In late 2003, Jost and colleagues received death threats for publishing a paper that said that being politically conservative served a number of ‘existential functions’, not all of which were positive…

Both SDO and RWA were significant predictors…

Right-Wing Authoritarianism

Social Dominance Orientation  

Here’s my take on this…

Consider (again) the correlations between Social Dominance, Authoritarianism, and Political Conservatism:

Both SDO and RWA are significantly correlated with Conservatism, BUT they are also correlated with each other.

Correlations

1 .453** .653**

. .000 .000

406 406 406

.453** 1 .632**

.000 . .000

406 406 406

.653** .632** 1

.000 .000 .

406 406 406

Pearson Correlation

Sig. (2-tailed)

N

Pearson Correlation

Sig. (2-tailed)

N

Pearson Correlation

Sig. (2-tailed)

N

SDOSCALE

RWASCALE

S6O_SHOR

SDOSCALE RWASCALE S6O_SHOR

Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).**.

Controlling for.. RWASCALE

 

S6O_SHOR SDOSCALE

 

S6O_SHOR 1.0000 .5310

( 0) ( 403)

P= . P= .000

 

SDOSCALE .5310 1.0000

( 403) ( 0)

P= .000 P= .

Controlling for.. SDOSCALE

 

S6O_SHOR RWASCALE

 

S6O_SHOR 1.0000 .4987

( 0) ( 403)

P= . P= .000

 

RWASCALE .4987 1.0000

( 403) ( 0)

P= .000 P= .

So, the question is whether the variation that these two variables share with conservatism is unique (e.g., SDO and RWA explain different ‘parts’ of

conservatism), or shared (e.g., they both explain the same bit)… Partial correlations can help:

.65 .53 .63 .50

Controlling for.. S6O_SHOR

 

RWASCALE SDOSCALE

 

RWASCALE 1.0000 .0678

( 0) ( 403)

P= . P= .173

 

SDOSCALE .0678 1.0000

( 40) ( 0)

P= .173 P= .

And we can look at the relationship between RWA and SDO once we partial out Conservatism (the bit the two share with conservatism):

.45 .07

So… what does this tell us?

The major part of variance that SDO (and RWA) share with conservatism, is unique to SDO (and RWA) – the part of Conservatism that they explain does not overlap (much).

The major part of the the variation that SDO and RWA share is also shared in common with Conservatism.

Given the results of these analyses, what would you expect to find if you regressed Conservatism onto SDO and RWA?

Model Summary

.754a .569 .567 .47007Model1

R R SquareAdjustedR Square

Std. Error ofthe Estimate

Predictors: (Constant), SDOSCALE, RWASCALEa.

ANOVAb

117.653 2 58.827 266.230 .000a

89.048 403 .221

206.701 405

Regression

Residual

Total

Model1

Sum ofSquares df Mean Square F Sig.

Predictors: (Constant), SDOSCALE, RWASCALEa.

Dependent Variable: S6O_SHORb.

Coefficientsa

1.702 .078 21.704 .000

.281 .024 .424 11.551 .000

.350 .028 .461 12.579 .000

(Constant)

RWASCALE

SDOSCALE

Model1

B Std. Error

UnstandardizedCoefficients

Beta

StandardizedCoefficients

t Sig.

Dependent Variable: S6O_SHORa.

EXCELLENT!…

…as long as SDO, RWA, and conservatism are NOT the same thing!

Remember – Jost et al., say that antiegalitarianism and resistance to change are defining characteristics of conservatism, not the psychological basis of it.

If you EFA the SDO and RWA scales they seem to reduce fairly neatly into two, clearly distinguishable, factors, but…

When you include the conservatism items it gets REALLY messy.

What I need is a technique that will allow me to compare how good a one-factor model (SDO, RWA, Conservatism as all representing the same ‘latent’ construct) with a three factor (SDO, RWA and Conservatism as separate but correlated latent constructs).

