Talk:Social dominance theory

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I have made a start at wikifying this interesting article. This is work in progress by a non-specialist. Comments and additions welcome.--Henri 23:30, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

There are still errors in the references. The links to Duckitt and RWA are weak. The article would still benefit from some real expertise!--Henri 19:01, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

other definitions of 'social dominance'

This article covers the racist, oppressive side of Social Dominance Theory. Another use of the term 'social dominance' is when speaking of the animal world, as in the the social dominance of chimps hamsters and many other animals, including humans. Therefore, I feel that this page needs to mention this other use of the words, 'social dominance,' and perhaps then, eventually, for another page on the topic of social dominance across many (all?) animal species be created. Thanks. 65.32.176.165 (talk) 19:09, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Merger proposal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

The result of this discussion was a lack of consensus to merge. Jaydavidmartin (talk) 22:11, 16 January 2021 (UTC)

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I propose that Social dominance orientation be merged into Social dominance theory. It seems like there is a lot of redundancy across these two articles and I can't think of a strong rationale for the separation (if anything I think it limits understanding). I can see that at least one other person thinks this way, but what do others think? Cheers Andrew (talk) 06:50, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

I oppose the merger. SDT is a moderately-developed social theory that touches on social organization, ideology, and power relationships. SDO is a well-developed psychological construct for measuring a certain kind of authoritarian personality. The two theories are logically independent, except that SDO was theorized as a personality likely to be successful in an SDT-type of society. Burressd (talk) 02:10, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi Burressd. That is not my understanding. Instead, following the literature I have always understood SDO to be a part of SDT and therefore not independent theories as you claim. Or in Pratto et al.'s words “Social dominance theory postulates that a significant factor is an individual-difference variable called social dominance orientation” (1994, p. 741, emphasis added). Can you point to some sources that would support your point of view? Cheers Andrew (talk) 04:40, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

A requirement for authoritative sources explicitly describing a separation of literatures would be unreasonable. For example, I doubt if anyone bothers to state that literature on Republicans is distinct from literature on American conservatives. Instead, observe actual facts.

1. An influential book that compares SDO with Right Wing Authoritarianism never once mentions SDT. (Bob Altemeyer, The Authoritarians, http://members.shaw.ca/jeanaltemeyer/drbob/TheAuthoritarians.pdf).

2. The original authors of SDT have stated: "the theory is a theory of social dominance, not a theory of social dominance orientation. We view measures of SDO to be a theoretical tool, rather than viewing SDO as a root cause of social hierarchy." (Felicia Pratto, Jim Sidanius, and Shana Levin,"Social dominance theory and the dynamics of intergroup relations: Taking stock and looking forward," EUROPEAN REVIEW OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY, 2006, 17, 271 – 320, http://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.topic895260.files/PrattoSidaniusLevin_2006.pdf Burressd (talk) 02:12, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi Burressd. I think you might be misinterpreting the quote that you plucked out. I am pretty sure Pratto et al. (2006) are not trying to claim that SDT is separate to SDO. Their point instead is that SDT is not only SDO. Their concern here, which I think is clear in light of the complete section, is that some view SDO to be a personality explanation of social hierarchy, rather than understanding SDO as only one part of SDT, which is a far broader account of prejudice. This latter interpretation would also be in accord with the remainder of the article, which views SDO as as methodological aspect of SDT (even if this is a slight shift from their earlier statements).

Does this resonate with you? It does, after all, look like we both value the source materials. It seems like Pratto, Sidanius, and collegues' account should be the one that Wikipedia is based on. That is, you can't have SDO without SDT, and to do so risks misinterpreting the theory. I would say that your other source, Altemeyer, does run this risk by not explaining full context of SDO, but he does cite an SDT paper and perhaps that is enough. What do you think? Cheers Andrew (talk) 03:49, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

I continue to disagree. As I read the SDO literature, it has become part of authoritarian and conservative personality research and does not deal at all with social structure. SDT was almost entirely concerned with social structure and hypothesized SDO as an explanation. I do not see the SDO research as especially validating the very complex SDT theory, other than demonstrating the relatively uncontroversial claim that there is a drive for differentiated power and status that differs between individuals. Some SDO research did validate the prediction that SDO tends to be stronger among males than females, but that subject is highly peripheral to current SDO research.

