Development of a Questionnaire to Measure Attitude to War as a Means of Solving International Conflicts
Keywords:
attitudes toward war, right-wing authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, nationalism, questionnaire
Abstract
The article describes the authors’ tool to measure attitudes towards war as a means to solve international conflicts. Its construction passed two main steps. On the first step a number of items were formulated, which reflected the perception of various aspects of war. Then those items were chosen that constituted the final version of the questionnaire. The developed questionnaire comprised 6 factors (effectiveness of war, moral justification of war, economic aftermath of war, social aftermath of war, positive humanitarian aftermath of war, negative humanitarian aftermath of war), which add into a unified factor of general attitudes towards war. In the Study 1 (N=978) the results of confirmatory factor analysis showed that the version of the questionnaire that comprised 12 items demonstrated satisfactory fit to the empirical data. The multigroup analysis demonstrated structural equivalence with the use of the questionnaire in two samples: 1) man and women; 2) people older and younger than 30 years. It was found that men have more positive attitudes towards war, than women, and people younger than 30 bear more positive attitudes that those who are older than 30. Positive links of attitudes towards war with the level of right-wing authoritarianism and orientation towards social dominance in the realm of international relationships were established. In the present study the alpha Cronbach’s of the questionnaire of attitudes towards war was high (α = .87).
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References
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29. Stoner, S. B., & Spencer, W. B. (1987). Age and gender differences with the anger expression scale. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 47(2), 487-492. https://doi.org/10.1177/0013164487472023
30. Tessler, M., Nachtway, J., & Grant, A. (1999). Further tests of the women and peace hypothesis: Evidence from cross-national survey research in the Middle East. International Studies Quarterly, 43, 519-531.
31. Van der Linden, N., Leys, C., Klein, O., & Bouchat, P. (2017). Are attitudes toward peace and war the two sides of the same coin? Evidence to the contrary from a French validation of the Attitudes Toward Peace and War Scale. PLoS ONE, 12(9), e0184001. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0184001
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2. Bizumic, B., Stubager, R., Mellon, S., Van der Linden, N., Iyer, R., & Jones, B. M. (2013). (In)compatibility of attitudes toward peace and war. Political Psychology, 34, 673-693. https://doi.org/10.1111 /pops.12032
3. Brooks, D. J., & Valentino, B. A. (2011). A war of one's own: Understanding the gender gap in support for war. Public Opinion Quarterly, 75, 270-286. https://doi.org/10.1093/poq/nfr005
4. Cohrs, C., & Moschner, B. (2002). Antiwar knowledge and generalized political attitudes as determinants of attitude toward the Kosovo War. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 8, 139-155. https://doi.org/10.1207/S15327949PAC0802_03
5. Cohrs, J. C., Moschner, B., Maes, J., & Kielmann, S. (2005). Personal values and attitudes toward war. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 11, 293-312. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327949pac1103_5
6. Crowson, H. M. (2009a). Nationalism, internationalism, and perceived UN irrelevance: Mediators of relationships between authoritarianism and support for military aggression as part of the war on terror. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 39,1137-1162. https://doi.org/10.1111 /j.1559-1816.2009.00475.x
7. Crowson, H. M. (2009b). Right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation: As mediators of worldview beliefs on attitudes related to the war on terror. Social Psychology, 40, 93- 103. https://doi.org/10.1027/1864-9335.40.2.93
8. Crowson, H. M., DeBacker, T. K., & Thoma, S. J. (2005). Does authoritarianism predict post-9/11 attitudes? Personality and Individual Differences, 39, 1273-1283. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2005.06.005
9. Crowson, H. M., Debacker, T. K., & Thoma, S. J. (2006). The role of authoritarianism, perceived threat, and need for closure or structure in predicting post-9/11 attitudes and beliefs. Journal of Social Psychology, 146, 733-750. https://doi.org/10.3200/S0CP.146.6.733-750
10. Doty, R. M., Winter, D. G., Peterson, B. E., & Kemmelmeier, M. (1997). Authoritarianism and American students' attitudes about the Gulf War, 1990-1996. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 23, 1133-1143.
11. Duncan, L. E., & Stewart, A. J. (1995). Still bringing the Vietnam War home: Sources of contemporary student activism. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 21, 914-924.
12. Dyakonova, N. A. (2001). Osobennosti avtoritarizma i ego vzaimosvyaz's tsennostnymi orientatsiyami i lokusom kontrolya u rossiiskikh i amerikanskikh studentov [Specifics of authoritarianism and its interrelations with values orientations and locus of control in Russian and American students] (Ph.D. dissertation). Retrieved from http://dl1.lib.ua-ru.net/files/dfd/252/030359001.doc (in Russian)
13. Federico, C. M., Golec, A., & Dial, J. L. (2005). The relationship between the need for closure and support for military action against Iraq: moderating effects of national attachment. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 31, 621-632.