…Confirmatory Factor Analysis…

Here, we have the end result of a CFA that forces all the items (‘packeted’ together) into a one-factor solution:

LSRP 2004chisq= 827.801df= 90p= .000gfi= .588cfi= .595rmr= .172srmr= \srmrrmsea= .176

.08

S6

s6_pkt5c

.48

e11

1.031

s6_pkt4c

.44

e101.651

s6_pkt3c

.36

e9 1.081

s6_pkt2c

.33

e8.69

1

s6_pkt1c

.40

e7

1.00

1 rwapkt1b

.46

e11

rwapkt2b

.49

e21

rwapkt3b

.38

e31

rwapkt4b

.38

e41

rwapkt5b

.23

e51

sdopkt5

.86

e16

1

sdopkt4

1.04

e15

1

sdopkt3

1.28

e14

1

sdopkt2

1.19

e13

1

sdopkt1

.85

e12

1

3.08

2.89

3.04

2.45

2.73

1.111.24 1.55 1.301.34

And the results when we allow packets of items to ‘load’ onto their respective latent variable:

LSRP 2004chisq= 182.292df= 87p= .000gfi= .912cfi= .948rmr= .044srmr= \srmrrmsea= .064

.16

S6

s6_pkt5c

.34

e11

1.181

s6_pkt4c

.41

e101.211

s6_pkt3c

.32

e9 .921

s6_pkt2c

.25

e8.86

1

s6_pkt1c

.32

e7

1.00

1

.80

RWA

.21

rwapkt1b

.40

e1

1.00

1

rwapkt2b

.44

e2.94

1

rwapkt3b

.33

e3.981

rwapkt4b

.35

e4.79 1

rwapkt5b

.22

e5

.861

.72

SDO

sdopkt5

.28

e16

1.00

1

sdopkt4

.54

e15

.94

1

sdopkt3

.54

e14

1.14

1

sdopkt2

.74

e13

.89

1

sdopkt1

.52

e12

.77

1

.22 .21

One-Factor model

Χ2(90)=827.80, p<.001GFI=.588CFI=.595RMR=.172RMSEA=.176

Three factor model: Χ2(87)=182.92, p<.001GFI=.912CFI=.948RMR=.044RMSEA=.064

So, the question is whether the variation that these two variables share with conservatism is unique (e.g., SDO and RWA explain different ‘parts’ of

conservatism), or shared (e.g., they both explain the same bit)… Partial correlations can help:

The difference is Χ2(3)= (827.80–182.92) = 644.88, which is significant.

This means that the data are a better fit for a model in which SDO, RWA, and conservatism are separate constructs, than if they are all parts of the same thing.

sdoscale

rwascale

s6o_shor

e3

1

e5

1

e4

1 sdo play with gen sampchisq= .000df= 0p= \pgfi= 1.000cfi= 1.000rmr= .000rmsea= \rmsea

sdoscale

rwascale

s6o_shor

.88

e3

1 .22

e5

1

1.15

e4

1

.35

.28

.46

If I want to have a look at the relationship between Social Dominance, Authoritarianism, and Political Conservatism, I can do that using SEM:

First, specify the paths… Then run the model

Coefficientsa

1.702 .078 21.704 .000

.281 .024 .424 11.551 .000

.350 .028 .461 12.579 .000

(Constant)

RWASCALE

SDOSCALE

Model1

B Std. Error

UnstandardizedCoefficients

Beta

StandardizedCoefficients

t Sig.

Dependent Variable: S6O_SHORa.

Do those unstandardised path coefficients (.35 for SDO to Conservatism and .28 for RWA to conservatism) look familiar?

They should – they’re identical to the unstandardised regression coefficients we got from regressing conservatism scores onto SDO and RWA.

In fact, for these examples, SEM does exactly the same thing as regression…But with SEM we can do SO much more!

Openness to Changevs

Conservation

Self-Transcendence vs

Self-Enhancement

DOMINANCE(Social Dominance

Orientation)

Conservatism

SUBMISSION(Right-Wing

Authoritarianism)

Social Values → Beliefs about Subordination → Ideology

Y’see – I have a theory… that political conservatism is founded on two sets of ‘deeper’ beliefs – about subordination (submission or RWA, and Domination or SDO) which are in turn founded on even more basic values – guiding principles in people’s

lives.

And here it is – and it works, okayish… The fit indices are good, and the RMSEA is borderline satisfactory. If there’s one thing that looks dodgy it’s the

non-significant path from openness to change to conservatism.

GT samp 1chisq= 8.398df= 3p= .038gfi= .988cfi= .981rmr= .351rmsea= .082

.00

rslfvale

.00

ropennes

.14

sdoscale

.24

rwa_shor

.45

s6o_shor

e3

e5

e4

-.43

-.37

.40

.23

-.28

e1

e2

-.06

.23

When I eliminate that path, the model improves…

GT samp 1chisq= 9.751df= 4p= .045gfi= .986cfi= .979rmr= .358rmsea= .073

.00

rslfvale

.00

ropennes

.14

sdoscale

.24

rwa_shor

.45

s6o_shor

e3

e5

e4

-.43

-.37

.40

.26

-.28

e1

e2

.23