Development a Measurement of Attitudes about Ideal Government

Abstract

Objective. Develop a questionnaire to measure attitudes about ideal government and analyze the psychometric properties of this tool. Background. Psychological studies showed the key role of political attitudes (conservatism/liberalism) in different forms of political activity. Conservatism-liberalism dichotomy did not correspond with actual political “agenda” in Russia that induced the question about the structure of political attitudes. Study design. To indicate the attitudes about ideal government, an online survey was conducted. The structure of political attitudes was analysed through confirmatory factor analysis, and analyses of reliability, validity, and invariance. Participants. The research consisted of 2 independent studies. About 610 participants took part at the study 1 (353 men and 257 women) over 18 years old (M=34.28; SD=13.82); and 378 participants (196 men and 182 women) over 18 years old (M=35.26; SD=10.54) at the study 2. Methods. Russian-language versions of the scales of Needs for cognitive clousure, Openness to experience (“Big Five”), Right-wing Authoritarianism, System Justification, and the author’s questionnaire of attitudes about an ideal government. Additionally, participants completed the self-categoriaiton scales about political orientations (“left-right”; “liberal-conservatives”). Results. The structure of attitudes about the ideal government consisted of “respect” and “support”. “Political respect” was correspondent to “liberal” and “left-wing” self-identification that indicated the criterion validity. At the same time, the analysis of convergent validity showed that “respect” and “support” were linked with right-wing authoritarianism and need for cognitive clousure. Conclusions. The structure of political attitudes in Russia consisted of “governmental support” and “political respect”. The current perspective discussed in the context of liberal/conservative political orientations.

Keywords

• political attitudes
• “ideal government”
• conservatism
• liberalism
• political respect