITY VS. INDIVIDUALISM
Again, as in other areas of life, the values of high-scoring subjects with respect to sex tend to be conventionally determined as opposed to the more individualized values of low-scoring subjects (Category 2 7). This variable differentiates significantly (at the I per cent level) between high- and low- scoring men; a similar trend, I 8 positive and 7 negative instances, is found in women; because of the large proportion of "Neutrals," however, the dif- ference is not statistically significant.
The following records show that in the choice of their mates high-scoring subjects tend to place a great deal of emphasis on socioeconomic status, church membership, and conformity with conventional values. The accent is on what is generally socially approved and accepted. Thus the men expect their future wives to stay home, take care of house and children, and attend church. This tendency is often found in the same men who show evidence of primitive and crude sex experience, outside of marriage (see above).
The conventional approach to marriage is best illustrated by the follow- ing records of high-scoring women:
Fp: "Well, I think that because of the society in which we live, young people
? SEX, PEOPLE, AND SELF SEEN THROUGH INTERVIEWS 403
miss a great deal by not being married in the church of their faith. They lose the reverence for marriage and don't learn the true meaning of ? the marriage vows, when it is done so commercially (in a public office). I think that when people are married in church-by that I don't mean a large wedding necessarily-they have one of the most beautiful experiences of their lives. . . . The thing which the church can teach youth is 'to choose. '" By this, she means principally the choice between right and wrong, but also to choose one's friends. "In a church group one meets the right kind of young people; not the kind who hang around the lake shore at night. "
F78: "It was just love at first sight. He has brown hair, brown eyes, white teeth, not handsome, but good clean-cut looking; beautiful smile; mixes well, easy to get along with but has a will of his own. He's lots of fun, interested in everything. He's a high school graduate, now a mechanic in the ground crew of the Naval Air Transport. He wants to go into something in the mechanical line. Before the war he was an apprentice in the auto industry. . . . " The vocation of her husband really wouldn't matter. She thinks boy friend has good chances of getting along, definitely. She would like a profession-"sort of middle class. "
F74: "Too much emotional feeling involved under these conditions. " (Desirable traits? ) Boy friend should be about the same socioeconomic status. They should enjoy doing the same things and get along without too many quarrels.
Or in high-scoring men:
Ms8: (Wife like? ) "Very good person. She has gone to church, and has con- tinued to . . . ever since the child was born. A very good wife, good mother, and darned good cook. Considerate of my folks . . . helped my mother with money, of her own accord. (What do wife and subject offer each other? ) Well, I'll be dog- goned if I know. Doesn't seem as if any bonds at all. Just she belongs there and so do I.
Although rejection of the id, in the foregoing records of high-scoring men, is manifested mainly in the choice of, and attachment to, a frigid woman, it is interesting to note that some of the men at the same time show signs of crude and unsocialized sex impulses (see below). In these cases the inability to accept genuine sexuality leads to both a frequent change of the sex object without personal involvement, and involvement without sex.
Anti-id moralism is more clearly manifest in the statements of prejudiced women, who often have very definite ideas of what is to be considered as wrong. Examples from their interviews follow.
F22: "Sex isn't uppermost in my mind by any means. . . . I'm more for having a good time with the exclusion of sex interest. (Q) I've been shocked by the conduct of my girl friends. I didn't think they were that type. "
F;z: "I think a girl should be friendly, but I don't like necking in the back of a show. A boy and a girl should be just friends. "
Fu: "When at high school was first kissed. " Subject didn't like it. She was fright- ened.
F7z. ? (Proper? ) "I don't believe in parking-no matter what you're doing. I be- lieve in kissing. I've done my share of it, but I've never parked. . . . (A girl who did) I'd stick with, but wouldn't think much of her. . . . Mother says 'a boy admires a girl who admires herself. ' "
Low-scoring subjects, on the other hand, show more acceptance of sex in general, though not without evidence of conflict.
