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REACTIONS TO NORM VIOLATIONS 1

The Relationship between Authoritarianism, Group Membership and

Reactions to Norm Violations

Sample Student

Mercer University


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Abstract

Social norms are rules of behavior that society uses to assess the population. How

people respond to a violation of social norms depends on a number of different factors. This

study looks at the difference between prescriptive and descriptive norm violations and how in-

groups and out-groups react to them while looking to see if high and low authoritarians

respond differently to these different types of norms. In the present study, 50 participants

rated the perceived negativity of eight scenarios depicting an individual who was either part

of the in-group or out-group who violated a specific norm. The results showed that

participants viewed prescriptive norm violations more negatively than descriptive norm

violations. Additionally, participants desired to interact more with their in-groups than with

the out-groups, even when the in-groups committed prescriptive norm violations. These

results show that people do respond differently to immoral acts which affect the way they

view the character of the norm violators. This also suggests that people are connecting on a

deeper level and tend to want to associate themselves with people who share some of the

same ideals as them.


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The Relationship between Authoritarianism, Group Membership and

Reactions to Norm Violations

Social norms are important because they help govern our society. They develop

naturally and provide a sense of normalcy pertaining to how a society should run. Social

norms are generally specific to regions and allow individuals to judge whether or not a person

is acting out of the norm. Norms can be categorized by two types; descriptive norms and

prescriptive norms. Forsyth (1999) explained that descriptive norms are what most people do,

feel, and think in a situation. People who violate these norms are usually viewed as unusual.

An example of a violation of this norm would be someone who dresses differently from the

norm, someone who has tattoos covering every inch of their body, or someone who covers

their car completely in bumper stickers. According to Forsyth (1999), a prescriptive norm

involves certain behaviors that people should perform. When people violate these norms, they

are considered bad, and are frowned upon by other people in society. For example, kicking

puppies, drinking and driving, slapping ones girlfriend, and shoplifting are seen as bad and

are therefore classified as prescriptive norm violations.

Certain norms a person does or does not follow, can often affect what type of group

they identify with. If a person is a member of a group, they view themselves as the in-group.

If a person is not a member of a group, they see that crowd as the out-group. For example, if

an individuals favorite baseball team is the Atlanta Braves, they would consider everyone

else who supports the Braves as part of the in-group. On the other hand, they would also

consider those people who support the New York Yankees as part of the out-group simply

because they support a team other than the Braves. Concerning in-group and out-group status,

Kessler and Cohrs (2008) concluded that if people identify with a social group, they perceive


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everything affecting this group, the in-group, as important. On the other hand, on a general

level, an example of an out-group would be a group that one does not identify with. In many

ways, prescriptive norm violations are more serious than descriptive norm violations.

Accordingly, group members judge those norms differently. Marques, Abrams, and Serodio

(2001) showed that group members are especially sensitive to deviance from generic

prescriptive norms when the in-groupsclaim to be embracing those norms is undermined. In

view of that, Kreindler (2005) illustrated that we choose groups that accord with our values

and leave groups that we do not fit into. When groups are based on the same values, they hold

similar moral ideals. When group members violate prescriptive norms, they are defying those

values and those members no longer wish to be associated with that group. Kreindler (2005)

looked at group processes and individual tendencies, which focused on both authoritarianism

and on social dominance as a product of group dynamics. Kreindler (2005) also showed how

individuals are judged within the group. A member who violates an important norm provokes

normative differentiation; other members judge him severely and seek to distance him from

the group. Although norm violations are often reprimanded, there are a few exceptions.

Kreindler (2005) showed that fondness for ones in-group and conformity to its norms do not

in themselves imply hostility toward nonconforming fellow members. Holders of non-

normative opinions are sometimes shown leniency by virtue of their shared group

membership. Under some conditions, groups cherish their more extreme members. Someone

who holds a non-normative opinion would fall under the less serious category of a descriptive

norm where they would often be judged less harshly and sometimes even be appreciated.