As to the quote, the authors are saying they do not have a theory of the origins of SDO personalities. Such a theory is precisely a core concern of SDO research. Here is great review article comparing SDO and other conservatism constructs that never once mentions SDT: "Political Conservatism as Motivated Social Cognition, by John T. Jost, Jack Glaser, W. Kruglanski, and Frank J. Sulloway, Psychological Bulletin 2003, Vol. 129, No. 3, 339–375, at http://faculty.virginia.edu/haidtlab/jost.glaser.political-conservatism-as-motivated-social-cog.pdf.

I would suggest, however, that the discussion of SDT in the SDO article ought to be abbreviated as it is decreasingly relevant to the SDO research. A reference to the SDT article would then be sufficient.

Another point floating around here is that the SDT theory as such seems to be sadly underesearched. There have apparently not been a lot of tests at the macro or crosscultural level (however I'm not an expert).

Burressd (talk) 07:02, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi Burressd. I have exhausted my wiki-time for today and will reply to you properly tomorrow (with a little luck). In the meantime though, when you say "Here is great review article comparing SDO and other conservatism constructs that never once mentions SDT", did you actually mean to say "Here is great review article comparing SDO and other conservatism constructs that mentions SDT by name six times and devotes a section to explaining SDT and SDO concurrently"? Cheers Andrew (talk) 07:49, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

I stand corrected. I had relied on memory and carelessly searched for SDT, which wasn't there. Nevertheless, nothing in Jost discusses the social structural questions that I see as at the heart of SDT--discriminatory institutions as personality selectors, interactions of ideology and roles. Conversely nothing in Pratto discusses the conservative personality question, which seems to be at the heart of current SDO research Burressd (talk) 16:38, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi again Burressd. I am happy to leave the discussion there until we have some other editors weigh in. You seem to have a particular take on the literature and make a lot of uncited claims about the state of the field. I suspect this might be your own original research and thus not a valid basis for structuring wikipedia, but maybe some other editors will come along who can provide some sources that support your perspective. In the meantime it might be worth pointing out two areas where there does seem to be agreement between us:

• SDO was developed as a part of SDT.
• SDO is still discussed as part of SDT (e.g. in the review article you provided and by the original architects of the theoretical perspective, which you also provided)

For me, in the absence of reputable sources suggesting otherwise, this is enough to justify strongly the merge.

I am happy to keep discussing your particular perspective and interpretations if you like, as maybe there is a chance that we may come to be on the same page. Really though, you seem a bit "out there". The fact that, when looking to demonstrate the independence of SDO and SDT, you somehow blinded yourself to an entire section on SDT is a bit of a worry. You also have just recently claimed that "authors are saying they do not have a theory of the origins of SDO personalities", despite this statement in that same paper:

we have posited that [SDO] is influenced by at least five broad forces: (1) group position, (2) social context, (3) stable individual differences in temperament and personality, (4) gender, and (5) socialisation

Absent mindedness, or willful blindness? Either way, you will have to forgive me if I don't take your word on the current scientific consensus. Anyway, I am happy to hear your thoughts if you feel like responding. Cheers Andrew (talk) 05:24, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Andrew-1.you have have a point about S&P having model of the nature of SDO. My point (and I think P&S's point) was that their SDO model is an assumption of SDT used to predict social structure. It is not a direct contribution to personality theory as such because it was not placed in the context of other personality types. SDO research does what SDT research didn't intend to do, namely place SDO within broader personality theory.

2. You continue to insist on a unstated principle that seems to be something like this: topics that reference each other ought to be in the same Wikipedia article unless a reputable source says they are distinct topics. In other words you place the burden of proof on the separatists. Why? Can you cite one single source that says the two articles should be combined? Also, can you cite even one single example where your approach actually was followed in a positive sense, i.e where a Wikipedia article was split because reputable sources said it ought to be?

3. For me, the presence of a detailed review article like Jost which covers SDO but not SDT (and there are others) constitutes definitive proof that the topics are seen by personality researchers as separate. (Mentioning SDT is not the same as covering it. SDO appears in the summary tables, and SDT does not. There is no discussion whatsoever of social structure, which is the main topic of SDT.)

4. Your speculations as to my character are ad hominem and irrelevant. I was asking people to respond to my arguments, not my authority. Note that I have admitted error and shown some flexibility. Can you say the same?

5. Unless you introduce seriously new arguments I will let you have the last word. My silence will indicate continued disagreement.

Burressd (talk) 06:10, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi Burressd. I might respond to some of your other points on Monday if I get the time, but I just wanted to respond to (2) here quickly because it is easy to respond to. As such...

