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arXiv · 2604.12314

Racial Comparability in Authoritarianism Scales: Latent Beliefs or Biased Measurement?

Bang Quan Zheng
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Abstract

Racial differences in authoritarianism are widely used to explain variation in political attitudes, yet it is unclear whether they reflect true latent differences or measurement artifacts. Using anchor-based multi-group confirmatory factor analysis across multiple nationally representative surveys, this paper examines measurement equivalence in the standard child-rearing authoritarianism battery. We find systematic differences in how respondents use response categories across groups. Accounting for this non-invariance alters but does not eliminate racial differences in authoritarianism; African Americans continue to exhibit higher latent authoritarianism under partial scalar invariance. However, conventional multi-item scales substantially attenuate the association between authoritarianism and policy attitudes. These results show that measurement non-invariance is not merely a technical concern but can meaningfully shape substantive inferences about racial differences and their political consequences, underscoring the importance of explicit measurement modeling in studies of public opinion and political behavior.

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Bang Quan Zheng. 2026-04-14. Racial Comparability in Authoritarianism Scales: Latent Beliefs or Biased Measurement?. https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.12314

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