Not all group members identify strongly with their group. Kreindler (2005)

demonstrated that low identifiers responded to negative in-group members by further


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detaching themselves from the group. Therefore, because they do not feel a strong connection

with their group, they find it much easier to distance themselves from the group then to try

and fit in. On the other hand, Kreindler (2005) showed that high identifiers believe that

adhering to important group norms is significant to group membership and members will be

reprimanded if they threaten the preservation of those norms.

However, evidence shows that members may not initially follow up on a norm that

was only violated once. Kreindler (2005) showed that group members only punished an anti-

norm deviant when the relevant norm was threatened by frequent violation. Generally

speaking, in-groups tend to care more about their own group members so they strive to uphold

their important norms and become less concerned with the out-group behavior. Marques,

Abrams, and Serodio (2001) showed that individuals are motivated to try to persuade deviant

in-group, but not deviant out-group, members to change their opinion. In general, groups tend

to reprimand members who violate the norms that most people view as morally wrong, like

prescriptive norms. Kreindler (2005) recognized that people to whom a group membership is

salient and valuable are likely to express normative attitudes or even to advocate extremitized

moral majority ideas.

Individuals that have an authoritarian personality also hold group membership as

something valuable however, they tend to advocate ideas and norms that are specific to the

group, and not necessarily what the majority believes. According to the Adorno (1950)

theory, authoritarians are categorized by conventionalism, submission, aggression,

superstition, stereotypy, power and toughness, cynicism, projectivity, and destructiveness. In

general, authoritarians have a fondness for order. Kreindler (2005) showed that authoritarian

desire for social control is an outgrowth of their fear of social disorder and rebellion, so they


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become particularly anxious about social disorder and the harmful actions of social deviants.

Therefore, authoritarians should be less fond of norm violations in general, regardless of

whether a person violated a descriptive or prescriptive norm. Kessler and Cohrs (2008)

showed that, authoritarians tend to be aggressive against people or groups of people if they

perceive that these targets deviate from established norms and conventions. So, whereas in

general, in-groups tend to be most concerned with members who violate the norms that most

people view as morally wrong, like prescriptive norms, authoritarians in the in-group tend to

reprimand in-group members who violate the specific norms that they establish within their

group, which could encompass both descriptive and prescriptive norms. Therefore,

authoritarians may also express aggression or disapproval towards those who violate both

descriptive and prescriptive norms.

Authoritarians often have aggressive tendencies and have a desire to punish

individuals who do not behave in a conventional manner. Kessler and Cohrs (2008) illustrated

that authoritarianism has been shown to correlate with preferences for severe punishment of

lawbreakers, unless wrongdoers were admired officials or the crimes were targeted against

unconventional, norm-violating victims. Authoritarians also have a very strict view on the

cooperation of all in-group members. Although authoritarians dislike the violation of norms in

general, Kreindler (2005) states, authoritarians practice normative differentiation which

involves evaluating group members on the basis of their prototypicality regarding salient

attributes. This shows that as with in and out-groups in general, authoritarians also evaluate

individuals on the basis of more important attributes of their members. So, it seems that if

they are evaluating members regarding important attributes, they would be slightly less

judgmental of descriptive norms compared to prescriptive norms, yet they still believe in


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reprimanding both. Overall, authoritarians view deviations from the out-group as very serious

and view the out-group in a much more negative way than the in-group. According to

Kreindler (2005), individuals who ignore the norms are perceived as anti-norm deviates that

belong to society but do not fit in, which represents a threat to societys purity. Accordingly,

Kessler and Cohrs (2008) suggested that authoritarianism has been shown to correlate with

positive attitudes toward conventional groups and negative attitudes toward unconventional

groups. This finding demonstrates that authoritarianscare about what the out-group is doing

and if it doesnt coincide with the in-groupsvalues, the out-group will be judged accordingly.