No I do not believe that all topics that reference each other ought to be in the same article unless sources suggest otherwise. Nothing I have said would reasonably suggest this to you (straw man much?). Instead, as should be clear based on my comments, my feeling is that when a concept has begun its life as a subset of broader theory, that concept continues to be discussed as a subset of a broader theory, and that it is possible to remove a large amount of wiki-redundancy by merging associated articles, a merge should occur. Unless, of course, reputable sources suggest that strong distinction should be made. And, despite your incredulity, there is precedent for this:

...although we can use the epithet the social identity approach as shorthand to refer to the full range of arguments and hypotheses that are generated by the two theories, it is still important - intellectually and practically - to continue to distinguish between them.

Note the evolution of the wiki-structure of the articles social identity approach, social identity theory, and self-categorization theory. Cheers Andrew (talk) 06:50, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Andrew--good though partial response. Evidently my "straw man" argument did its job, which was to lead to clarify your points. You found an example of an authority distinguishing two related lines of research.

More importantly, you clarified that your goal is "economy.' I agree with that goal.

You did not address the burden of proof. As a matter of economy, in intellectual discourse it is nearly always incumbent on the individual seeking change to accept the burden of proof. Otherwise we would be engaged in disputing every crazy notion that came along. For that reason it is incumbent on you (the apostle of change) to find authorities arguing that personality theory is NOT distinct from social theories such as SDT. It seems to me that the quote I gave from S&J says exact the opposite, that SDO personality theory is not the subject of SDT social theory, hence is distinct. Your interpretation is that the words do not have their plain meaning, but instead mean " SDT is not only SDO." I will address that and also another point by changing the subject slightly.

As a manner of economy, when I consult an article on personality theory, which does (or should) leads into deep psychometrics, I do not want to be distracted by an extended discussion of social theory, which uses entirely different theories and methods. Conversely, social theorists are not deeply interested in psychometrics and personality theory.

Here is how we can clarify the deep distance between SDO and SDT: either theory can falsified without falsifying the other theory. Conversely, confirmation of neither theory has much bearing on confirming the other.

First, it could turn out that social discrimination has root causes unrelated to personality. In many structural situations such as the Lombardo experiment, people do bad things because of the situation, not because of the type of person they are. If so, SDT is (substantially if not completely) wrong. Yet at the same time SDO could still be (as it in fact is) a successful theory of a personality trait that passes many psychometric tests.

Second, it could have turned out that SDO failed all psychometric tests and failed to jive with other personality theories and was decisively rejected by personality psychologists. Nevertheless DST could still be valid, with rather modest modifications: rather than assuming SDO was a fixed personality type, it could be a behavioral repertoire available to all (though more accessible in males) that is triggered by situational opportunities. The rest of SDT theory (which is say nearly all of it) would go through unchanged. Indeed, that is exactly what I think J&S were implying when they said that "We view measures of SDO to be a theoretical tool, rather than viewing SDO as a root cause of social hierarchy."

In summary, Andrew, you are seeking to combine articles on two logically independent theories belonging to two distinct disciplines that use two mostly different research methods--simply because they originated in one single, seminal publication. You would not of course argue that all the myriad lines of research stemming from "Origin of Species" belong in a single Wiki article, so you will get the point that common origin in a seminal text is not nearly a sufficient basis for a joining of articles.

Burressd (talk) 18:01, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi Burressd. You have replaced one straw man with another straw man. I would suggest you stop. It only serves to waste our time and it doesn't reflect well on you. I clearly did not claim that “a common origin in a seminal text is sufficient basis for merging corresponding articles”. I instead said that…

when a concept has begun its life as a subset of broader theory, that concept continues to be discussed as a subset of a broader theory, and that it is possible to remove a large amount of wiki-redundancy by merging associated articles, a merge should occur.

With that in mind, we can certainly talk about burden of proof if you like. And no, in intellectual discourse it is not “nearly always incumbent on the individual seeking change to accept the burden of proof”. It is instead incumbent on the individual positing the additional premise. I would argue that in this case that is you. Specifically, you are essentially claiming that there is an extra SDO; an SDO that is a personality construct in addition to the one that is tied to SDT. Now, you have made a myriad of comments about the reality of your SDT-SDO independence, about the general state of the field, about what sort of Wikipedia article is useful to you, and about the utility of separating personality research and social psychological research (the last of which, incidentally, I disagree with wholeheartedly). And sure, you might be right, but Wikipedia isn’t 'Burressd’s opinions on stuff'. It is instead an encyclopedia that reflects the current state of knowledge as espoused in reputable sources. As such, either back up your opinions or keep them to yourself.