14. Feinstein, Y. (2016). Pulling the trigger: how threats to the nation increase support for military action via the generation of hubris. Sociological Science, 3, 317-334.
15. Grigoryan, L. K., & Lepshokova, Z. Kh. (2012). Empiricheskaya model' vzaimosvyazi grazhdanskoi identichnosti i ustanovok po otnosheniyu k immigrantam s ekonomicheskimi predstavleniyami rossiyan [Empirical model of interrelation of civic identity and attitudes towards immigrants and economic beliefs of the Russians]. Sotsial'naya Psikhologiya i Obshchestvo, 2, 5-20. (in Russian)
16. Gulevich, O. A., Agadullina, E. R., & Khukhlaev, O. E. (2018). Approval of Group Hierarchy: Russian Version of Social Dominance Orientation Scale. Psychology. Journal of the Higher School of Economics, 15(3), 407-428. (in Russian)
17. Heaven, P. C. L., Organ, L., Supavadeeprasit, S., & Leeson, P. (2006). War and prejudice: A study of social values, right-wing authoritarianism, and social dominance orientation. Personality and Individual Differences, 40, 599-608.
18. Heskin, K., & Power, V. (1994). The determinants of Australians' attitudes toward the Gulf War. The Journal of Social Psychology, 134, 317-330.
19. Izzett, R. R. (1971). Authoritarianism and attitudes toward the Vietnam War as reflected in behavioral and self-report measures. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 17, 145-148. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0030391
20. Jones-Wiley, D. G., Restori, A. F., Lee, H. B., Himelfarb, I., & Boluyt, M. (2007). A psychometric evaluation of existing attitude measures toward capital punishment and war. North American Journal of Psychology, 9, 475-484.
21. Levada-Tsentr. (2018, 1 February). Vazhneishie sobytiya 2017goda [The most important events of the year 2017]. Retrieved from https://www.levada.ru/2018/02/01/vazhnejshie-sobytiya-2017-goda (in Russian)
22. Maoz, I. (2012). The women and peace hypothesis. In D. J. Christie (ed.), The encyclopedia of peace psychology (pp. 1185-1188). London: Wiley-Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470672532.wbepp296
23. McFarland, S. G. (2005). On the eve of war: authoritarianism, social dominance, and American students' attitudes toward attacking Iraq. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 31, 360-67.
24. McFarland, S. G., Ageyev, V. S., & Abalakina-Paap, M. A. (1992). Authoritarianism in the former Soviet Union. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63, 1004-1010. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.63.6.1004
25. Nelson, L. L. (1995). Militaristic attitudes in college students: Developmental antecedents and personality correlates. Paper presented at the Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, New York.
26. Nelson, L. L., & Milburn, T. W. (1999). Relationships between problem-solving competencies and militaristic attitudes: Implications for peace education. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 5, 149-168. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327949pac0502_4
27. Obshchestvennoe mnenie - 2009. (2009). Moscow: Levada-Tsentr. Retrieved from http://www.levada.ru/sites/default/files/levada_2009_rus.pdf (in Russian)
28. Pratto, F., Sidanius, J., Stallworth, L. M., & Malle, B. F. (1994). Social dominance orientation: A personality variable predicting social and political attitudes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 741-763. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.67.4.741
29. Stoner, S. B., & Spencer, W. B. (1987). Age and gender differences with the anger expression scale. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 47(2), 487-492. https://doi.org/10.1177/0013164487472023
30. Tessler, M., Nachtway, J., & Grant, A. (1999). Further tests of the women and peace hypothesis: Evidence from cross-national survey research in the Middle East. International Studies Quarterly, 43, 519-531.
31. Van der Linden, N., Leys, C., Klein, O., & Bouchat, P. (2017). Are attitudes toward peace and war the two sides of the same coin? Evidence to the contrary from a French validation of the Attitudes Toward Peace and War Scale. PLoS ONE, 12(9), e0184001. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0184001
32. Weise, D. R., Pyszczynski, T., Cox, C. R., Arndt, J., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S., & Kosloff, S. (2008). Interpersonal politics: The role of terror management and attachment processes in shaping political preferences. Psychological Science, 19, 448-455. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02108.x
Published
2018-11-08
How to Cite
НеврюевА. Н. (2018). Development of a Questionnaire to Measure Attitude to War as a Means of Solving International Conflicts. Psychology. Journal of the Higher School of Economics, 15(3), 464-476. https://doi.org/10.17323/1813-8918-2018-3-464-476
Issue
Section
Questionnaires for Studying Social-Psychological Issues