Furthermore, Block (1951) revealed that authoritarians view in-groups as rightly dominant

and out-groups as subordinate. Overall, setting norm violations aside, authoritarians view the

out-group more negatively than the in-group and according to Downing and Monaco (1986),

those who scored high on the authoritarianism scale favored in-group over out-group

members more so than low authoritarian people do.

Most past researchers have not looked at the difference between prescriptive and

descriptive norm violations and how in-groups and out-groups react to them while looking at

how it affects a specific personality. Previous studies have just looked at norms in general or

general social norm violations among groups. The present study is designed to look at a

combination of variables that will test to see if high and low authoritarians respond differently

to these different types of norms.

I hypothesize that overall, perceived positivity scores for individuals who violate

descriptive norms will be lower than prescriptive norm violation scores (i.e., a main effect for

norm type). People who identify high on authoritarianism will give lower positivity scores

overall compared to those low in authoritarianism (i.e., a main effect for authoritarianism). I


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expect a three-way interaction between norm type, authoritarianism, and group status. For

descriptive norm violations, people high in authoritarianism will rate the in-group members

more negatively than the out-group members, whereas people low in authoritarianism will

rate out-group members more negatively than in-group members. For prescriptive norm

violations, people high andlow in authoritarianism will rate in-group members more

negatively than out-group members. The rationale for this hypothesized interaction is that

authoritarians want their own group norms to be followed, so they should dislike when in-

group members do so, more than when out-group members do so. The group of people who

should have the least difficulty tolerating deviations from the norm should be those low in

authoritarianism (who are less concerned with following the rules) looking at in-group

members (for whom we are more likely to recognize variety) violating descriptive norms

(which are seen as less serious than prescriptive violations).

Method

Participants

Participants were 73 undergraduate students from a medium sized university in the

southeast who participated in the study in return for partial course credit.

Materials

Right Wing Authoritarianism Scale: The Right Wing Authoritarianism scale (RWA)

was developed by Altemeyer (1981). The scale is made up of 24 items and each item is scored

on a 6-point scale ranging from disagree strongly to agree strongly. A high score

represents the presence of high authoritarianism. The reliability for this measure is high (alpha

= .88 to .95) (Altemeyer 1981; Zwillenberg, 1983). Although highly reliable scales do not

always have predictable validity because they narrowly measure a construct, when tested, the


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RWA scale had the highest correlation with the criterion validity variables in each case. This

scale is most appropriate for my study because it was meticulously constructed and

appropriately measures specific characteristics I am looking to test including, authoritarian

aggression, authoritarian submission, and conventionality.Refer to Appendix A.

Demographic Survey: Participants were given a short demographic survey which

showed what groups they belonged to. Participants were divided based on objective

characteristics that would establish themselves as either part of the in-group or part of the out-

group. These dividing characteristics were gender, age, and race, American vs. Non-

American, region, Greek status, and housing location. I also asked for the phone number and

e-mail address of each participant so I could contact them for the actual experiment. Refer to

Appendix B.

Norm violation scenarios. The criteria needed in order to qualify as a prescriptive

norm violation would mean that the person had to break the law, harm another person, or do

something that is considered morally wrong. Prescriptive norm violations included reading

about: A male cheating on his girlfriend, someone who is seen shoplifting, cheating on an

exam, and, abusing or neglecting animals. In order to be considered a descriptive norm

violation, that person would have to engage in some sort of cosmetic change, engage in some

sort of odd behavior, or break one of the unwritten rules of the social code. Descriptive norm

violations included reading about: people who colored their hair bright pink, someone with

tattoos covering his/her entire body, someone who had an extensive collection of McDonalds

figurines, and someone who assigns inappropriate nicknames to people they have just met.

See Appendix C for the actual scenarios used.


