Personal Belief in a Just World and Conscientiousness: A meta-analysis, facet-level examination, and mediation model

Justice for me and for all: Longitudinal analysis of justice perceptions across demographic indicators

Most research on justice perceptions stems from high-income contexts, even though most youth grow up in contexts of inequality and injustice. This study examines the development of justice perceptions in 659 Brazilian adolescents (51.3% male; 45.2% White) in São Paulo across 3 years, ages 12, 13, and 14. Perceptions of justice of the world declined with age and perceived justice in one's personal life differed across ethnic, economic, and educational groups. Privileged groups differentiated more between their evaluations of the world and their personal lives. K-means clustering revealed five trajectories of justice beliefs, which significantly differed across school type, race/ethnicity, and income levels. Evidence suggests that personal belief in a just world reflects known social group inequalities.

Belief in a just world and organisational loyalty: Trust as an underlying mechanism

This research examined whether employees' personal belief in a just world (BJW) is associated with their organisational loyalty and whether this relationship is statistically mediated by organisational trust. To test these hypotheses, we conducted two studies with employees from China (study 1, N = 314) and Germany (study 2, N = 189). The results from both studies supported the proposed model. In addition, study 2 revealed that the relationship between BJW and organisational loyalty persisted when controlling for global personality traits. These suggest that managers and organisations may increase employees' loyalty by providing an environment that fosters their sense of justice and trust.

The Mechanism of Cumulative Ecological Risk Affecting College Students' Sense of Social Responsibility: The Double Fugue Effect of Belief in a Just World and Empathy

According to bioecological theory, the development of college students' social responsibility is affected by the cumulative effect of ecological risks. However, research on the impact of cumulative ecological risk on social responsibility and its potential mechanisms are still lacking. Carol Gilligan (1982) proposed that the ethics of care and justice are like two related but independent melodies, which together constitute the whole of moral psychology. However, despite being an important part of moral psychology, social responsibility has rarely been investigated empirically with regards to the psychological mechanisms of justice and caring orientation. Therefore, the current study had 1607 college students complete questionnaires regarding cumulative ecological risk, social responsibility, belief in a just world, and empathy, aiming to explore the impact of cumulative ecological risk on college students' sense of social responsibility and the mediating roles of belief in a just world and empathy. Results showed that: (1) cumulative ecological risk was significantly negatively correlated with college students' sense of social responsibility, belief in a just world, and empathy, whereas social responsibility, belief in a just world, and empathy were significantly positively correlated; (2) belief in a just world and empathy played mediating roles in the relationship between cumulative ecological risk and social responsibility. The results also showed that the development of college students' sense of social responsibility was affected by the cumulative ecological risk from various directions; this influence was also seen to play a role in the motivation system of social responsibility through the ethics of care with empathy as the important part, as well as through the ethics of justice. The results suggest that we should reduce the ecological risks at their source, and improve and consolidate students' social support systems; moreover, we should not only enhance college students' sense of mission and responsibility to consciously maintain social justice order, but also adopt empathy training as a part of the curriculum to improve students' empathy at the individual level.

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

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.

The relationship between just world belief and wellbeing, cheating behaviors, and academic work behaviors during COVID 19 among university students

Is the belief in a just world among students also stable under COVID-19? To answer this question, a study was conducted with university students from Germany (n = 291). The aim of the study was to analyze the predictive performance of the personal belief in a just world (PBJW) on students' life satisfaction and academic cheating and to take into account important mediators from the university context such as fellow student justice, lecturer justice, and procrastination. Derived from existing research, university students with a stronger PBJW should be more satisfied with their lives and cheat less than those with a weaker PBJW. The results support the hypothesized direct effects of PBJW on life satisfaction. Procrastination additionally mediated the effect of PBJW on life satisfaction. The level of PBJW predicted academic cheating only indirectly. The mediators procrastination and lecturer justice were crucial here. The results persisted when gender, learning, time to exam, socially desirable responding, general BJW, and self-efficacy were controlled. The findings were discussed in relation to the stressful situation caused by COVID-19. A reflection on the adaptive function of PBJW as a resource and relevant situation-specific mediators for university research and practice followed.

Can Personality Traits Predict Depression during the COVID-19 Pandemic?

The emotional costs of the COVID-19 pandemic have raised concerns among clinicians and scholars. The goal of the current study was to test whether or not neuroticism, conscientiousness, and personal belief in a just world are associated with depression during the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, the contribution of neuroticism and conscientiousness was assessed over and above demographic variables and COVID-19 perceptions, and the unique contribution of personal belief in a just world was evaluated beyond all the other study variables. Samples were collected in three different countries-Israel (N = 917), Germany (N = 213), and India (N = 160). Online self-report questionnaires were utilized to measure age, gender, COVID-19 perceptions (probability, severity, and self-efficacy), neuroticism, conscientiousness, personal belief in a just world, and depression. The findings indicated that, across the three countries, neuroticism was positively associated with depression (correlations ranging from .24 to .44), and conscientiousness and personal belief in a just world were negatively associated with depression (correlations ranging from - .31 to - .21, and from - .35 to - .23, respectively). Moreover, neuroticism and conscientiousness explained unique variance over and above demographic variables and COVID-19 perceptions (except conscientiousness in India), and the effect of personal belief in a just world on depression was significant beyond the effects of all other study variables. These findings support the role of personality in explaining depression regardless of situational characteristics and stress the role of just world beliefs as protective factors against negative emotions.