The Authoritarian Personality.

The article focuses on the research which was guided by hypothesis that the political, economic, and social convictions of an individual often form a broad and coherent pattern, as if bound together by a mentality or spirit and that this pattern is an expression of deep-lying trends in his personality. The major concern was with the potentially fascistic individual, one whose structure is such as to render him particularly susceptible to antidemocratic propaganda. The author offers opinion that no politico-socio trend imposes a graver threat to traditional values and institutions than does fascism, and that knowledge of the personality forces that favor its acceptance may ultimately prove useful in combating it. The insights and hypotheses concerning the antidemocratic individual, which are present in general cultural climate, must be supported by a great deal of painstaking observation, and in many instances by quantification, before they can be regarded as conclusive. According to the theory that has guided the present research, personality is a more or less enduring organization of forces within the individual. The present research seeks to discover correlations between ideology and sociological factors operating in the individual's past whether or not they continue to operate in his present.