Studies in Social Attitudes: I. Variations in Latitudes of Acceptance and Rejection as a Function of Varying Positions on a Controversial Social Issue

Studies in Social Attitudes: III. Attitude Assessment Through the Semantic-Differential Technique

“…A s stated in the introduction, subjects with a moderate stand towards Arab unity (those checking Positions D, E, or F as "most acceptable" from a good-bad continuum of nine statements-A to I ) were found to reject a significantly greater number of statements than they accepted. Such a n unexpected finding for moderate subjects was previously accounted for in terms of the strong commitment to the moderate stand exhibited by the majority of moderate subjects ( 1 ) . In addition to this explanation, the use of several semanticdifferential evaluation scales has helped to shed more light on the behavior of moderate subjects.…”

“…T h e use of the semantic-differential technique was intended, among other things, to provide further clarifications for some of the unexpected findings concerning moderate subjects, reached in earlier studies (1,2). A s stated in the introduction, subjects with a moderate stand towards Arab unity (those checking Positions D, E, or F as "most acceptable" from a good-bad continuum of nine statements-A to I ) were found to reject a significantly greater number of statements than they accepted.…”

“…T h e results presented in Table 1 show a comparison of the information that can be obtained from using scales representative of various factors of meaning to that which was obtained on the same subjects in a n earlier study, using the Sherif-Hovland technique (1). About 62 per cent of the subjects that were considered previously as moderates ( a t positions, D, E, and F ) on the evaluative dimension turned out, as shown by their mean evaluative ratings [see Table 11, to be either strongly for or strongly against Arab unity rather than moderates.…”

“…O u r present interest was in selecting scales with high loadings on the evaluative factor for the Arabic language and in the use of such scales (consisting of pairs of adjectival opposites) as a basis for judging the concept "Arab unity." Such scales, representing the evaluative factor, as well as other scales representing other factors in the semantic space for our Arab subjects, were available in a mimeographed report by Osgood, Archer, and Miron (4) ; hence the present study will make use of a number of semanticdifferential scales, representing the evaluative as well as other factors of meaning, in an attempt to clarify some of the unexpected findings concerning moderate subjects (1,2 ) and to throw more light on the meaning of "Arab unity" to extreme pro-Arab unity as well as to extreme anti-Arab unity subjects.…”

Studies in Social Attitudes: II. Selectivity in Mass Communication Media as a Function of Attitude—Medium Discrepancy

“…T h e same sample used in a recent study by the author ( 1 ) was utilized in this study. It consisted of 260 undergraduate Arab students at the American University of Beirut (198 males and 62 females) with a mean age of 20% years.…”