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The aim of this study is to understand the effect of asymmetric social comparison on subjective well-being, and how it differs due to reciprocity. Our approach considers the social network of individuals as a local reference group. We tested competing hypotheses on negative and positive effects of comparison with worse-off (downward) and better-off (upward) targets with a representative sample of 1,596 Chileans over the age of 18.The findings support that life satisfaction is influenced by social comparison. By considering the social network as a reference group, the positive effect of downward comparison and the negative effect of upward comparison are confirmed. Upward comparison seems to be more substantial than downward comparison. Additionally, the positive effect of downward comparison decreases slightly with a reciprocal exchange of support between respondents and targets. The application of social network analysis opens a path to understanding the mechanisms underlying social comparison processes. Key wordsHappiness; reciprocity; social networks; asymmetric social comparison.3 This study has a threefold aim. First, to estimate the effect that comparison with relevant acquaintances, as identified by each subject, has on the own life satisfaction. Second, to understand how these comparisons work in relation to better or worse-off reference groups (upward and downward comparison, respectively). And third, to examine the influence that reciprocity with those relevant others has on this social comparison. By reciprocity, we understand the mutual exchange of support between the individual and their comparison targets, who are members of their social network. This threefold aim enables us to discuss the theoretical equivalence between the definitions of reference groups for social comparisons. Happiness research has used a wide variety of reference groups, such as classmates (Dijkstra, Kuyper, van der Werf, Buunk and van der Zee, 2008), colleagues (Gätcher, Nosenzo and Sefton, 2012; Gätcher and Thöni, 2010), and proximity of residence in the same city (Götz, Ehret, Jullien and Hall, 2006). However, research on the local dominance effect has shown the preeminence of closer targets in social comparison processes when multiple resources are available (Zell and Alicke, 2010). Despite this wide range of groups, social networks have not so far been considered. To our knowledge, this the first study considering social networks as the reference group of comparison. As we shall see later, the social network is the closest social surrounding of each individual and eventually, a more accessible, concrete, and suitable cognitive reference of comparison.Moreover, this study attempts to understand the cognitive basis of the social comparison process.Previous studies (Ateca-Amestoy et al., 2014;Senik, 2008;McBride, 2001) have been grounded in the analysis of the material life circumstances of a reference group, mainly income. Discussions on income reference groups are a growing field of research with a broad perspective. Senik...

Different research traditions have long held that parental beliefs motivate children’s performance. However, regarding meritocratic beliefs, sociologists often argue that meritocratic narratives legitimize and make sense of societal inequalities as justly deserved. Using the case of China, I tested these competing hypotheses of the relationship between parental meritocratic beliefs and children’s educational achievement. Parental beliefs about skills and hard work as predictors of higher grades were used. I analyzed data from the first and second waves of the China Educational Panel Survey. Autoregressive cross-lagged structural models indicated that parental meritocratic beliefs do not affect children’s educational performance but, rather, meritocratic beliefs are affected by academic results, suggesting their justificatory role. This pattern is much sharper in rural China, where traditional Chinese culture is preserved. The implications of meritocratic beliefs for a broader discussion of citizens’ beliefs about social inequalities and stratification are discussed.

Este artículo busca comprender los mecanismos que permiten la construcción de confianza de las comunidades hacia las compañías extractivas, y cómo las propias características de los individuos moderan la elaboración de juicios de confianza a partir de la evaluación del desempeño social y económico de las empresas. Para ello, se presenta un estudio de caso con base en encuestas factoriales en la comunidad de Pozo Almonte en la primera región de Chile. Dado lo anterior, se concluye que las licencias sociales para operar, que se podrían obtener de la confianza hacia la organización, dependen en último término de la benevolencia e integridad de las empresas, ya que en escenarios de desempeño social negativos, el desempeño económico no genera confianza.

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Recibido 10 de junio de 2013 • Corregido 11 de julio de 2013 • Aceptado 31 de julio de 2013Este artículo presenta la evaluación del programa Yo aprendo y emprendo ejecutado en la ciudad de Antofagasta, Chile. El programa tiene como objetivo contribuir al desarrollo de jóvenes estudiantes a través de la entrega de herramientas que les permitan incorporar el espíritu emprendedor como actitud de vida y formación. Se realizó una evaluación de impacto mediante Propensity Score Matching, a una muestra de 150 estudiantes de cinco escuelas secundarias. En general, la evaluación sugiere que el programa tiene un efecto positivo sobre el puntaje obtenido por los estudiantes en la prueba de imaginación creativa y las subpruebas de creatividad narrativa y creatividad gráfica.

OBJECTIVES. Citizen complaints are considered by policing researchers as an indicator of police misconduct, and a proxy of police-community relations. Nevertheless, US and EU-based studies tend to focus on sustained complaints as reported by official agencies and officer-based correlates. Using the case of Carabineros, the Chilean militarized police force, this study examines (a) latent topics contained in a large set of complaints against the police on a digital platform, and (b) the change of those topics across time and (c) by complainants’ educational level.METHODS. We use novel computational natural language processing techniques to identify latent themes across the corpus of complaints (N=1,623), hosted on an online forum from 2013 to 2020. RESULTS. Our findings show eight latent themes across the corpus. Among others, these themes were related to police effectiveness, police misbehavior, and a master frame of institutional crisis that has significantly grown over the last year. Additionally, differences in the prevalence of topics by complainants’ educational level were also found.CONCLUSIONS. Thus, the findings contribute to the enterprise of opening the black box of complaints against the police and highlighting opportunities for social accountability in a developing country.

The aim of this study is to understand the effect of asymmetric social comparison on subjective well-being, and how it differs due to reciprocity. Our approach considers the social network of individuals as a local reference group. We tested competing hypotheses on negative and positive effects of comparison with worse-off (downward) and better-off (upward) targets with a representative sample of 1,596 Chileans over the age of 18. The findings support that life satisfaction is influenced by social comparison. By considering the social network as a reference group, the positive effect of downward comparison and the negative effect of upward comparison are confirmed. Upward comparison seems to be more substantial than downward comparison. Additionally, the positive effect of downward comparison decreases slightly with a reciprocal exchange of support between respondents and targets. The application of social network analysis opens a path to understanding the mechanisms underlying social comparison processes.