stories, where many characters suffered mutilating
injuries
and acci- dents.
Adorno-T-Authoritarian-Personality-Harper-Bros-1950
These marriages were unsuccessful.
At the time of her treatment, she was happily married to a more passive man who admired her and encour- aged her professional ambitions.
The patient was a serious, sensitive, tense person who was uncomfortable and shy in groups and preferred to be or work alone.
Asked about her early life, she described herself as a thoroughly undisciplined, nonconforming child, who in spite of very high intelligence could not do well in school because she got bored and refused to do work she disliked.
She did not get along with other children, and preferred to do art work by herself.
In later childhood she wanted to be a cowgirl.
In adoles- cence she went through a very rebellious period, then took art training and became a radical.
She was talented and had had some success in various artistic fields.
She was interested in modern experimental art forms and in the repre- sentation of psychological moods.
She was politically left-wing but felt she could not be of great use to any political movement because of her shyness and inability to function in groups or to approach people.
She described herself and her history with much psychological perceptiveness, frankness, and insight.
In spite of this, psychotherapy was difficult because everything was told in a very intellectualized fashion.
Instead of letting herself feel the appropriate emotions, the patient usually managed to keep quite aloof, care- fully choosing her words to describe her early environment and history.
The patient had had previous periods of depression, each time when some- thing blocked her professional ambitions. The last episode was very severe: She became afraid there was a man in the house who could harm her, and she developed such a loathing for herself that she felt her skin was covered with repulsive fish scales.
The history revealed that she was the only child of two rather neurotic people, who in her early childhood gave the girl a good deal of freedom and individual attention. In spite of this, she often felt lonely and "left out. " Through the circumstance of the parents' separation when the patient was 5, the patient came to feel that her mother had caused the beloved father much suffering and was responsible for the separation. She began to feel great dis- gust for and hostility towards her mother, who became the prototype for her image of the "shallow, pretty, exploiting woman. " Her professional interests and activities were based on identification with her professionally successful father, and perhaps also her stepmother.
It is not necessary for our purpose to go into a detailed discussion of the dynamics of this woman's personality and development. The case was pre- sented merely as a description of one type of female patient found among the low scorers. Though too extreme to be representative, the case has many characteristics typical of a whole group of low-scoring women, usually polit- ical radicals or militant liberals: the masculine identification (which is un- usually strong here), the competition with men and striving for professional
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achievement, the rejection of femininity and inability to accept the role of mother. The latter two are exceptionally pronounced here. In most of o low-scoring women there were strong feminine identifications also whic were in conflict with the "masculine" strivings. In contrast to the hig scoring women, there is-as with low-scoring women generally-little con pulsiveness, less constriction, greater richness of fantasy life-here express in artistic and other professional fields-introversion (here particular strong), and concern with ideas and inner experience. The patient tried handle her conflicts by seeking rational explanations (therapy) and by subl mations.
In a few of the low-scoring women anxiety symptoms predominated. these cases, feelings of inadequacy were quite prominent and there w anxiety and shyness in certain social situations. One woman felt so unea: in groups that she frequently broke into a sweat. She was also jealous of h husband's interest in other women and afraid she might retaliate by having affair, as she did once before. Another patient, an unmarried woman wl was embarrassed in social situations, had developed tremors whenever s had to hold a cup or stemmed glass, or when filling out application blanl After having fallen down the stairs at a party where she was very uncomfo: able, she developed a panic of going down stairs. Also, the patient thoug she was always attracted by the wrong men-usually very neurotic m< One very inhibited young girl came to the Clinic because she was afraid l former enuresis might return. She thought she would use the symptom avoid social engagements, of which she was somewhat afraid. She felt ve guilty about her adolescent sexual interests. She had night terrors aboUI
half hour after going to sleep, in which she saw something coming down her-sometimes a net, sometimes a swarm of bugs. Sometimes an abstr: shape of a person would crawl into her bed. She would scream and jump < of bed. One case was of a more phobic character. The girl had had an anir phobia. When seen at the Clinic she was in a ''confused anxious state," afr of entering graduate school, particularly of going to see her graduate : visor. She could not bring herself to go to him and discuss her work. ~ felt that she had not accomplished much. She was also worried because : did not feel warmly towards anyone, because she felt rather hostile-parti' larly toward her mother.
There was one case with obsessive-compulsive symptoms, a woman " a previous depressive episode. At the time of her treatment she was unablt do her (clerical) work for fear she might write down something that wo embarrass her or damage someone else. The trouble began at 17 when feared to write down "dam" or "damn. " (Swearing was severely condem1 by her strict father, whom she reported she hated. ) Years later, after she r about rape in the papers she began to worry about the word "rape. " Now was afraid of writing down something pertaining to her current employ
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raping or attacking her. She was never certain whether she had not by chance inserted these ideas into a letter, or into other products of her typing work. For the last few years she had found that sedatives and alcohol would relieve her condition.
One of the low-scoring women was classified as a paranoid schizophrenic. Yet her complaints, except for a few bizarre ideas, were similar to the ones reported by other low-scoring women suffering primarily from depression. The patient described with much insight her extreme sensitivity to other people's reactions, her concern lest she be rejected by others, her early feel- ings of insecurity and of being unwanted. She said her illness started with nervousness, indecision, and fears "of not being able to keep a job, that I might harm people, of dying of a cerebral hemorrhage (her mother had died in this way); afraid I was going to die and none knew about it or cared. " When first interviewed she complained of being depressed and la"cking in the ability to concentrate on her work. She was afraid people were "question- ing her motives" and had tried to read her mind by saying things to elicit her reactions. She felt a change in the attitude of her family towards her. She had been weak and tired, attributing this to a drug which she believed was used in the food at the previous hospital. She said "there is a barrier between me and other people erected by myself. Last week I felt closer to people. "
Finally, there were two cases who were referred by physicians to whom they had turned because of physical symptoms. In one case the main com- plaint was a headache and "hypersensitivity to light, necessitating wearing of dark glasses. " The other case complained mainly of dismenorrhea, also of nausea and of muscular pains simulating her mother's arthritis. Both cases traced their symptoms to accidents. Although little material on these patients was available, it seemed very likely that they were cases of conversion hysteria.
3. THE ''MIDDLES"
Most of the data just presented pertain only to patients receiving E scores within the high or low quartiles. We have, of course, collected some data on "middle scorers. " First, there were the questionnaire data, including responses to Projective Questions, and second, the psychiatric diagnoses and Minnesota Multiphasic scores. These indicated that, on the whole, "low middles" re- sembled the low scorers more, the "high middles" showed more resemblance to the high scorers.
In addition, several clinical case studies were made of patients with middle scores. In these cases one could clearly discern both "high" and "low" per- sonality trends and, sometimes, curious inconsistencies in ideology and be- havior. This was true of some of our most disturbed patients. Most of the psychotic patients made middle scores-a few were "low middles," but most of them made high middle scores. Some explanations of this trend have been
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advanced in Section D above; it seemed to be related in these patients to ego weakness and unconcern with social reality. There were, of course, people with middle scores who were relatively little disturbed, but we have very little information concerning them.
The total sample of Clinic subjects contained 27 cases diagnosed as psy- chotic. Of these, 70 per cent (19 cases) made scores in the middle quartiles. This percentage is considerably greater than chance (which would be so per cent) and is significant at the 5 per cent level. However, little weight can be given this result because of the small number of cases.
The clinical case studies also indicate that many of the most disturbed patients tended to make middle rather than extreme scores. In these cases it can often be shown that the over-all personality picture is either "high" or "low" but that the neurotic or psychotic processes lead to certain contra- dictory opinions, or attitudes that are the opposite.
