Perceiving a Lack of Social Justice: Lower Class Individuals Apply Higher Moral Standards to Others

Wang, Xue; Chen, Zhansheng; Poon, Kai Tak; Jiang, Tianyun

doi:10.1177/1948550619898558

Cited by 7 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…Rather, the present results, including the moderating impact of zero-sum beliefs, underline the flexibility of moral cognition. They resonate with findings that self-serving double standards are eliminated when people perceive justice as restored or experience guilt (Polman & Ruttan, 2012;Wang et al, 2021). Highly sensitive to characteristics of the situation, persons, and their relationships, (double) moral standards thus appear highly functional in regulating valued social relationships versus individual self-interest.…”

Section: Contributions To Research On Moral Judgmentsupporting

confidence: 67%

Other-serving double standards: People show moral hypercrisy in close relationships

Weiß

Burgmer

2021

Journal of Social and Personal Relationships

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Extending research on self-serving double moral standards (hypocrisy), we examine the reverse pattern of other-serving hypercrisy toward close relationship partners. In three studies ( N = 1,019), for various imagined transgressions, people made more lenient moral judgments for their close friends (Studies 1 & 2) and romantic partners (Study 3) compared to themselves. This hypercrisy effect emerged both for transgressions toward third parties (Study 1) and toward each other (i.e., within the relationship; Studies 2 & 3). Moreover, it was moderated by perceptions of the relationship: Participants who more strongly believed their relationship to be a zero-sum game (i.e., needs can only be met competitively) showed greater leniency for themselves and attenuated hypercrisy for mutual transgressions (Studies 2 & 3). Investigating people’s close others rather than strangers as targets of moral judgment thus suggests that other-serving hypercrisy is more prevalent than previously thought, but sensitive to people’s conceptualizations of their relationships.

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Section: Contributions To Research On Moral Judgmentsupporting

confidence: 67%

Other-serving double standards: People show moral hypercrisy in close relationships

Weiß

Burgmer

2021

Journal of Social and Personal Relationships

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“…The extant literature on double standards has mainly paid attention to the morality domain, in which people make judgements about behaviours that violate a set of obligatory virtues (e.g., Lammers et al., 2010; Polman & Ruttan, 2012; Valdesolo & DeSteno, 2008; Wang et al., 2021; Weiss et al., 2018). The current research focused on policy implementation in a public crisis and still found evidence of inconsistent standards for the self and others.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It is a common phenomenon that has been observed in the domain of morality (Graham et al., 2015). For instance, people think of themselves as more acceptable than others are when they engage in the same misconduct (Polman & Ruttan, 2012; Valdesolo & DeSteno, 2008; Wang et al., 2021; Warach et al., 2019; Weiss et al., 2018). Similarly, people judge others more harshly than they judge themselves for the same sexually unfaithful behaviour (Warach, Josephs, & Gorman, 2019).…”

Section: Double Standards Amid Covid‐19mentioning

confidence: 99%

Double standards in the COVID‐19 pandemic: The moderation of perceived threat

Wang

Jiang

et al. 2022

Euro J Social Psych

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This research explored whether people hold double standards in a public crisis. We proposed that during the COVID‐19 pandemic, people required others to strictly follow self‐quarantine rules and other preventive behaviors, whereas they themselves would not, demonstrating double standards. Moreover, this effect would be moderated by the perceived threat from the pandemic. Using data collected in the United States and China, three studies ( N = 2,180) tested the hypotheses by measuring (Study 1) and manipulating the perceived threat (Studies 2 and 3). We found that people generally applied higher standards to others than to themselves when it came to following the self‐quarantine rules. This effect was strong when a relatively low threat was perceived, but the self–other difference disappeared when the perceived threat was relatively high, as the demands they placed on themselves would increase as the perceived threat intensified, but their requirements of others would be constantly strict. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved

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“…In contrast, low social class individuals tend to hold stricter moral standards than high social class individuals: They are more opposed to freedom of self‐expression and choice, especially in the areas of abortion, divorce, and sexual morality (Lamont, 2000). Besides, individuals in low social classes might feel more unfairly disadvantaged, which would further make them apply stricter moral standards in judging others (Wang et al., 2021).…”

Section: Main Effects Of Self Social Class and Target Social Class On...mentioning

confidence: 99%

The interactive effect between self social class and target social class on moral judgements

Yang

Xue

Hou

et al. 2022

Asian J of Social Psycho

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The gap between the rich and the poor is growing, and moral judgements between the rich and the poor will greatly affect their interaction and social stability. Based on subjective group dynamics theory, the current research leveraged two studies to test the interactive effect between self social class and target social class on moral judgements, and explored one important boundary of this interactive effect. The results of Study 1 showed that participants tended to make a stricter moral judgement on a target of the same social class as themselves than on a target of a different social class. The results of Study 2 further showed that people from the same social class and the same university judged each other with stricter moral standards; in contrast, people from the same social class but different universities did not use stricter moral standards. Therefore, individuals would make stricter moral judgements on people from the same social class as themselves, but make looser judgements on people from different social classes. This phenomenon only occurred when the participants and the target came from the same well-defined groups instead of different well-defined groups. Finally, the implications and limitations of this research were discussed.

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Perceiving a Lack of Social Justice: Lower Class Individuals Apply Higher Moral Standards to Others

Cited by 7 publications

References 40 publications

Other-serving double standards: People show moral hypercrisy in close relationships

Other-serving double standards: People show moral hypercrisy in close relationships

Double standards in the COVID‐19 pandemic: The moderation of perceived threat

The interactive effect between self social class and target social class on moral judgements

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