Why are people ‘Lying Flat’? Personal relative deprivation suppresses self‐improvement motivation

Abstract

The ‘Lying Flat’ mindset refers to people's low intention to self‐improvement. We hypothesized that personal relative deprivation (PRD), the negative consequence of social comparisons, is one of the reasons that might harm individuals' self‐improvement motivations. In study 1 (N = 313), we found that PRD negatively predicted self‐improvement after controlling for various confounding variables. This result is confirmed in study 2a (N = 3399) and 2b (N = 3219) by using a national representative sample. Furthermore, Study 2a found that the effect of PRD on self‐improvement was mediated by the system‐justifying belief (SJB). In study 3 (N = 160), we experimentally demonstrated that PRD harms self‐improvement and persistence via its effect on SJB. The higher PRD people experienced, the less they endorsed the SJB, which thereby reduced self‐improvement. Taken together, this research manifested that not only would PRD affect people's social beliefs (e.g. SJB) but also hinder self‐improvement motivations.

Youth participation in governance in China: The roles of perceived responsibility and political efficacy

“…Research has also suggested that Chinese Generation Zers possess strong innovative and transformative capabilities in participating in social governance (Li, 2019). On the other hand, along with China's economic rise, “lying flat” [躺平], which depicts the life choice of youth barely being motivated to self‐improvement or giving up active roles in society to avoid intense competition (Zheng et al, 2022; Zhou, 2022), has become a popular term among the younger generation. It is possible that some Generation Zers deliberately chose not to take action to participate actively.…”