An example of such a picture is a schizophrenic man, a strongly intrapuni- tive person, thoroughly opposed to any kind of prejudice against minorities, usually a pacifist (and believer in a vague humanitarianism) who at certain times expressed marked chauvinism and destructive ideas directed against other nations. He developed these ideas when control of his own homosexu- ality and hostility was threatening to collapse. Another case is that of a man with a strongly paranoid character who had the most outspoken fascist ideology. This man's character structure and his scores on the F and PEC scales revealed that in most respects this man was very much like our high- scoring subjects. Great hostility and fear of his father had prevented genuine identifications. But the subject spent all his efforts in a fruitless attempt to prove to himself and the world that he was more powerful, capable, intelli- gent, and virtuous than his father. This manifested itself, among other ways, in continual though unrealistic and unsuccessful strivings for positions of power, in a grandiose conception of himself, in a verbose manner of speech and continual orientation toward making an impression on others. In many ways this man could be described as a psychopathic character. Still, he made only a low-middle score on E. Interviews revealed that this was related to a certain opposition to the father's prejudiced ideology, although in other areas this subject had very conventional values. Also, the mild opposition to preju- dice seemed to rest on a certain amount of identification with deprived groups. For instance, he considered the differences between whites and Negroes to be primarily due to a difference in education; in fact he would like to solve all problems in the area of group relations by giving educa- tional opportunities to all. He also considers the basis for all his own failures to be his lack of a college education due to the fact that his father lost his money just when the patient was of college age. Needless to say, this subject's ideology differed qualitatively from that of low-middle subjects whose
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characters were more typical of low scorers. These differences, however, were revealed only in the interview.
H. CONCLUSIONS
In this concluding section we shall discuss the problem of the relationship between ethnocentrism and psychological ill health in the light of the find- ings just reported. First, however, it will be necessary to make a statement about the degree to which conclusions drawn on the basis of findings from the Langley Porter Clinic group can be generalized. In our description of the sample (Section B) we have defined the Langley Porter Clinic population as a group coming mainly from the urban lower middle-class and, on the average, somewhat younger and slightly more educated and more intelligent than the general population, and more cooperative than average. In these respects Langley Porter Clinic patients are probably similar to patient groups from other psychiatric clinics in large American cities. Within the limits set by our selection procedure, the sample studied was thought to be fairly rep- resentative of the Clinic population as a whole, although an exact comparison with the clinic population at large could not be made for want of available data. Results of the present investigation which were found to be statistically significant probably hold for similar clinic groups. A question then arises as to how representative these clinic groups are of the psychologically dis- turbed (neurotic-psychotic) population as a whole. This question cannot be answered, because no one knows just what this population is like. There are countless individuals who have severe psychological disturbances but never come to the attention of clinics or private psychiatrists. On the other hand, a public clinic such as the one described probably covers a wider range of clinical pictures and social backgrounds than any other agency, certainly a much wider one than could be found among patients going to private ther- apists and institutions.
As far as the statistical significance of most of the results is concerned, much is left to be desired. The scope of the investigation did not permit the use of many more than 120 subjects. For many of our comparisons this group had to be divided into many small subgroups. Taken one by one, most of the numerical results therefore are not statistically significant, nor otherwise impressive. Whatever value there is in the present investigation lies more in the consistency of all of our findings with one another and with the findings of the study as a whole.
Now an attempt will be made to bring our findings to bear on several questions regarding the relationships between ethnocentrism and psycho- logical ill health. All of the following questions have been raised in connection with the research findings reported in this book: (1) Are people with rela-
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tively severe psychological disturbances on the average more or less preju- diced than "normal" people? (2) Are people making extreme (high or low) scores on the E scale also extreme on the dimension of mental health-mental illness? (3) Are high or low scorers prone to develop certain specific kinds of psychological disturbances? (4) Did the study of neurotic and psychotic subjects lead to new hypotheses about the character structure and its possible genetic sources in high and low scorers? (5) Is there any evidence that one of the two groups, at the opposite extremes of the E scale, was more severely disturbed than the other? Is there a relationship between ethnocentrism and psychosis?
1. Are people with relatively severe psychological disturbances on the average more or less prejudiced than "normal" people? When the average ethnocentrism scores of the Langley Porter men and women were compared with scores obtained by averaging all other groups, the Clinic group turned out to be slightly, but not significantly, less prejudiced than average. The scores showed a wide range and great variability, indicating that the group contained subjects of greatly varying ideologies and personalities. If one would like to generalize to a wider group of psychologically disturbed people, the Langley Porter Clinic mean is probably too low. As we have shown, the Clinic group was younger, somewhat more educated, intelligent, and cooperative than average. All these selective factors are known to show slight negative correlations with ethnocentrism. On these and other grounds it seems reasonable to assume that a large group of disturbed persons taken at random from the general population would on the average make prejudice scores similar to those of a group of nondisturbed people.
2. Are people making extreme (high or low) scores on the E scale also extreme on the dimension of mental health-mental illness? Most of the dy- namic formulations in this book have been derived from comparisons of subjects scoring in the high and low quartiles. An objection to this procedure has been that perhaps high and low scorers are both deviant groups, that they are "marginal and neurotic," and that "normal people" in our society are "middles," that is, mildly in agreement with the stereotypes prevalent in our culture. In order to answer the above question conclusively one would first have to establish a reliable measure of degree of psychological disturbance. This could then be correlated with ethnocentrism in a large group of subjects. No such measure was available for the present investigation. However, there were some indications that the subjects receiving middle scores on E were at least as disturbed-if not more so-than the patients making extreme scores. This statement is based on some clinical case studies of neurotic and psychotic middle scorers and on the finding that 70 per cent of our psychotic subjects scored in the middle quartiles.
3? Are high or low scorers prone to develop certain specific kinds of psy- chological disturbances? On the whole our data seem to show that the clinical
? PSYCHOLOGICAL ILL HEALTH AND POTENTIAL FASCISM 963
pictures of subjects in the high quartile resemble each other and differ system- atically from the clinical pictures shown by patients from the low quartile. These trends cannot be completely described in terms of the conventional psychiatric classifications as they were used at Langley Porter Clinic. In these terms, the trends were partially expressed in a predominance of "mixed neurosis" with "depressive and anxiety features" in low-scoring women, of "anxiety states" in high-scoring women. The relationships were less marked in the men. However, clinically defined similarities among high-scoring cases, on the one hand, and low-scoring cases, on the other, cut across the lines drawn by these diagnostic classifications. There are high as well as low scorers in each of the major psychiatric categories (e. g. , schizophrenia, manic-depressive psychosis, anxiety state, hysteria, obsessive-compulsive, and "mixed neurosis"). It cannot be decided here whether this is due to the essentially nondynamic nature of the classification system or to the way in which the classifications were applied by the physicians. Probably both factors are responsible. More detailed study of the complaints as described by the patients in a first psychiatric interview revealed the following differ- ences in clinical pictures of high and low scorers.
The subjects scoring high on ethnocentrism usually displayed very little awareness of their own feelings and psychological problems. What is more, they tended to resist psychological explanations and to suppress emotion. Their complaints were very often devoid of any psychological content. The most common symptoms in both men and women were vague anxiety or physical signs of anxiety and rage. The more disturbed patients suffered from feelings of depersonalization, lack of interest, and depressed affect of a more schizoid type. Very many high-scoring men and women came to the Clinic with somatic complaints-some of them psychosomatic symptoms which could be understood as expressions of suppressed affects such as fear or rage. They were inclined to dwell at length on these symptoms to the exclusion of other problems. Some showed pathological fear of sickness, physical injury, or death.