Acceptance of instinctual tendencies is shown in the following records of low-scoring subjects:
? SEX, PEOPLE, AND SELF SEEN THROUGH INTERVIEWS 397
Ms6: (hnportance of sex in' marriage? ) "Very high. I was fortunate in being per- fectly mated to my wife, sexually, that is. "
Mss: (Sex adjustment with her? ) "Very well, took quite a long time, though. "
M16: Subject was in love several times-some of the times the girls were married or did not want to marry him. Once during the depression he had an affair with one girl for several years but did not want to get married because of financial cir- cumstances. Subject married in _ _ after living with his present wife for several years. "We get along pretty well, never quarrel. (How did you get along sexually? ) Pretty well. "
4. "PURE" VS. "BAD" WOMEN
It is probably the predominance of surface adulation of, and underlying resentment against, the mother, found in high-scoring men, that leads to what is here called their dichotomous sex attitudes as defined by the separa- tion of sex and affect, or by the sharpness of the distinction between a "bad" and a "pure" woman. On the other hand, fusion of sex and affect, a tendency to more personalized sex relations, is found more often in low-scoring men
(Category 24). The difference is significant at the 1 per cent level as de- fined at the end of Chapter IX.
In our sample of women we find the same trend, but the difference is not statistically significant.
Examples of the dichotomous conception of "good" vs. "bad" women, taken from the records of high-scoring men, follow.
M s1: (Other relations with women? ) "Well, yes, three or four, all older than me and they weren't anything but physical. "
Mp: "She taught me something that stuck with me all my life, that a woman is the most perfect thing in the world, that is, the right kind of woman. "
M6: "I like a girl who is level-headed and can talk on several topics. I don't like the Maizie and Flo type or the sex boxes. Yes, I have been out with the latter, but you have to be careful. There's always the danger of disease. "
The records of the following two high scorers show the kind of charac- teristics these men value most in the girls they would like to marry:
M 14: (What about girls? ) "Well, there is nothing definite yet, though I have known a lot. I never have found one I'd like to marry. I want a girl whose sole inter- est is in the home. I think a woman's place should not be in the business world. So many women have lost the sense of home. . . . "
M2o: "They're (Indians) a reckless lot, careless about marriages and divorce. . . . (Q) Yes, I went through high school with one girl. . . . Very religious. Got with her around the church. . . . Never took each other very seriously, more or less, just accepted one another. " The subject left and when he returned, she had gotten mar- ried. "She was more or less what I was looking for. Very religious. . . . "
The conception of marriage as a rather external affair not involving com- mon interests, and also demonstrating conventional moralism, is given by the record of the following high scorer:
M41: (What was your wife like? ) "A nice person. A nurse, before I married her.
? THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
(Q) Well, I liked her looks and manners. (In what ways were you most alike? ) Well, we weren't much alike in any way. We got along all right. . . . Her mother was Christian Science. (What about her? ) She was Christian Science. (Any chil- dren? ) No. (In what ways most different? ) \Vell, a little different in tastes about things. (Q) Most anything. I liked flowers and she didn't care much for flowers. (Main difficulties? ) I didn't have any. We got along good. I let her have her own way. Takes two to start an argument. (Have her way in what things? ) In most anything. Well, if we was going anywhere, if I went to buy a suit of clothes, I let her pick it out. If we wanted anything for the house, I let her pick it. (Childhood sex experiences? ) Well, I don't remember any. \Vhen I was a kid, such things weren't taught. . . . Such things weren't mentioned by parents or anyone else. If you met a girl on the street, you'd blush. . . . I don't think it's a very good subject to teach. They learn it soon enough. "
The lack of integration of sex and affection found in high-scoring men is likewise illustrated by some of these quotations. Quite commonly, in the girls they would like to marry, they require, above all, moral standards; often this is the only requirement. Frequently their marriages do not seem to be based on companionship or love. As far as their reports about premarital sexual relationships are concerned, they usually manifest contempt for the women involved. In both marriage and the more casual sex relationships there seems to be little concern with common interest and comradeship.
The difference in the attitude toward sexual relationships in high-scoring as compared with low-scoring men can perhaps best be exemplified by two records describing extramarital relationships. In both cases there is evidence of sexual and marital maladjustment. The differences, however, are charac- teristic of the two groups, respectively.