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Procedure

The experiment used a 2 (norm type: prescriptive, descriptive) x 2 (authoritarianism:

high, low) x 2 (group membership: in-group, out-group) design, with norm type and group

membership as within subject factors. In the first session, participants were asked to complete

the Right Wing Authoritarianism scale. Of the 73 participants who took part in the screening

session, I took roughly the top and bottom thirds to create the high and low authoritarianism

groups, resulting in 26 high authoritarianism participants and 24 lows. The scores of

participants who were categorized as high authoritarians ranged from 102-120, and the scores

of participants who were categorized as low authoritarians ranged from 65-90. Participants

were then given a short demographics survey. I then organized participants into their groups

and contacted them for the second session which was the actual experiment. Participants were

told I was assessing social perception. Each participant was given eight written scenarios.

Three scenarios were created for the in-group regarding a descriptive norm violation, three

scenarios were created for the in-group regarding a prescriptive norm violation, one scenario

was created for the out-group regarding a descriptive norm violation, and one scenario was

created for the out-group regarding a prescriptive norm violation.

Participants were given scenarios relevant to the group they identified with; i.e., their

in-group. For example, males were given scenarios regarding males violating norms and

females were given scenarios depicting females violating norms. After reading each scenario,

participants rated their overall opinion of the person in the paragraph using a seven-point

scale (1 = very negative, 7 = very positive). I also included some filler questions so

participants did not catch on to the intended purpose of the study regarding their desire to


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interact with the person such as asking, Would you hire this person for a job? and Would

you like to be neighbors with this person? See Appendix C.

Results

A 2 (authoritarianism: high, low) x 2 (group membership: in-group, out-group) x 2

(norm type: descriptive, prescriptive) mixed analysis of variance, with group membership and

norm type as within subjects variables, was conducted on the opinion measure. The test was

performed to analyze how people who either scored high or low in authoritarianism would

rate their opinion of people who violated both prescriptive and descriptive norms and are

either part of the participants in-group or out-group. Tests revealed that there was a

significant main effect for norm typeF(1, 48) = 413.51,p


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either part of the participants in-group or out-group. The desire to interact with norm

violators variable was created by taking the average of three separate measures: participants

desire to hire, be neighbors with, and be friends with the person they read about. Tests

revealed that there was a significant main effect for group membershipF(1, 48) = 8.89,p=

.005. Participants desired to interact more with the in-group (M= 3.40) than the out-group (M

= 3.12). The strength of this relationship, shown by , was .16. This indicates a strong effect.

There was also a significant main effect for norm type,F(1, 48) = 189.80,p


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prescriptive norm violation. Therefore, indicating that participants viewed prescriptive norm

violations more negatively than descriptive norm violations. Subsequent tests for the desire to

interact variable also revealed that participants desired to interact more with people who

committed a descriptive norm violation than a prescriptive norm violation. This suggests that

people take prescriptive norm violations more seriously than descriptive norm violations.

Participants viewed scenarios of descriptive norm violations as simply unusual and not as

defining characteristics of their personality that would completely sway their opinion of them

or sway their desire to interact with them to the negative side. However, participants viewed

scenarios of prescriptive norm violations as considerably more representative of the person

that they are enough to sway their opinion of the person further to the negative side.

Tests further revealed that there was a significant main effect for group membership

on the desire to interact measure. Participants desired to interact more with the in-group than

the out-group. One must take into account that the in-group contained examples of people

who committed both descriptive and prescriptive norm violations. Kreindler (2005) showed

that holders of non-normative opinions are sometimes shown leniency if they are part of the

in-group, and under some conditions, groups cherish their more extreme members. This

suggests that even though participants who read scenarios of people in their in-group violating

both descriptive and prescriptive norms, the norm violators were granted a form of leniency

just because they were part of the in-group. Therefore, there is still a desire to interact with

them and have them be a part of the in-group. Another possibility in support of the results is

presented by Kreindler (2005), who showed that group members only punished anti-norm

deviants when the relevant norm was threatened by frequent violation. Therefore, even though

group members violated norms, people from the in-group only read about the person in the


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scenarios violating each specific norm one time and may not see a onetime violation as a

threat to group membership and desirability to interact with the person. This may explain why

participants desired to interact more with the in-group than the out-group. However, this same

effect was not found for the opinion variable. I am not sure why the results came out this way

because if participants desired to interact with the in-group more than the out-group, they

should also have a less negative opinion of the in-group as opposed to the out-group. One

reason for this outcome may be that participants not quite as concerned about interacting with

a person even if they have a negative opinion of him or her.