The most frequent physical complaints of the high-scoring men in our group were stomach ulcers and physical expressions, such as tremors, sweat- ing, etc. , of tension and anxiety. Some of the cases had markedly compulsive characters, others appeared to be more "phobic" or to have characters built around defenses against passive homosexuality. In some of these cases fears of being injured or attacked, or other paranoid trends, were part of the pic- ture. Other types of cases were primarily psychopathic (one of these had admitted sexual exposure to a child) and still others were overt homosexuals. All of them, except for one case of simple schizophrenia, showed to some extent the "toughness" and masculine fa~_;ade together with various signs of extreme castration anxiety and underlying passivity. The majority of the high-scoring women complained of irritability, anxiety or hyperven-
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tilation symptoms; many also had temper outbursts or attacks of trem- bling, screaming, or fainting (probably equivalents of attacks of rage) and fear of dying during such an attack. When one of these cases was stUdied in detail, it was found that her attacks of panic, trembling, fainting, and screaming were expressions of extreme rage precipitated by an incident earlier in the day but suppressed at the time. There was one case of hysterical conversion in a woman with a very rigid character, and there were several very infantile schizoid cases with different features such as agitated depres- sion, depersonalization, and paranoid fears. All of these women, however, resembled each other in the following ways: their main problems seemed to center around the inability to express strong hostilities directed against some member of their family; their personalities were rigid and very constricted; most of them had marked compulsive traits. Rigidity of personality and the tendency to use countercathective defenses seem to be characteristic of both high-scoring? men and high-scoring women.
The low scorers were found to exhibit a wide variety of clinical pictures and complaints. They were much more familiar with themselves, more aware and accepting of emotional experiences and problems. The complaints of low-scoring patients very rarely consisted of vague anxiety or physical symptoms? alone. If anxiety without content appeared at all, the patient also reported being concerned about other problems. Usually, the patients stated their problems in terms of specific impulses, fears, or adjustment difficulties. The most common single symptom characteristic of low-scoring men and women was neurotic depression with feelings of inadequacy. Most of these patients had inhibitions in some area-sexual, work, social-and felt uneasy in group situations.
Summarizing these findings, then, one might say that some statistical rela- tionship was found for the women between high E score and the classification "anxiety state," on the one hand, low E score and a classification which was labeled "mixed neurosis" (which probably should have been called "neurotic depression"), on the other. It became clear, however, that ethnocentrism was much more strongly related to certain very general personality trends which cut across the lines drawn by the psychiatric classifications. It has therefore been impossible to speak of symptoms or "types of disturbance" without some reference to the personality syndromes in which they oc- curred. These personality syndromes will be discussed more fully, more interpretatively in the following section.
4? Did the study of neurotic and psychotic subjects lead to new hypoth- eses about the character structure and its possible genetic sources in high and low scorers? All the important variables in which high- and low-scoring patients differed, were identical with those found to differentiate high and low scorers in groups of people who were relatively little disturbed. In the
? PSYCHOLOGICAL ILL HEALTH AND POTENTIAL FASCISM 965
disturbed group, however, these characteristics were seen in more exagger- ated form. In the first student group studied by the questionnaire and clinical techniques, Frenkel-Brunswik and Sanford (38) found that the high-scoring women more often mentioned health problems, in spite of the fact that their health histories appeared to be quite similar to those of the low scorers. These few, often casual, remarks about health were related to certain themes in the T. A. T.
stories, where many characters suffered mutilating injuries and acci- dents. On the basis of these data, a tentative interpretation was made to the effect that high-scoring women characteristically show concern about their physical well-being because they are unconsciously afraid of being hurt as a punishment for strong hostile impulses. This hypothesis was confirmed and extended by the data furnished by the Clinic group. In the Langley Porter Clinic women, references to physical symptoms were not confined to a few more or less casual remarks but often formed the most emphasized part of the patient's statement of complaint. Intensive study of several cases sup- ported the hypothesis, developed on the basis of earlier findings (Chapter XII), that the tendency to focus on one's physical condition in this par- ticular way not only expresses strong unconscious (castration) anxiety but also represents the way in which a person with a very constricted ego defends himself against becoming aware of large areas of his emotional life.
Similarly, some of the "normal" subjects in the over-all sample of the study mentioned tendencies towards depressed feelings. The data on the low- scoring Clinic patients confirmed the hypothesis that tendencies toward feelings of inferiority and guilt and depression were consistent with a type of character structure found commonly in low scorers and would appear to some degree under conditions of inner or outer stress. In the "normal" sub- jects, however, these tendencies appeared to be relatively mild, while some of the Clinic patients were incapacitated by them.
Thus, the material from the Clinic group supported and, in some instances shed additional light upon, the dynamic hypotheses advanced in Chapters IX through XIII. Also, our data strongly bore out our hypothesis that the rela- tionships between ethnocentrism and personality variables would be essen- tially the same for "normal" and for psychologically disturbed groups, but that some of these personality trends would, in the disturbed group, appear in pathological forms and degrees.
Taking the evidence from the various techniques with which our group was studied, and recalling major conclusions from earlier chapters, we can make the following general formulation regarding the character structure of high and low scorers.
The high scorers have rigid, constricted personalities, as shown by their stereotyped, conventionalized thinking and acting and their violent and categorical rejection of everything reminding them of their own repressed
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impulses. Their egos appear to be not only very constricted but also quite undifferentiated: their range of experience, emotionally and intellectually, is narrow. It is as if they can experience only the one conventionally correct attitude or emotion in any given situation. Everything else is suppressed or denied, or if another impulse breaks through, it is experienced as something which is completely incompatible with the conception of the self, and which suddenly overwhelms the ego. In part, this high degree of ego-alienness probably derives from the fact that the impulses emerging from repression are so primitive and, especially in the women, so very hostile. Compare, for example, the ways in which two high-scoring women on the one hand, and one low-scoring woman, on the other, expressed their ambivalence towards their children. The two high-scoring women had "spells" of excitement, trembling, and various physical manifestations which they did not recognize as expressions of rage. One woman actually choked her children during such attacks, the other had had the impulse but could control it. Both tried to convince the interviewer and themselves that they "really" loved their chil- dren. The low-scoring woman was quite aware of rejecting her child, of her habitual impatience and inability to give enough love to the child. She recog- nized the effects of her behavior on the child, tried to make up for it at times and hoped that after therapy she would be able to be a better mother. The high-scoring mothers were not able to admit any deviation from the conven- tional idea that a mother, unless she is utterly depraved, can feel anything but tenderness and devotion for her children. In these, and in all of the other cases of high scorers, it seemed as if the person's ego had usually been able to keep the unacceptable impulses completely out of consciousness, by means of countercathexes, and that this prevented modifications of the impulse, such as channelization into milder and more adult forms, sublimations and the like. The T. A. T. stories of the high scorers showed the ego's constriction and lack of differentiation particularly clearly. Even subjects of high intelli- gence, with excellent vocabularies, told stereotyped, unimaginative stories. The repressed impulses appeared in very primitive, crude forms, giving rise to stories of crime and punishment very much like those of high scorers in
other groups (see Chapter XIV). The stories of the low scorers were much richer in content and often less primitive, giving evidence that the person had experienced in himself or through empathy with others a wide range of emotions and that he had found relatively mature ways of expressing his impulses. Besides this channelization, sublimations and intellectualization seemed to play a larger role in low scorers as expressed in their intellectual and artistic interests, their attitudes towards their work, and their attempts to solve their neurotic problems by intellectual analysis and understanding.