Turning back to those reputable sources then, I will repeat that they indicate that...

• SDO was developed as a part of SDT.
• SDO is still discussed as part of SDT.

Looking past your multiple misrepresentations of the literature (which to your credit you did own), the only actual source that you have provided that speaks to your perspective is Pratto et al. (2006) and there we disagree on the interpretation. I think you are intentionally ignoring the greater context of the article (where SDO is clearly described as intimately related to SDT) and abusing the author’s modicum of linguistic flare by opting for an inappropriately literal interpretation. I don’t, however, see the need to push this point with you. I am instead happy to have other editors to weigh in on this.

I think that covers everything from me. Cheers Andrew (talk) 13:30, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

If social dominance orientation is a mainstream measure, accepted outside adherents of social dominance theory, then it certainly deserves its own article. If SDO is only really just part of SDT, then a merge would be fine but not required. It is a somewhat complicated subtopic which works coherently as a separate article. Social dominance orientation claims that it is a "widely used" measure, but I'm not convinced. The article could use some citations and more context to establish what sociologists and psychologists generally think about it.

For now, I'm removing the merge tags because there's no strong consensus to merge. Any overlap editors see between the articles should probably be dealt with by moving material between articles and cross-referencing as appropriate. -- Beland (talk) 17:40, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

References

References

Redundant SDT material in the SDO article

Related to the merger discussion but logically distinct, as a matter of economy I would suggest that much of the SDT material in the SDO article ought to be replaced with a brief summary and reference to the SDT article. Burressd (talk) 18:05, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Bad citation removed, Need for better criticism section, and other of my recent edits

• Study.com says SDT formulated in 1999?!? This is a bad cite. Obviously the 1992 paper explicitly described the theory. My bet is that study.com site typo'd, but in any case it is wrong, and in my upcoming edit I will simply cite Sidanius et al 1992 instead. --J JMesserly (talk) 02:28, 10 September 2020 (UTC)
• I am not familiar with any collected survey of criticisms of SDT other than that I saw scattered about in the Pratto2006 article. My problem is that, with two decades of research using SDO and SDT concepts after the appearance of the SDT book- I have a hard time believing that the Wilson2003 article is representative of current criticism of SDT. It's not just my skepticism that Wilson and Liu would make the same claims, but that is a place to start. For example, the point on not acknowledging the contribution of SIT is hard to fathom, given that Sidanius1992 explicitly credited it as an important influence. If someone more knowledgeable in this area thinks that the list of authors that Pratto2006 responds to is the best collection, then I will try and read and summarize some of these critical views. If an alternative survey is available, then any pointers would be appreciated. --J JMesserly (talk) 07:00, 10 September 2020 (UTC)
• As noted by Henri above in 2007, the links between RWA and Duckitt are weak. The prior article assigned great weight to Duckitt in relationship to Authoritarianism research, and after reviewing Duckitt's major articles, I agree that there is enormous need for an authoritarianism theory section mentioning things such as the RWA - SDO paired studies and their impact on theory. However the original author of the Duckitt section made claims about what Duckitt thought that are either contradicted or not supported by the literature. Duckitt made important contributions deserving mention in the article, but they are different than those made. My edits and future edits will reflect this, and I will make ample citations so that future editors may further polish or correct errors of interpretation of the the papers. J JMesserly (talk) 22:35, 20 September 2020 (UTC)

Criteria for deciding if material belongs in SDT vs. SDO article

When looking at new SD material that belongs in Wikipedia, what sort of questions should contributors be asking to determine whether it belongs in the SDO vs SDT article? My non expert observation is that SDO is a metric used outside the area of SDT research, and by many who are not either not social dominance theory adherents or are not particularly interested in expanding that particular theory. In response to this instrumentalized use of SDO, my current editing practice is to confine to the SDO article discussion focusing on SDO flavors, methodology, and how it is being used across different sociological and neuroscience studies. How particular SDO based studies back up particular SDT hypotheses belongs in the SDT article. If there are objections or refinements to this sort of split, I'd be very much interested to hear them.--J JMesserly (talk) 07:00, 14 September 2020 (UTC)