For both dependent variables, I predicted a three-way interaction between norm type,

group membership, and authoritarianism. This interaction was significant for the opinion

measure, and marginally significant for the desire to interact measure. Further analysis of the

interaction for the desire to interact measure revealed that the only significant difference

between cells was between in-group prescriptive norm violations and out-group prescriptive

norm violations. For participants low in authoritarianism, participants desired to interact more

with the in-group who committed prescriptive norm violations, than with the out-group who

also committed prescriptive norm violations. This finding is not consistent with my

hypothesis, I predicted a significant three-way interaction between norm type,

authoritarianism, and group status and that there would be significant differences for

participants who rated both high and low in authoritarianism. I also predicted that for

prescriptive norm violations, people high andlow in authoritarianism would rate in-group

members more negatively than out-group members. This finding suggests that there is perhaps

variation in group status among low authoritarians. It is not surprising that the variation is

among prescriptive norm violations because those are the violations that are the most


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shocking. The finding that participants low in authoritarianism desired to interact more with

the in-group who committed prescriptive norm violations, than with the out-group who also

committed prescriptive norm violations suggests that low authoritarians may be more

forgiving of their in-group members. It also suggests that even though in-group members

violated a prescriptive norm, group members would rather interact with someone from a

group they identify with on other levels than with someone who they may not identify with at

all. This finding is inconsistent with the research where Kreindler (2005) revealed that when a

member violates an important norm, other members judge him severely and seek to distance

him from the group.

It is important to note, however, that the effect described above was only one difference

between cells in a marginally significant interaction for one measure. Extracting meaning

from this one difference should be done with caution at best. Even though significant (or

marginally significant) interactions emerged for both measures, the most meaningful

differences within these interactions which are apparent are the main effects for norm type,

i.e., that people rated descriptive norm violations more positively than prescriptive norm

violations.

I predicted there would be a main effect for authoritarianism, and people who identified

high on authoritarianism would have higher negativity scores overall compared to those low

in authoritarianism. However, the findings were not consistent with my hypothesis; there was

no main effect for authoritarianism. Although I predicted authoritarians would rate

prescriptive norm violations more negatively than descriptive norm violations, this was not

the case. One reason for this outcome was suggested by Kessler and Cohrs (2008) who

showed that, authoritarians tend to be aggressive against people or groups of people if they


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perceive that these targets deviate from established norms and conventions. This may indicate

that, authoritarians are less fond of norm violations in general, regardless of whether a person

violated a descriptive or prescriptive norm.

One of the limitations of this study was that the conditions were affected by the number

of scenarios each participant read. The original intention was to create two of each type of

scenario which would result in a total of eight scenarios. However, three scenarios were

inadvertently created for the in-group regarding a descriptive norm violation, three scenarios

were created for the in-group regarding a prescriptive norm violation, one scenario was

created for the out-group regarding a descriptive norm violation, and one scenario was created

for the out-group regarding a prescriptive norm violation. This unintended change only

allowed participants to judge the out-group once for each type of norm violation. In the

conditions where participants could read three examples of a specific type of norm violation, I

was able to use the average score of the three scenarios as opposed to just looking at one score

of one scenario. For participants reading only one scenario, their ratings were more likely to

have been affected by the specifics of the story depicted in that scenario. A different specific

story may have resulted in a very different rating, even if it were of the same norm type. The

process of averaging ratings for multiple scenarios was intended to deal with this issue in all

conditions, but unfortunately an error prevented this from happening.