It is our general impression that the high scorers, more than the low scorers, are dominated by castration anxiety and more often show anal character traits such as hostile rejectiveness, retentiveness, and anal reaction formations. The
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last trend was found to be par'ticularly strong in the women. High scorers- particularly men-also seem to have strong but repressed passive-dependent desires, but these appear to be differently organized in the personality than is the case with the low scorers. Whereas in the low scorers these tendencies are expressed directly in interpersonal relationships, in the desire to be loved and in the fear of being rejected in a very personalized way, the high-scoring men's passivity and dependency probably is mainly a reaction to their extreme castration anxiety. The high-scoring men often seek protection from this anxiety in a motherly woman, but without having a very differentiated rela- tionship to this woman as a person.
This brings us to the problem of interpersonal relationships in high and low scorers. The relevant information comes from the detailed case studies (including T. A. T. 's) and the first psychiatric interviews. The frequency with which the low scorers discussed their relationships to others was strik- ing; though often quite disturbed, they tend to behave toward others in a very personal way. Furthermore, the low scorers' relationships, as expressed in their lives as well as in their fantasies, often were of a combined nur- turant-dependent type. The same tendency was also shown in their occu- pational interests (social service, physician, psychological counselor). The interpersonal relationships of high scorers appeared to be much weaker, less personal, more conventional, and more often expressed in terms of
dominance-submission.
5? Is there any evidence that one of the two groups, at the opposite ex-
tremes of theE scale, was more severely disturbed than the other? Is there a relationship between ethnocentrism and psychosis? Two kinds of hypotheses regarding possible relationships between ethnocentrism and mental ill health have been advanced by people who were more or less familiar with the results reported on throughout this book. Some, usually those strongly inter- ested in fighting prejudice, have focussed their attention on the personality descriptions of high scorers. Because these include so many variables (e. g. , constriction, projectivity, self-deception, etc. ) usually considered unfavor- able from a mental-hygiene point of view and because of the fact that our low-scoring subjects do not have these characteristics to any great extent, the conclusion has been drawn that highly prejudiced people are simply men- tally disturbed people, those opposed to prejudice are the "normals. " The difference in ideology is then explained by the hypothesis that the ethnocen- tric ideology of the high scorers is based on irrational attitudes which in turn spring from their neurotic conflicts, while the ideology of the "normal" low scorers is developed entirely in a rational, reality-adapted manner.
Others, however, have pointed out that of our two groups, the low scorers deviate more from the culture pattern of their environment. They are more often "socially maladjusted" and seem to suffer more from feelings of de- pression, anxiety, and inadequacy-all characteristic of a popular conception
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of the neurotic pattern. According to this hypothesis, then, people who are prejudiced are the "normals" because they are well adjusted in their culture. They have taken over the prejudices along with other ideologies of the cul- ture to which they conform. The low scorers, who rebel against their parents and often against many of the cultural mores, are psychologically ill.
Both of these hypotheses assume that one of the groups scoring at the ex- tremes of theE scale is a "normal," the other an "abnormal" group. Our inves- tigation shows that one is likely to find people with more or less severe psy- chological disturbances in the high, low, and middle quartiles although we cannot say in what proportions. It even suggests the possibility that the most disturbed people will be found in the middle quartiles.
But there are more basic theoretical reasons for objecting to both of the above hypotheses. The first one, commonly found in liberal thought, as- sumes that "rational" behavior, in contrast to "irrational" behavior, is en- tirely independent of deeper-lying personality dynamics. Finding obvious irrational qualities in ethnocentric ideology, some individuals have concluded that prejudiced people think "emotionally" whereas unprejudiced people think "rationally"-that is, without being influenced by their needs and emo- tions. Our results indicate, however, that the way a person thinks is always conditioned, to a greater or lesser degree, by emotional dispositions. The capacity for rational functioning, in which needs and affects play a positive rather than a negative (distorting, inhibiting) role, is part of what we and others have called a strong ego. While ego strength seems higher, on the average, in the low than in the high scorers, it must be emphasized that irrationality has been found to some degree in both; however, it is quali- tatively different in the two groups and impels the individuals in antipodal directions.
We must object even more strenuously to the second of the above hypotheses-which equates conformity with psychic health, nonconformity with psychic disturbance-because it represents a way of thinking which is all too common in the social sciences as well as in everyday life. It is true, as our results and others show, that ethnocentric individuals are frequently more conforming and more "adjusted" to the prevailing pressures and ideas of our culture. These individuals are thus more "normal" in the sense of approximating the behavior- and ideology-demands of the culture. How- ever, to see normality (in this external sense) as identical with psychic health (a concept involving inner integration, sublimation, and the like) is to maintain a thoroughly behavioristic, nondynamic conception of the indi- vidual. If good external adjustment is to be psychologically healthy, it must be in response to an environment which sufficiently gratifies the most im- portant needs of the individual; being "well-adjusted" under other condi- tions, e. g. , in the face of severe suppression or denial of self-expression, can only be achieved at tremendous inner expense. The "cost" of adjustment to
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most high scorers has been demonstrated throughout this book. Similarly, rebellious and nonconforming behavior must also be understood in rela- tion to external forces and inner demands. That they may occur, though with different meanings, in both democratic and authoritarian personalities showing various degrees of disturbance, is shown by data from the Clinic group, the San Quentin group (Chapter XXI), and the over-all study sample
(Parts II and III).
What, then, can we say regarding our original question of the relation
of ethnocentrism to the degree of psychological disturbance? Although no really conclusive answer is at hand, we can, however, try to make cer- tain hypotheses based on (I) our data regarding the incidence of neuroses and psychoses in the various E quartiles for the Clinic group; and (2) the evidence, presented throughout this book, regarding personality character-
istics of high and low scorers.
As pointed out in Section D of this chapter, we found a consistent increase
in the proportion of psychoses going from the low to the high middle quar- tiles, with a drop from the high middle to the high quartile. The figures are presented in Tables 3(XXII) and 4(XXII). Because of the small numbers of cases in each quartile, this trend is not statistically significant. Supposing that this result were found to be generally valid, and if psychosis is regarded as a more severe disturbance than neurosis, one could say that there is a slight relationship between severity of mental disturbance (psychosis) and ethno- centrism. The possible reasons why there were fewer psychotics in the ex- treme high quartile have already been discussed.
Is there a relationship between ethnocentrism and psychosis, anti- ethnocentrism and neurosis? The following discussion is meant as a mere speculation on our findings and presented only to stimulate further discussion and research. It seemed to all of us, who discussed and made formulations about the character structures of high and low scorers, that there were per- sonality trends in the high scorers which would make them more prone to develop psychotic manifestations, while the low scorers seemed to tend more towards neurotic disturbances. (See also Simmel, I I I. )
In spite of the fact that we found some low scorers with very disorganized and weak egos (among them at least one schizophrenic), comparison with the high scorers still gave the impression that the low scorers had relatively much stronger egos-that is, they appeared to us to be able to handle their impulses much more successfully due to relatively less extensive repressions and countercathexes and to greater capacity for sublimation and other modifica- tions. Also, the low scorers appeared capable of more genuine relationships to other people, whereas the interpersonal relationships of the high scorers were much more shallow and founded less on personal experiences and feel- ings than on conventions and stereotypes. These character trends are more consistent with the formation of neurotic traits rather than with the forma-
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97?
tion of psychotic ones. In pathological forms, these tendencies are less alien and less overwhelming to the ego. Just exactly what the deeper dynamics and the genetic sources of these trends are, we cannot say. Perhaps the clue to the type of character found most commonly among low scorers is a very early inhibition of aggressions which are then turned upon the self; or the early relationships to parents lead to strong identifications and a well-inter- nalized-though often disturbing-conscience.
