Need: I am looking for a question that would measure how likely someone is to have a negative view of authority. Specifically, I am looking at medical authority, but I am also interested in measuring general anti-authoritarian attitudes. I could design/adapt my question, but I know using those already shown to have validity/reliability is generally better.
Process:
I found this article
Hawbaker, Amelia, Jacqueline Y. Paiz, Brandon L. Crawford, Ronna C. Turner, and Kristen N. Jozkowski. 2023. “Medicine and Abortion: Public Trust in Medical Authority and Americans’ Acceptance of Legal Abortion.” SSM. Qualitative Research in Health 4:100361-. doi: 10.1016/j.ssmqr.2023.100361.
I then went to see how they might have measured public trust in medical authority. I didn't get a good sense from the article the question(s) they asked. Link to article here: https://www-sciencedirect-com.proxy.library.vanderbilt.edu/science/article/pii/S2667321523001452#mmc1
But the article's references did point me to this:
Pescosolido, Bernice A., Steven A. Tuch, and Jack K. Martin. 2001. “The Profession of Medicine and the Public: Examining Americans’ Changing Confidence in Physician Authority from the Beginning of the ‘Health Care Crisis’ to the Era of Health Care Reform.” Journal of Health and Social Behavior 42(1):1–16. doi: 10.2307/3090224.
Link to article for more information: https://catalog.library.vanderbilt.edu/permalink/01VAN_INST/11nigse/cdi_proquest_miscellaneous_70849257
Among other data sets, they use GSS to measure confidence in physicians and medicine
"s. First, while public confidence in physicians remains relatively high, we document a crystallization of attitudes reflecting greater negative and fewer positive sentiments. Second, while neither the structure of attitudes nor the role of sociodemographic characteristics in explaining attitudes has significantly shifted over time, in 1998 health status and insurance status are correlated with negative attitudes. Third, using General Social Survey time trend data on the confidence in medicine compared to other professions (science and education), we find support for a general public response to social institutions, with confidence in medicine tracking closely with confidence in science in level, and education in pattern. We end with four possible explanations of our findings, including and a general discussion of the role of the public in the professional status of physicians and its implications for social change in the institution of medicine"
A more recent article
Zheng, Hui. 2015. “Losing Confidence in Medicine in an Era of Medical Expansion?” Social Science Research 52:701–15. doi: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2014.10.009.
Abstract: Has the expansion of the medical field inspired more or less confidence in medicine among the American public? This study investigates how confidence in medicine has changed over the past three decades, whether this trend is uniform across social groups and which aspects of medicine are most affected. Data are from repeated cross-sectional U.S. General Social Surveys spanning the years 1973–2008, including the 2002 Doctors and Patients Module and the 1998 Pressing Issues in Health and Medical Care Module. Americans’ confidence in medicine has declined continuously over the past three decades, and the extent of this decline did not vary by gender, age group, cohort, or income level. Analysis of differences across socio-demographic groups suggests that confidence in medicine is related to trust in doctors’ ethics but different from obedience to doctors’ authority. Therefore, the downward trend in confidence in medicine may suggest a decline in public trust in doctors’ ethics, but not necessarily a decline in obedience to doctors’ authority.
3.2. Measures
3.2.1. Confidence in medicine
Since 1973, the GSS has collected data about public confidence in medicine. Respondents were asked, ‘‘As far as the people running [the institution of medicine] are concerned, would you say you have a great deal of confidence, only some confidence, or hardly any confidence at all in them?’’ In the pooled sample including all 25 waves, about 48% of respondents reported having ‘‘a great deal of confidence;’’ 44% reported having ‘‘only some confidence;’’ and 8% reported having ‘‘hardly any confidence’’ in medicine. The proportion of the population who reported ‘‘a great deal of confidence’’ in medicine has decreased from 54% in 1973 and 62% in 1974 to 39% in 2008.
This link is a link to variables in ICPSR paired with the question asked (e.g. I trust my doctor's judgments about my medical care. I prefer to rely on my doctor's knowledge and not try to find out about my condition on my own.)
https://www.icpsr.umich.edu/web/ICPSR/studies/35536/variables?q=doctor
Others:
M7.CONFIDENCE IN MEDICINE
(Would you say you have a great deal of confidence, only some confidence, or hardly any confidence at all in the people running) medicine?
Taken from: Survey of Consumer Attitudes and Behavior, June 2004.
CONFIDENCE IN MEDICINE
As far as the people running these institutions are concerned, would you say you have a great deal of confidence, only some confidence, or hardly any confidence at all in them? Medicine
Taken from: General Social Survey, 2012 Merged Data, Including a Cultural Module [United States].
I found these by using the variable search in ICPSR. https://www.icpsr.umich.edu/web/pages/ICPSR/ssvd/
Things like doctor, confidence, trust, medicine
I would then limit to surveys/series for the United States, like GSS.
I also did a big control F (find) in the GSS Code book to see what was there. I'm attaching it. It's huge, so you definitely want to use your computers find feature
All this to say, when I look at articles that talk about people's attitudes toward medical authority, they seem to mention GSS and the questions about confidence.