Another limitation of the study was that I only used Mercer students as a defining in-

group characteristic. So, when participants read scenarios about Mercer students, they were

reading about their in-group, and when they read scenarios about students from another

university, they were reading about the out-group. There was too much variation among the

other in-group characteristics I screened for through the demographic survey, which is why I


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did not use them. Moreover, I reasoned that using the Mercer status as representative of the

in-group status is a common thread students are most likely to identify with. Students identify

themselves as Mercerians while they are on campus and even after they graduate as alumni.

Accordingly, it is something that students cannot change easily, unlike a political ideology.

However, there is a chance that some students may not have picked up on the idea of non-

mercer students being part of the out-group. Therefore, future research could investigate other

dimensions along which to form the in-group/out-group membership. Future research in this

area could also consider using a measure other than the RWA scale. Perhaps using a measure

such as the Counterbalanced F Scale, which includes items that are only worded in a positive

manner, would be a better indicator of authoritarianism because the items would be less

confusing to the reader.

In conclusion, the results seem to reveal an overall trend that participants viewed

prescriptive norm violations more negatively than descriptive norm violations. This effect for

norm type shows that students do care about how others are treated and that when people

engage in immoral acts such as, stealing, cheating, or treating animals inhumanely, it should

be taken as a serious offense and should affect the way they view that person. Additionally,

participants desired to interact more with their in-groups than with the out-groups, even when

the in-groups committed prescriptive norm violations. The results suggest that individuals

both high and low in authoritarianism have their own morals, ideals, and standards which they

use to judge other peoples character and their desire to interact with them in several different

situations. In accordance with the research, people must view prescriptive norm violations as

badactions, which are frowned upon and seem to not want to associate themselves with

those types of people. However, the results also showed the power of group membership. If


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you are part of the in-group and you do something that others frown upon, the members of

your group would still rather interact with you than interact with people they didnt associate

with who violated a prescriptive norm. This could suggest that people are connecting on a

deeper level and join common groups for multiple different reasons which are partly based on

accordance with their own morals. The rationale for this conclusion supports the finding that

people would rather interact with someone they know who did something bad than someone

they didnt know who did something bad.

Social norms structure the way in which we live our lives and we must continually learn

to adapt to the constant change of what is seen as behaviorally acceptable. Therefore, this

topic warrants continued research in order to understand why people react to norm violations

in different ways and why norm violators are viewed as negative.


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References

Block, J. (1951). An investigation of the relationship between intolerance of ambiguity

and ethnocentrism.Journal of Personality, 19, 303-311.

Downing, L., & Monaco, N. (1986). In-Group/Out-group Bias as a Function of

differential contact and authoritarian personality.Journal of Social Psychology, 126,

445-453.

Forsyth, D. R., (1999). Group Dynamics (3rded.). Belmont, California: Wadsworth

Publishing Company.

Kessler, T., & Cohrs, J. (2008). The evolution of authoritarian processes: Fostering

cooperation in large-scale groups. Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice,

12, 73-84.

Kreindler, S. (2005). A dual group processes model of individual differences in

prejudice.Personality & Social Psychology Review, 9, 90-107.

Marques, J., Abrams, D., & Serdio, R. (2001). Being better by being right: Subjective

group dynamics and derogation of the in-group deviants when generic norms are

undermined.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 81, 436-447.


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Table 1

Means and Standard Deviations for the Opinion of Norm Violators

________________________________________________________________________

Low Auth High Auth

________________________________________________________

Norm Type In-group Out-group In-group Out-group

________________________________________________________________________

Descriptive 4.18 (.60) 4.54 (1.06) 3.97 (.69) 4.15 (1.38)

Prescriptive 2.03 (.61) 1.75 (1.11) 1.64 (.63) 2.00 (1.06)

________________________________________________________________________

Note. Standard deviations appear in parentheses. Ns = 24 for Low Auth, 26 for High Auth.