In the high scorers, extensive repressions and countercathexes have hin- dered the ego's development. The ego remains rather primitive, undifferen- tiated, and completely isolated from a large portion of the deeper layers. When the unresolved unconscious conflicts become intensified and come closer to consciousness, the ego, totally unprepared, feels overwhelmed and shocked. This may lead merely to strong anxieties with or without somatic symptoms. In more extreme form, however, it may lead to depersonalization, withdrawal from reality, denial, projections, and other psychotic manifes- tations. Given a sufficiently supporting environment, highly ethnocentric individuals achieve a sense of "comfort" and "adjustment"; but they fre- quently lack the productiveness, the capacity for love, and, in times of stress, the grip on reality, which are more characteristic of the anti-authoritarian individuals.
The patient had had previous periods of depression, each time when some- thing blocked her professional ambitions. The last episode was very severe: She became afraid there was a man in the house who could harm her, and she developed such a loathing for herself that she felt her skin was covered with repulsive fish scales.
The history revealed that she was the only child of two rather neurotic people, who in her early childhood gave the girl a good deal of freedom and individual attention. In spite of this, she often felt lonely and "left out. " Through the circumstance of the parents' separation when the patient was 5, the patient came to feel that her mother had caused the beloved father much suffering and was responsible for the separation. She began to feel great dis- gust for and hostility towards her mother, who became the prototype for her image of the "shallow, pretty, exploiting woman. " Her professional interests and activities were based on identification with her professionally successful father, and perhaps also her stepmother.
It is not necessary for our purpose to go into a detailed discussion of the dynamics of this woman's personality and development. The case was pre- sented merely as a description of one type of female patient found among the low scorers. Though too extreme to be representative, the case has many characteristics typical of a whole group of low-scoring women, usually polit- ical radicals or militant liberals: the masculine identification (which is un- usually strong here), the competition with men and striving for professional
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achievement, the rejection of femininity and inability to accept the role of mother. The latter two are exceptionally pronounced here. In most of o low-scoring women there were strong feminine identifications also whic were in conflict with the "masculine" strivings. In contrast to the hig scoring women, there is-as with low-scoring women generally-little con pulsiveness, less constriction, greater richness of fantasy life-here express in artistic and other professional fields-introversion (here particular strong), and concern with ideas and inner experience. The patient tried handle her conflicts by seeking rational explanations (therapy) and by subl mations.
In a few of the low-scoring women anxiety symptoms predominated. these cases, feelings of inadequacy were quite prominent and there w anxiety and shyness in certain social situations. One woman felt so unea: in groups that she frequently broke into a sweat. She was also jealous of h husband's interest in other women and afraid she might retaliate by having affair, as she did once before. Another patient, an unmarried woman wl was embarrassed in social situations, had developed tremors whenever s had to hold a cup or stemmed glass, or when filling out application blanl After having fallen down the stairs at a party where she was very uncomfo: able, she developed a panic of going down stairs. Also, the patient thoug she was always attracted by the wrong men-usually very neurotic m< One very inhibited young girl came to the Clinic because she was afraid l former enuresis might return. She thought she would use the symptom avoid social engagements, of which she was somewhat afraid. She felt ve guilty about her adolescent sexual interests. She had night terrors aboUI
half hour after going to sleep, in which she saw something coming down her-sometimes a net, sometimes a swarm of bugs. Sometimes an abstr: shape of a person would crawl into her bed. She would scream and jump < of bed. One case was of a more phobic character. The girl had had an anir phobia. When seen at the Clinic she was in a ''confused anxious state," afr of entering graduate school, particularly of going to see her graduate : visor. She could not bring herself to go to him and discuss her work. ~ felt that she had not accomplished much. She was also worried because : did not feel warmly towards anyone, because she felt rather hostile-parti' larly toward her mother.
There was one case with obsessive-compulsive symptoms, a woman " a previous depressive episode. At the time of her treatment she was unablt do her (clerical) work for fear she might write down something that wo embarrass her or damage someone else. The trouble began at 17 when feared to write down "dam" or "damn. " (Swearing was severely condem1 by her strict father, whom she reported she hated. ) Years later, after she r about rape in the papers she began to worry about the word "rape. " Now was afraid of writing down something pertaining to her current employ
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raping or attacking her. She was never certain whether she had not by chance inserted these ideas into a letter, or into other products of her typing work. For the last few years she had found that sedatives and alcohol would relieve her condition.
One of the low-scoring women was classified as a paranoid schizophrenic. Yet her complaints, except for a few bizarre ideas, were similar to the ones reported by other low-scoring women suffering primarily from depression. The patient described with much insight her extreme sensitivity to other people's reactions, her concern lest she be rejected by others, her early feel- ings of insecurity and of being unwanted. She said her illness started with nervousness, indecision, and fears "of not being able to keep a job, that I might harm people, of dying of a cerebral hemorrhage (her mother had died in this way); afraid I was going to die and none knew about it or cared. " When first interviewed she complained of being depressed and la"cking in the ability to concentrate on her work. She was afraid people were "question- ing her motives" and had tried to read her mind by saying things to elicit her reactions. She felt a change in the attitude of her family towards her. She had been weak and tired, attributing this to a drug which she believed was used in the food at the previous hospital. She said "there is a barrier between me and other people erected by myself. Last week I felt closer to people. "
Finally, there were two cases who were referred by physicians to whom they had turned because of physical symptoms. In one case the main com- plaint was a headache and "hypersensitivity to light, necessitating wearing of dark glasses. " The other case complained mainly of dismenorrhea, also of nausea and of muscular pains simulating her mother's arthritis. Both cases traced their symptoms to accidents. Although little material on these patients was available, it seemed very likely that they were cases of conversion hysteria.
3. THE ''MIDDLES"
Most of the data just presented pertain only to patients receiving E scores within the high or low quartiles. We have, of course, collected some data on "middle scorers. " First, there were the questionnaire data, including responses to Projective Questions, and second, the psychiatric diagnoses and Minnesota Multiphasic scores. These indicated that, on the whole, "low middles" re- sembled the low scorers more, the "high middles" showed more resemblance to the high scorers.
In addition, several clinical case studies were made of patients with middle scores. In these cases one could clearly discern both "high" and "low" per- sonality trends and, sometimes, curious inconsistencies in ideology and be- havior. This was true of some of our most disturbed patients. Most of the psychotic patients made middle scores-a few were "low middles," but most of them made high middle scores. Some explanations of this trend have been
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advanced in Section D above; it seemed to be related in these patients to ego weakness and unconcern with social reality. There were, of course, people with middle scores who were relatively little disturbed, but we have very little information concerning them.
The total sample of Clinic subjects contained 27 cases diagnosed as psy- chotic. Of these, 70 per cent (19 cases) made scores in the middle quartiles. This percentage is considerably greater than chance (which would be so per cent) and is significant at the 5 per cent level. However, little weight can be given this result because of the small number of cases.
The clinical case studies also indicate that many of the most disturbed patients tended to make middle rather than extreme scores. In these cases it can often be shown that the over-all personality picture is either "high" or "low" but that the neurotic or psychotic processes lead to certain contra- dictory opinions, or attitudes that are the opposite.