Ms8, a high-scoring man, reports: "And if you're not satisfied it might become uppermost in your mind, even above work, etc. . . . I believe I've seen where it is necessary for emotional stability, to relieve yourself regardless of marriage. (How do you mean? ) First thing you know you're looking around . . . find something some- where and relieve . . . then can go back and concentrate. . . . (What main difficulties have you found in your marriage? ) My wife and I have always been thoroughly compatible . . . (only trivial daily problems) . . . can't think of anything . . . only one particular thing: I got to chasing around with another woman (although my wife had nothing to do with it; there was no conflict with her) it was in me entirely alone. . . . "
Mzo, a low-scoring man: "We have not enjoyed our sexual relationships almost since the first day of our marriage. I don't want it, and we often go for months with- out coitus . . . is that the word? My wife always takes the initiative in our relation- ships; she is very passionate. So am I-I have had three affairs since my marriage. I am having one now and she knows it. "
The first of these men, a high scorer, talks about sex as though it were an ego-alien tension which has to be "relieved" for hygienic reasons. Thus, in the most intimate interpersonal relationships, he displays a utilitarian and
(pseudo-)realistic outlook. The depersonalized attitude in this subject is drastically expressed by referring to his sexual partner as "something," and
? SEX, PEOPLE, AND SELF SEEN THROUGH INTERVIEWS 399
in the phrase "find something somewhere and relieve. " On the other hand, the low-scoring subject, in a somewhat evasive, unperceptive effort to integrate his extramarital relationships into his total life-pattern, exemplifies the inhibited and at the same time impulse-ridden maladjustment sometimes
found in those scoring low on ethnocentrism.
5. EGO-ALIEN AMBIV ALENCE VS. "FONDNESS"
The isolation of sex experience in the typical high scorers is connected with an ambivalent underlying disrespect for, and resentment against, the opposite sex, often hidden behind an externalized and excessive pseudoad- miration. Low scorers, on the other hand, manifest more often genuine respect and fondness for the opposite sex (Category 25). The difference is highly significant (1 per cent level) for men, and satisfactorily significant
(5 per cent level) for women.
An example of the "High" type of ambivalence toward women is the fol-
lowing statement:
M8z: "I don't think men respect women or anything about women, the way they ought to. . . . In other words, women aren't inferior to men. If anything, they are superior. After all, they are the hands that rock the cradle.
" His admiration of women goes hand in hand with his conception of women as weak. Subject argues strongly at this point that restrictions should be removed on women, but still ex- presses his disapproval of women in business on the grounds that it would spoil the dependent (i. e. , the home type) woman's chances.
More open lack of appreciation is shown in the following description of his stepmother by a high scorer:
M4o: (What sort of person was your stepmother? ) "Pretty hard to describe, just another woman, I guess . . . nothing glaringly ou. tstanding. (In what ways was she like your father? ) She wasn't. (How different? ) In every way. She wasn't his equal in anything-intellectually. More matter of convenience than anything else. "
Undisguised contempt for girls is displayed by another high scorer:
M u : "But I can't stand being around a bunch of girls, a lot of senseless chatter. They are all the same. Sororities are the cliquiest and the snottiest. "
One of the high-scoring prison inmates blames his fate on his wife:
M57: "This last one I married was really a corker. . . . She just got her divorce. . . . I found out she was married all the time to another man. . . . She got me in here, I guess I got pussy-simple. "
Correspondingly, contempt for men is expressed in the following records of high-scoring women:
F24: "Of course, now if you pick a boy as a friend, right away they want to get juicy. You have to be careful about boys. "
F31: "I wouldn't want to be a factory worker, either. It's not very good to say now, when they need everybody that's working in factories, but I can't see a girl
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working in jeans and around grease and putting themselves on the same level with men. "
Low-scoring subjects, on the other hand, in seeking companionship with the opposite sex, more often manifest some measure of fondness. This at- titude, shown by the following protocols, tends to increase in longer and more intimate relationships, as indicated by the statement of M42 that "a successful marriage certainly leads to familiarity but not to contempt. "
The necessity of frankness in marriage is emphasized by Msg: "When I do meet the one girl for me, I shall explain all my past life to her, because I do not believe that happiness can be based on lies. " The frankness but also the compulsive feature in this statement are characteristic of the type of low scorer with neurotic features (see below).