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Table 2

Means and Standard Deviations for the Desire to Interact with Norm Violators

________________________________________________________________________

Low Auth High Auth

________________________________________________________

Norm Type In-group Out-group In-group Out-group

________________________________________________________________________

Descriptive 4.41 (.67) 4.26 (1.01) 4.19 (.67) 3.87 (1.24)

Prescriptive 2.57 (.60) 2.01 (1.17) 2.45 (.64) 2.33 (.88)

________________________________________________________________________

Note. Standard deviations appear in parentheses. Ns = 24 for Low Auth, 26 for High Auth.


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Figure 1. Participants positivity of opinion ratings of norm violators.

High Authoritarianism

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5

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Ingrp Outgrp

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Membership

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Low Authoritarianism

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Figure 2. Participants desire to interact ratings of norm violators.

Low Authoritarianism

1

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3

4

56

7

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High Authoritarianism

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Appendix A

RWA

Please circle the response that best reflects the extent to which you agree or disagree

with each statement.

1. Laws have to be strictly enforced if we are going to preserve our way of life.DISAGREE DISAGREE DISAGREE AGREE AGREE AGREESTRONGLY SOMEWHAT SLIGHTLY SLIGHTLY SOMEWHAT STRONGLY

2. People should pay less attention to the Bible and the other old traditional forms ofreligious guidance, and instead develop their own personal standards of what is moral andimmoral.

3.

Women should always remember the promise they make in the marriage ceremony toobey their husbands.

4. Out customs and national heritage are the things that have made us great, and certainpeople should be made to show greater respect for them.

5. Capital punishment should be completely abolished.6. National anthems, flags, and glorification of ones country should all be de-emphasized

to promote the brotherhood of all men.

7. The facts on crime, sexual immorality, and the recent public disorders all show we haveto crack down harder on deviant groups and troublemakers if we are going to save our moralstandards and preserve law and order.

8. A lot of societys rules regarding modesty and sexual behavior are just customs whichare not necessarily any better or holier than those which other peoples follow.

9. Our prisons are a shocking disgrace. Criminals are unfortunate people who deservemuch better care, instead of so much punishment.

10. Obedience and respect for authority are the most important virtues children shouldlearn.

11. Organizations like the army and the priesthood have a pretty unhealthy effect upon menbecause they require strict obedience of commands from supervisors.

12. One good way to teach certain people right from wrong is to give them a good stiffpunishment when they get out of line.


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13. Youngsters should be taught to refuse to fight in a war unless they themselves agree thewar is just and necessary.

14. It may be considered old-fashioned by some, but having a decent, respectableappearance is still the mark of a gentleman and, especially, a lady.

15. In these troubled times laws have to be enforced without mercy, especially whendealing with the agitators and revolutionaries who are stirring things.

16. Atheists and others who have rebelled against established religions are no doubt everybit as good and virtuous as those who attend church regularly.

17. Young people sometimes get rebellious ideas, but as they grow up they ought to getover them and settle down.

18. Rules about being well-mannered and respectable are chains from the past that weshould question very thoroughly before accepting.

19. The courts are right in being easy on drug offenders. Punishment would not do anygood in cases like these.

20. If a child starts becoming a little too unconventional, his parents should see to it hereturn to the normal ways expected by society.

21. Being kind to loafers or criminals will only encourage them to take advantage of yourweakness, so its best to use a firm, tough hand when dealing with them.

22. A womans place should be wherever she wants to be. The days when women aresubmissive to their husbands and social conventions belong strictly in the past.

23. Homosexuals are just as good and virtuous as anybody else, and there is nothing wrongwith being one.

24. Its one thing to question and doubt someone during an election campaign, but once aman becomes the leader of our country we owe him our greatest support and loyalty.


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Appendix B

Demographic Survey

1. Are you Male or Female?M F

2. What is your age?________.

3. What race are you? (Circle one)White Hispanic African-American Asian Pacific Islander Native American

Other

4. Where did you grow up (city, state, and country if applicable)?

5. What year are you?1ST 2ND 3RD 4TH 5TH

6. Are you part of a sorority or fraternity on campus?YES (Which one?):________________________ NO

7. Do you live on or off campus?ON OFF

8. Generally speaking, do you consider yourself to be a:Democrat Republican Other

9. Have you ever attended a university other than Mercer? If so, which university?YES (Specify):___________________________ NO

If you qualify for the later study, we will need to contact you to set up an appointment.