An example of such a picture is a schizophrenic man, a strongly intrapuni- tive person, thoroughly opposed to any kind of prejudice against minorities, usually a pacifist (and believer in a vague humanitarianism) who at certain times expressed marked chauvinism and destructive ideas directed against other nations. He developed these ideas when control of his own homosexu- ality and hostility was threatening to collapse. Another case is that of a man with a strongly paranoid character who had the most outspoken fascist ideology. This man's character structure and his scores on the F and PEC scales revealed that in most respects this man was very much like our high- scoring subjects. Great hostility and fear of his father had prevented genuine identifications. But the subject spent all his efforts in a fruitless attempt to prove to himself and the world that he was more powerful, capable, intelli- gent, and virtuous than his father. This manifested itself, among other ways, in continual though unrealistic and unsuccessful strivings for positions of power, in a grandiose conception of himself, in a verbose manner of speech and continual orientation toward making an impression on others. In many ways this man could be described as a psychopathic character. Still, he made only a low-middle score on E. Interviews revealed that this was related to a certain opposition to the father's prejudiced ideology, although in other areas this subject had very conventional values. Also, the mild opposition to preju- dice seemed to rest on a certain amount of identification with deprived groups. For instance, he considered the differences between whites and Negroes to be primarily due to a difference in education; in fact he would like to solve all problems in the area of group relations by giving educa- tional opportunities to all. He also considers the basis for all his own failures to be his lack of a college education due to the fact that his father lost his money just when the patient was of college age. Needless to say, this subject's ideology differed qualitatively from that of low-middle subjects whose
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characters were more typical of low scorers. These differences, however, were revealed only in the interview.
H. CONCLUSIONS
In this concluding section we shall discuss the problem of the relationship between ethnocentrism and psychological ill health in the light of the find- ings just reported. First, however, it will be necessary to make a statement about the degree to which conclusions drawn on the basis of findings from the Langley Porter Clinic group can be generalized. In our description of the sample (Section B) we have defined the Langley Porter Clinic population as a group coming mainly from the urban lower middle-class and, on the average, somewhat younger and slightly more educated and more intelligent than the general population, and more cooperative than average. In these respects Langley Porter Clinic patients are probably similar to patient groups from other psychiatric clinics in large American cities. Within the limits set by our selection procedure, the sample studied was thought to be fairly rep- resentative of the Clinic population as a whole, although an exact comparison with the clinic population at large could not be made for want of available data. Results of the present investigation which were found to be statistically significant probably hold for similar clinic groups. A question then arises as to how representative these clinic groups are of the psychologically dis- turbed (neurotic-psychotic) population as a whole. This question cannot be answered, because no one knows just what this population is like. There are countless individuals who have severe psychological disturbances but never come to the attention of clinics or private psychiatrists. On the other hand, a public clinic such as the one described probably covers a wider range of clinical pictures and social backgrounds than any other agency, certainly a much wider one than could be found among patients going to private ther- apists and institutions.
As far as the statistical significance of most of the results is concerned, much is left to be desired. The scope of the investigation did not permit the use of many more than 120 subjects. For many of our comparisons this group had to be divided into many small subgroups. Taken one by one, most of the numerical results therefore are not statistically significant, nor otherwise impressive. Whatever value there is in the present investigation lies more in the consistency of all of our findings with one another and with the findings of the study as a whole.
Now an attempt will be made to bring our findings to bear on several questions regarding the relationships between ethnocentrism and psycho- logical ill health. All of the following questions have been raised in connection with the research findings reported in this book: (1) Are people with rela-
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tively severe psychological disturbances on the average more or less preju- diced than "normal" people? (2) Are people making extreme (high or low) scores on the E scale also extreme on the dimension of mental health-mental illness? (3) Are high or low scorers prone to develop certain specific kinds of psychological disturbances? (4) Did the study of neurotic and psychotic subjects lead to new hypotheses about the character structure and its possible genetic sources in high and low scorers? (5) Is there any evidence that one of the two groups, at the opposite extremes of the E scale, was more severely disturbed than the other? Is there a relationship between ethnocentrism and psychosis?
1. Are people with relatively severe psychological disturbances on the average more or less prejudiced than "normal" people? When the average ethnocentrism scores of the Langley Porter men and women were compared with scores obtained by averaging all other groups, the Clinic group turned out to be slightly, but not significantly, less prejudiced than average. The scores showed a wide range and great variability, indicating that the group contained subjects of greatly varying ideologies and personalities. If one would like to generalize to a wider group of psychologically disturbed people, the Langley Porter Clinic mean is probably too low. As we have shown, the Clinic group was younger, somewhat more educated, intelligent, and cooperative than average. All these selective factors are known to show slight negative correlations with ethnocentrism. On these and other grounds it seems reasonable to assume that a large group of disturbed persons taken at random from the general population would on the average make prejudice scores similar to those of a group of nondisturbed people.
2. Are people making extreme (high or low) scores on the E scale also extreme on the dimension of mental health-mental illness? Most of the dy- namic formulations in this book have been derived from comparisons of subjects scoring in the high and low quartiles. An objection to this procedure has been that perhaps high and low scorers are both deviant groups, that they are "marginal and neurotic," and that "normal people" in our society are "middles," that is, mildly in agreement with the stereotypes prevalent in our culture. In order to answer the above question conclusively one would first have to establish a reliable measure of degree of psychological disturbance. This could then be correlated with ethnocentrism in a large group of subjects. No such measure was available for the present investigation. However, there were some indications that the subjects receiving middle scores on E were at least as disturbed-if not more so-than the patients making extreme scores. This statement is based on some clinical case studies of neurotic and psychotic middle scorers and on the finding that 70 per cent of our psychotic subjects scored in the middle quartiles.
3? Are high or low scorers prone to develop certain specific kinds of psy- chological disturbances? On the whole our data seem to show that the clinical
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pictures of subjects in the high quartile resemble each other and differ system- atically from the clinical pictures shown by patients from the low quartile. These trends cannot be completely described in terms of the conventional psychiatric classifications as they were used at Langley Porter Clinic. In these terms, the trends were partially expressed in a predominance of "mixed neurosis" with "depressive and anxiety features" in low-scoring women, of "anxiety states" in high-scoring women. The relationships were less marked in the men. However, clinically defined similarities among high-scoring cases, on the one hand, and low-scoring cases, on the other, cut across the lines drawn by these diagnostic classifications. There are high as well as low scorers in each of the major psychiatric categories (e. g. , schizophrenia, manic-depressive psychosis, anxiety state, hysteria, obsessive-compulsive, and "mixed neurosis"). It cannot be decided here whether this is due to the essentially nondynamic nature of the classification system or to the way in which the classifications were applied by the physicians. Probably both factors are responsible. More detailed study of the complaints as described by the patients in a first psychiatric interview revealed the following differ- ences in clinical pictures of high and low scorers.
The subjects scoring high on ethnocentrism usually displayed very little awareness of their own feelings and psychological problems. What is more, they tended to resist psychological explanations and to suppress emotion. Their complaints were very often devoid of any psychological content. The most common symptoms in both men and women were vague anxiety or physical signs of anxiety and rage. The more disturbed patients suffered from feelings of depersonalization, lack of interest, and depressed affect of a more schizoid type. Very many high-scoring men and women came to the Clinic with somatic complaints-some of them psychosomatic symptoms which could be understood as expressions of suppressed affects such as fear or rage. They were inclined to dwell at length on these symptoms to the exclusion of other problems. Some showed pathological fear of sickness, physical injury, or death.
