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Relationships Between Ethnicity, Attitudes Toward Institutional Authority, And Hope In The African American Community, Garnadette Stuckey

Dissertations

Abstract

A set of two mixed method studies were conducted to examine attitudes toward institutional authority and to understand how the presence of societal authority and oppression can impact individual and community capacity for hope and full freedom. Researchers have discussed concepts such as attitudes to authority, suggesting that some individuals are naturally more resistant to authority (Rigby, 1985). However, in the United States, racial disparities are great, particularly when the “authority” is a police officer in an urban community and the individual is African American. In African American communities in the U.S., interactions with authority figures begin in childhood. …