Another low scorer shows love and respect for a woman in spite of the fact that the marriage did not work out:
Mso: " A t that time I was too self-centered t~ be in love with anyone. . . . I did admire and respect and like her . . . but we never should have gotten married. . . . Today I think we could have a better chance of making a go of it . . . because I have grown up sufficiently. "
This record further shows the inclination toward self-blame and intra- punitiveness often found in low scorers.
Real love and common interest with her husband is stressed by:
F3o: "I thought was wonderful. He was so brilliant and his ideas and aspirations and mine were just alike. . . . W e were all good companions and chums, and and I had settled all the world's problems but we had never really talked about ourselves. "
6. EXPLOITIVE MANIPULA TION FOR POWER
In their relations to the opposite sex as in other interpersonal relationships, high scorers tend toward an exploitive-manipulative type of power orienta- tion. There is more of a warm and affectionate "love-seeking" attitude in the low scorers. Differences with respect to this pair of opposites (Category
(26) are statistically highly significant (r per cent level) for both men and women.
Thus, the traits which high-scoring men tend to emphasize in women are the giving of material benefits and submissiveness ("sweet," "kind and gen- erous"), along with purity ("wholesome") and conventionality. They ex- pect to get something from women often without giving much in return. As in the attitude toward their parents, it is again a dependence oriented primarily toward material benefits rather than a dependence stemming from the wish to give or to receive love, although the latter tendencies are by no means completely squelched. Examples are:
M4o: (What sort of woman would you like to marry? ) "Wealthy woman? . Other
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requirements? ) Well, I'd like . her to be maximum 35, preferably anywhere between 28 and 30. (Any other specifications? ) I'll take that as it comes. "
M45: "Was married three times. The first time in _ _ at eighteen. It lasted six weeks. My panner in a dance walkathon. Married on the floor, no love, but received money for it from the spectators. . . . Sex relationship was more enjoyable than with either of my other wives. "
In line with this, the traits which the typical high-scoring woman tends to desire in men are likewise primarily instrumental in getting the things she wants. They are: hard-working, "go-getting," energetic, "a good per- sonality," (conventionally) moral, "clean-cut," deferent toward women. The next record shows clearly the two-sided nature of the demands high-scoring women tend to make upon a man. On the one hand, he must have a strong drive in order to get things for her; on the other, he must be deferent and "thoughtful. "
F7z: (Q) "Fine boy. Father a writer; grandfather secretary of Canal; very wealthy family but he doesn't have the drive and ambition that I want; I just have to have more drive; somebody who doesn't have to lean on me. I had the feel- ing that if I walked away he would collapse. (War changed him? ) He has more ambition but not the drive-l haven't seen him for a long time; that's why I haven't
made any decision. Here you mingle with boys who have so much push and drive; another boy here has everything except that he isn't thoughtful like. . . . I've got to have someone who isn't selfish. I'm not critical-! know I'm not. "
This as well as the next two records of other high-scoring women illus- trate the inherently opportunistic point of view, the looking at men from the standpoint, above all, of social status and the ability to furnish support:
F22: "I'm going to look (among other things) for the fellow's views on support- ing me. I'd like to marry someone, for instance, who is going into a profession- maybe a doctor. (Engagement? ) It didn't take me long to get over it. His father died when he was 3; his mother was 40 when he was born. Father left mother lots of money. He was a playboy, worked but borrowed money from his mother. He was pretty much attached to his mother's apron strings. W e were engaged 7 or 8 months. I'm not demanding, but he was selfish. We argued more and more, broke up by mutual consent. I learned a lot from it-not to go into things blindly. "
F31: "But there is one thing that is bothering me. Saturday night I had a blind date, and I liked him a lot; only he is a sailor and my boy friend is an officer. It's not that I'm conscious of gold braid. . . . (Marriage? ) Well, I'd like someone . . . with a good personality who mixes well with people. Someone who at the same time is serious about the future. My boy friend is an engineer. "
By contrast, low-scoring subjects tend to emphasize as desired traits com- panionship, common interest, warmth, sociability, sexual love, understand- ing, presence of liberal values. Sometimes their quest for love is so intense and unrealistic that it becomes a source of disappointment to them. This search for the "great romantic love" seems to be based on a wish to restore a successful early relation with a parent, based on nurturance and succor-
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ance. As they were found to be for parents, expressions of passionate love for sex partners are generally infrequent in our interview material, however. Two records may suffice to illustrate, each in its own way, the different quality of what low-scoring subjects expect from their partners as well as a
certain pervasive tendency toward self-blame.