The most frequent physical complaints of the high-scoring men in our group were stomach ulcers and physical expressions, such as tremors, sweat- ing, etc. , of tension and anxiety. Some of the cases had markedly compulsive characters, others appeared to be more "phobic" or to have characters built around defenses against passive homosexuality. In some of these cases fears of being injured or attacked, or other paranoid trends, were part of the pic- ture. Other types of cases were primarily psychopathic (one of these had admitted sexual exposure to a child) and still others were overt homosexuals. All of them, except for one case of simple schizophrenia, showed to some extent the "toughness" and masculine fa~_;ade together with various signs of extreme castration anxiety and underlying passivity. The majority of the high-scoring women complained of irritability, anxiety or hyperven-
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tilation symptoms; many also had temper outbursts or attacks of trem- bling, screaming, or fainting (probably equivalents of attacks of rage) and fear of dying during such an attack. When one of these cases was stUdied in detail, it was found that her attacks of panic, trembling, fainting, and screaming were expressions of extreme rage precipitated by an incident earlier in the day but suppressed at the time. There was one case of hysterical conversion in a woman with a very rigid character, and there were several very infantile schizoid cases with different features such as agitated depres- sion, depersonalization, and paranoid fears. All of these women, however, resembled each other in the following ways: their main problems seemed to center around the inability to express strong hostilities directed against some member of their family; their personalities were rigid and very constricted; most of them had marked compulsive traits. Rigidity of personality and the tendency to use countercathective defenses seem to be characteristic of both high-scoring? men and high-scoring women.
The low scorers were found to exhibit a wide variety of clinical pictures and complaints. They were much more familiar with themselves, more aware and accepting of emotional experiences and problems. The complaints of low-scoring patients very rarely consisted of vague anxiety or physical symptoms? alone. If anxiety without content appeared at all, the patient also reported being concerned about other problems. Usually, the patients stated their problems in terms of specific impulses, fears, or adjustment difficulties. The most common single symptom characteristic of low-scoring men and women was neurotic depression with feelings of inadequacy. Most of these patients had inhibitions in some area-sexual, work, social-and felt uneasy in group situations.
Summarizing these findings, then, one might say that some statistical rela- tionship was found for the women between high E score and the classification "anxiety state," on the one hand, low E score and a classification which was labeled "mixed neurosis" (which probably should have been called "neurotic depression"), on the other. It became clear, however, that ethnocentrism was much more strongly related to certain very general personality trends which cut across the lines drawn by the psychiatric classifications. It has therefore been impossible to speak of symptoms or "types of disturbance" without some reference to the personality syndromes in which they oc- curred. These personality syndromes will be discussed more fully, more interpretatively in the following section.
4? Did the study of neurotic and psychotic subjects lead to new hypoth- eses about the character structure and its possible genetic sources in high and low scorers? All the important variables in which high- and low-scoring patients differed, were identical with those found to differentiate high and low scorers in groups of people who were relatively little disturbed. In the
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disturbed group, however, these characteristics were seen in more exagger- ated form. In the first student group studied by the questionnaire and clinical techniques, Frenkel-Brunswik and Sanford (38) found that the high-scoring women more often mentioned health problems, in spite of the fact that their health histories appeared to be quite similar to those of the low scorers. These few, often casual, remarks about health were related to certain themes in the T. A. T.
stories, where many characters suffered mutilating injuries and acci- dents. On the basis of these data, a tentative interpretation was made to the effect that high-scoring women characteristically show concern about their physical well-being because they are unconsciously afraid of being hurt as a punishment for strong hostile impulses. This hypothesis was confirmed and extended by the data furnished by the Clinic group. In the Langley Porter Clinic women, references to physical symptoms were not confined to a few more or less casual remarks but often formed the most emphasized part of the patient's statement of complaint. Intensive study of several cases sup- ported the hypothesis, developed on the basis of earlier findings (Chapter XII), that the tendency to focus on one's physical condition in this par- ticular way not only expresses strong unconscious (castration) anxiety but also represents the way in which a person with a very constricted ego defends himself against becoming aware of large areas of his emotional life.
Similarly, some of the "normal" subjects in the over-all sample of the study mentioned tendencies towards depressed feelings. The data on the low- scoring Clinic patients confirmed the hypothesis that tendencies toward feelings of inferiority and guilt and depression were consistent with a type of character structure found commonly in low scorers and would appear to some degree under conditions of inner or outer stress. In the "normal" sub- jects, however, these tendencies appeared to be relatively mild, while some of the Clinic patients were incapacitated by them.
Thus, the material from the Clinic group supported and, in some instances shed additional light upon, the dynamic hypotheses advanced in Chapters IX through XIII. Also, our data strongly bore out our hypothesis that the rela- tionships between ethnocentrism and personality variables would be essen- tially the same for "normal" and for psychologically disturbed groups, but that some of these personality trends would, in the disturbed group, appear in pathological forms and degrees.
Taking the evidence from the various techniques with which our group was studied, and recalling major conclusions from earlier chapters, we can make the following general formulation regarding the character structure of high and low scorers.
The high scorers have rigid, constricted personalities, as shown by their stereotyped, conventionalized thinking and acting and their violent and categorical rejection of everything reminding them of their own repressed
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impulses. Their egos appear to be not only very constricted but also quite undifferentiated: their range of experience, emotionally and intellectually, is narrow. It is as if they can experience only the one conventionally correct attitude or emotion in any given situation. Everything else is suppressed or denied, or if another impulse breaks through, it is experienced as something which is completely incompatible with the conception of the self, and which suddenly overwhelms the ego. In part, this high degree of ego-alienness probably derives from the fact that the impulses emerging from repression are so primitive and, especially in the women, so very hostile. Compare, for example, the ways in which two high-scoring women on the one hand, and one low-scoring woman, on the other, expressed their ambivalence towards their children. The two high-scoring women had "spells" of excitement, trembling, and various physical manifestations which they did not recognize as expressions of rage. One woman actually choked her children during such attacks, the other had had the impulse but could control it. Both tried to convince the interviewer and themselves that they "really" loved their chil- dren. The low-scoring woman was quite aware of rejecting her child, of her habitual impatience and inability to give enough love to the child. She recog- nized the effects of her behavior on the child, tried to make up for it at times and hoped that after therapy she would be able to be a better mother. The high-scoring mothers were not able to admit any deviation from the conven- tional idea that a mother, unless she is utterly depraved, can feel anything but tenderness and devotion for her children. In these, and in all of the other cases of high scorers, it seemed as if the person's ego had usually been able to keep the unacceptable impulses completely out of consciousness, by means of countercathexes, and that this prevented modifications of the impulse, such as channelization into milder and more adult forms, sublimations and the like. The T. A. T. stories of the high scorers showed the ego's constriction and lack of differentiation particularly clearly. Even subjects of high intelli- gence, with excellent vocabularies, told stereotyped, unimaginative stories. The repressed impulses appeared in very primitive, crude forms, giving rise to stories of crime and punishment very much like those of high scorers in
other groups (see Chapter XIV). The stories of the low scorers were much richer in content and often less primitive, giving evidence that the person had experienced in himself or through empathy with others a wide range of emotions and that he had found relatively mature ways of expressing his impulses. Besides this channelization, sublimations and intellectualization seemed to play a larger role in low scorers as expressed in their intellectual and artistic interests, their attitudes towards their work, and their attempts to solve their neurotic problems by intellectual analysis and understanding.
It is our general impression that the high scorers, more than the low scorers, are dominated by castration anxiety and more often show anal character traits such as hostile rejectiveness, retentiveness, and anal reaction formations. The
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last trend was found to be par'ticularly strong in the women. High scorers- particularly men-also seem to have strong but repressed passive-dependent desires, but these appear to be differently organized in the personality than is the case with the low scorers. Whereas in the low scorers these tendencies are expressed directly in interpersonal relationships, in the desire to be loved and in the fear of being rejected in a very personalized way, the high-scoring men's passivity and dependency probably is mainly a reaction to their extreme castration anxiety. The high-scoring men often seek protection from this anxiety in a motherly woman, but without having a very differentiated rela- tionship to this woman as a person.