Please provide up-to-date contact information below.

NAME: ___________________________ PHONE#:________________________

EMAIL(the one you check most often):____________________________________


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Appendix C

For each of the scenarios below, please read each one and answer the questions beneath

it. Thank you.

1. Daniel (Susan) recently enrolled as a student at Mercer and was assigned a roommatenamed Alex. From the first time they met, Alex noticed that Daniel always wore long sleevesand pants, even in the summer. Alex always wondered about his choice of clothing but neverfelt comfortable enough to ask him. After a few months of living together they became closefriends and Daniel finally revealed that he had tattoos covering three fourths of his bodywhich is why he always covered up while on campus.

What is your opinion of this person?

1 2 3 4 5 6 7Very Negative Neutral Very Positive

How likely would you be to hire this person for a job?

1 2 3 4 5 6 7Very Unlikely Neutral Very Likely

To what extent would you like to be neighbors with this person?

1 2 3 4 5 6 7Not at all Neutral Very Much

To what extent would you like to be friends with this person?

1 2 3 4 5 6 7Not at all Neutral Very Much--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------2. Eric (Erika) is a senior at Mercer. He enjoys going camping, playing the guitar, andhanging out with his fraternity brothers. For his theatre class, he and his partner, Jennifer hadto practice their performance for the play they were going to be acting in tomorrow night. Ericvolunteered to have them practice at his apartment. When his partner walks in, she noticesEric has an extensive collection of over 150 McDonalds Happy Meal toys displayed on hisdesk.

3. Mark (Wendy) has a girlfriend named Whitney. They have been dating for about 4 years.They always seem so happy whenever they are together and are often referred to as theperfect couple by their Mercer classmates. Recently, Mark confessed to one of the couplesclose friends that he had been cheating on Whitney for almost a year now with a girl from hishometown and he was certain Whitney had no idea what he was up to.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


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4. Ryan (Tina) goes to Mercer and joined a fraternity his freshman year. He is taking hisSociology final and needs to get an A on the exam in order to pass the class with a C. He isstuck on one of the questions but knows that he has the answer to it in his notes. He debateswhether or not he should try and sneak a look at them. The professor leaves the room for aminute and Ryan decides to take a quick look at his notes. By the time the professor comes

back, he has already put them away.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. Drew (Mandy) lives in California and enjoys waterskiing at the beach. He dyes his hair adifferent color each month. Last August it was orange, September it was green, and byJanuary it was blue. His friends call him the chameleon because he is always changing his

hair color.

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6. Nick (Melissa) attends Mercer and is a very outgoing guy and enjoys meeting new people

and making friends. Right after meeting new people, he quickly comes up with a nicknamefor them based on their characteristics such as, blondie or stretch and begins calling themthat name throughout the entire conversation.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

7. Jake (Jackie) attends Florida State University and lives off-campus in a small one bedroomapartment on the fifth floor. He owns two small dogs named Casper and Max. He never playswith his dogs even though they beg him to and will often forget to put food out on the smallbalcony where he leaves them for the majority of the day. He rarely gives them baths and willkick them if they climb on his bed since he doesnt like them up there.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------8. Sean (Jessica) rarely has any free time because he is always busy taking classes at Mercerso, Saturday afternoon he decided to take a break from studying and go to the mall. He neededto look for a new watch so he visited a couple of stores but, did not see anything he liked untilhe saw a watch in a store window. He went into the store and asked the lady how much thewatch was. When the lady told him it was $400, he almost walked away but then he noticedthat the lady was very busy helping other customers and that he could probably take the watchwithout getting caught. Sean casually slipped the watch into his pocket when the storekeeperwas not watching and walked out of the store without getting caught.

psych rch pper

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