F34: She talks of looking forward to marriage and children eventually, but she has modest financial requirements for a husband. She has had many boy friends and is the "romantic type. " "I always want to feel this is my great love-and then it isn't. That sort of thing is all right when you are in school. But nowadays when your boy friend goes away to war and you write letters and build up a lot of things that may not even be there-it isn't fair to either person. " She has been "sort of engaged" for two years to a boy she knew in school. He has been overseas in the navy and they have written regularly-romantic letters. She goes out with other boys and he knows this and doesn't object. She hasn't fallen in love with anyone else, but her worry is that her feeling for him is not love. He came home on furlough, and his family, who live in now, had her come down to their home and stay there for several days while he was there. She feels that he sensed that she did not feel the same, and yet she could not bring herself to say anything. She believes this was very cowardly of her and shows an absence of character. She thinks it is quite possible the boy's feelings have changed too, "but why can't people be honest about things like that? And now he is gone and nothing is settled. "
M44: Subject says that in visiting someone at the hospital, his wife seems to know naturally just how to act toward the person, or, at a public meeting1mows just what kind of questions to ask to draw the person out further instead of shutting him up. "And she is a helper, she is the helpingest person, the most willing and helping person that I've ever known. "
7. CONVENTIONALITY VS. INDIVIDUALISM
Again, as in other areas of life, the values of high-scoring subjects with respect to sex tend to be conventionally determined as opposed to the more individualized values of low-scoring subjects (Category 2 7). This variable differentiates significantly (at the I per cent level) between high- and low- scoring men; a similar trend, I 8 positive and 7 negative instances, is found in women; because of the large proportion of "Neutrals," however, the dif- ference is not statistically significant.
The following records show that in the choice of their mates high-scoring subjects tend to place a great deal of emphasis on socioeconomic status, church membership, and conformity with conventional values. The accent is on what is generally socially approved and accepted. Thus the men expect their future wives to stay home, take care of house and children, and attend church. This tendency is often found in the same men who show evidence of primitive and crude sex experience, outside of marriage (see above).
The conventional approach to marriage is best illustrated by the follow- ing records of high-scoring women:
Fp: "Well, I think that because of the society in which we live, young people
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miss a great deal by not being married in the church of their faith. They lose the reverence for marriage and don't learn the true meaning of ? the marriage vows, when it is done so commercially (in a public office). I think that when people are married in church-by that I don't mean a large wedding necessarily-they have one of the most beautiful experiences of their lives. . . . The thing which the church can teach youth is 'to choose. '" By this, she means principally the choice between right and wrong, but also to choose one's friends. "In a church group one meets the right kind of young people; not the kind who hang around the lake shore at night. "
F78: "It was just love at first sight. He has brown hair, brown eyes, white teeth, not handsome, but good clean-cut looking; beautiful smile; mixes well, easy to get along with but has a will of his own. He's lots of fun, interested in everything. He's a high school graduate, now a mechanic in the ground crew of the Naval Air Transport. He wants to go into something in the mechanical line. Before the war he was an apprentice in the auto industry. . . . " The vocation of her husband really wouldn't matter. She thinks boy friend has good chances of getting along, definitely. She would like a profession-"sort of middle class. "
F74: "Too much emotional feeling involved under these conditions. " (Desirable traits? ) Boy friend should be about the same socioeconomic status. They should enjoy doing the same things and get along without too many quarrels.
Or in high-scoring men:
Ms8: (Wife like? ) "Very good person. She has gone to church, and has con- tinued to . . . ever since the child was born. A very good wife, good mother, and darned good cook. Considerate of my folks . . . helped my mother with money, of her own accord. (What do wife and subject offer each other? ) Well, I'll be dog- goned if I know. Doesn't seem as if any bonds at all. Just she belongs there and so do I.