This brings us to the problem of interpersonal relationships in high and low scorers. The relevant information comes from the detailed case studies (including T. A. T. 's) and the first psychiatric interviews. The frequency with which the low scorers discussed their relationships to others was strik- ing; though often quite disturbed, they tend to behave toward others in a very personal way. Furthermore, the low scorers' relationships, as expressed in their lives as well as in their fantasies, often were of a combined nur- turant-dependent type. The same tendency was also shown in their occu- pational interests (social service, physician, psychological counselor). The interpersonal relationships of high scorers appeared to be much weaker, less personal, more conventional, and more often expressed in terms of
dominance-submission.
5? Is there any evidence that one of the two groups, at the opposite ex-
tremes of theE scale, was more severely disturbed than the other? Is there a relationship between ethnocentrism and psychosis? Two kinds of hypotheses regarding possible relationships between ethnocentrism and mental ill health have been advanced by people who were more or less familiar with the results reported on throughout this book. Some, usually those strongly inter- ested in fighting prejudice, have focussed their attention on the personality descriptions of high scorers. Because these include so many variables (e. g. , constriction, projectivity, self-deception, etc. ) usually considered unfavor- able from a mental-hygiene point of view and because of the fact that our low-scoring subjects do not have these characteristics to any great extent, the conclusion has been drawn that highly prejudiced people are simply men- tally disturbed people, those opposed to prejudice are the "normals. " The difference in ideology is then explained by the hypothesis that the ethnocen- tric ideology of the high scorers is based on irrational attitudes which in turn spring from their neurotic conflicts, while the ideology of the "normal" low scorers is developed entirely in a rational, reality-adapted manner.
Others, however, have pointed out that of our two groups, the low scorers deviate more from the culture pattern of their environment. They are more often "socially maladjusted" and seem to suffer more from feelings of de- pression, anxiety, and inadequacy-all characteristic of a popular conception
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of the neurotic pattern. According to this hypothesis, then, people who are prejudiced are the "normals" because they are well adjusted in their culture. They have taken over the prejudices along with other ideologies of the cul- ture to which they conform. The low scorers, who rebel against their parents and often against many of the cultural mores, are psychologically ill.
Both of these hypotheses assume that one of the groups scoring at the ex- tremes of theE scale is a "normal," the other an "abnormal" group. Our inves- tigation shows that one is likely to find people with more or less severe psy- chological disturbances in the high, low, and middle quartiles although we cannot say in what proportions. It even suggests the possibility that the most disturbed people will be found in the middle quartiles.
But there are more basic theoretical reasons for objecting to both of the above hypotheses. The first one, commonly found in liberal thought, as- sumes that "rational" behavior, in contrast to "irrational" behavior, is en- tirely independent of deeper-lying personality dynamics. Finding obvious irrational qualities in ethnocentric ideology, some individuals have concluded that prejudiced people think "emotionally" whereas unprejudiced people think "rationally"-that is, without being influenced by their needs and emo- tions. Our results indicate, however, that the way a person thinks is always conditioned, to a greater or lesser degree, by emotional dispositions. The capacity for rational functioning, in which needs and affects play a positive rather than a negative (distorting, inhibiting) role, is part of what we and others have called a strong ego. While ego strength seems higher, on the average, in the low than in the high scorers, it must be emphasized that irrationality has been found to some degree in both; however, it is quali- tatively different in the two groups and impels the individuals in antipodal directions.
We must object even more strenuously to the second of the above hypotheses-which equates conformity with psychic health, nonconformity with psychic disturbance-because it represents a way of thinking which is all too common in the social sciences as well as in everyday life. It is true, as our results and others show, that ethnocentric individuals are frequently more conforming and more "adjusted" to the prevailing pressures and ideas of our culture. These individuals are thus more "normal" in the sense of approximating the behavior- and ideology-demands of the culture. How- ever, to see normality (in this external sense) as identical with psychic health (a concept involving inner integration, sublimation, and the like) is to maintain a thoroughly behavioristic, nondynamic conception of the indi- vidual. If good external adjustment is to be psychologically healthy, it must be in response to an environment which sufficiently gratifies the most im- portant needs of the individual; being "well-adjusted" under other condi- tions, e. g. , in the face of severe suppression or denial of self-expression, can only be achieved at tremendous inner expense. The "cost" of adjustment to
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most high scorers has been demonstrated throughout this book. Similarly, rebellious and nonconforming behavior must also be understood in rela- tion to external forces and inner demands. That they may occur, though with different meanings, in both democratic and authoritarian personalities showing various degrees of disturbance, is shown by data from the Clinic group, the San Quentin group (Chapter XXI), and the over-all study sample
(Parts II and III).
What, then, can we say regarding our original question of the relation
of ethnocentrism to the degree of psychological disturbance? Although no really conclusive answer is at hand, we can, however, try to make cer- tain hypotheses based on (I) our data regarding the incidence of neuroses and psychoses in the various E quartiles for the Clinic group; and (2) the evidence, presented throughout this book, regarding personality character-
istics of high and low scorers.
As pointed out in Section D of this chapter, we found a consistent increase
in the proportion of psychoses going from the low to the high middle quar- tiles, with a drop from the high middle to the high quartile. The figures are presented in Tables 3(XXII) and 4(XXII). Because of the small numbers of cases in each quartile, this trend is not statistically significant. Supposing that this result were found to be generally valid, and if psychosis is regarded as a more severe disturbance than neurosis, one could say that there is a slight relationship between severity of mental disturbance (psychosis) and ethno- centrism. The possible reasons why there were fewer psychotics in the ex- treme high quartile have already been discussed.
Is there a relationship between ethnocentrism and psychosis, anti- ethnocentrism and neurosis? The following discussion is meant as a mere speculation on our findings and presented only to stimulate further discussion and research. It seemed to all of us, who discussed and made formulations about the character structures of high and low scorers, that there were per- sonality trends in the high scorers which would make them more prone to develop psychotic manifestations, while the low scorers seemed to tend more towards neurotic disturbances. (See also Simmel, I I I. )
In spite of the fact that we found some low scorers with very disorganized and weak egos (among them at least one schizophrenic), comparison with the high scorers still gave the impression that the low scorers had relatively much stronger egos-that is, they appeared to us to be able to handle their impulses much more successfully due to relatively less extensive repressions and countercathexes and to greater capacity for sublimation and other modifica- tions. Also, the low scorers appeared capable of more genuine relationships to other people, whereas the interpersonal relationships of the high scorers were much more shallow and founded less on personal experiences and feel- ings than on conventions and stereotypes. These character trends are more consistent with the formation of neurotic traits rather than with the forma-
? THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
97?
tion of psychotic ones. In pathological forms, these tendencies are less alien and less overwhelming to the ego. Just exactly what the deeper dynamics and the genetic sources of these trends are, we cannot say. Perhaps the clue to the type of character found most commonly among low scorers is a very early inhibition of aggressions which are then turned upon the self; or the early relationships to parents lead to strong identifications and a well-inter- nalized-though often disturbing-conscience.
In the high scorers, extensive repressions and countercathexes have hin- dered the ego's development. The ego remains rather primitive, undifferen- tiated, and completely isolated from a large portion of the deeper layers. When the unresolved unconscious conflicts become intensified and come closer to consciousness, the ego, totally unprepared, feels overwhelmed and shocked. This may lead merely to strong anxieties with or without somatic symptoms. In more extreme form, however, it may lead to depersonalization, withdrawal from reality, denial, projections, and other psychotic manifes- tations. Given a sufficiently supporting environment, highly ethnocentric individuals achieve a sense of "comfort" and "adjustment"; but they fre- quently lack the productiveness, the capacity for love, and, in times of stress, the grip on reality, which are more characteristic of the anti-authoritarian individuals.
