Question

Item-Total Statistics
	Scale Mean if Item Deleted	Scale Variance if Item Deleted	Corrected Item-Total Correlation	Cronbach's Alpha if Item Deleted
ta1	15.51	28.970	.324	.736
ta2	16.18	24.955	.584	.664
ta3	16.36	25.456	.534	.679
ta4	16.48	27.008	.451	.703
ta5	16.41	25.384	.585	.665
ta8	15.05	26.253	.372	.731

We usually run reliability analyses by removing items till we get excellent or good alphas that follow George and Mallory's (2003) rule. What are the items on the most reliable Tolerance of Ambiguity scale have now? What is the biggest drawback of this approach of removing items

Answer 1

(A) tolerance of ambiguity is not a generalized personality trait, but rather, that expressions of ambiguity tolerance are content specific. The findings suggest that, in comparison to the Attitudinal Ambiguity Tolerance scale, personality measures may be inaccurate predictors of ambiguity tolerance in specific content domains.

Budner’s scale was correlated with rankings of individuals on the basis of short biographies, peer ratings, and measures of conventionality, belief in divine power, attendence at religious services, dogmatism about religious beliefs and attitudes to censorship. The total scale also correlated positively with authoritarianism, idealism of and submission to parents, Machiavellianism, career choice in medical students etc. Not all the correlations were significant but they were sufficiently consistent to suggest that the measure had content, concurrent and construct validity. The items are also argued to be confounded by reference to specific situation, which may elicit misleading reactions.Not all the correlations were significant and most were in the 0.20 to 0.40 range .

Budner saw TA as a “non-specific” trait that does not lead to specific behaviours or evaluations that are not manifestations of TA itself.The interest in TA seems to have shifted from differential and social psychologist to clinical and organisational psychologists who see it as measure of adaptation and healthy functioning.

It would appear that an individuals ambiguity tolerance and the need for structure are highly inversely correlated - the higher the level of tolerance for ambiguity the less structure an individual needs. However this can cause problems with individuals for which structure helps them function efficiently.

Having an intolerance of ambiguity means that an individual tends to perceive situations as threatening rather than promising. ... High scores indicate a greater intolerance for ambiguity.

(b) drawback:-

•Too much tolerance of ambiguity can have a damaging effect.

•People can become “wishy-washy,” accepting virtually every proposition before them, not efficiently subsuming necessary facts into their cognitive organizational structure.

•Such excess tolerance has the effects of hampering or preventing meaningful subsumption of ideas.