Just-World Beliefs, System Justification, and Their Relationship with People's Health-Related Well-Being: A Narrative Review

Beliefs about a social system help people understand and evaluate their environment and are related to their behavior within a society. When people believe that they live in a just social system and develop positive attitudes about the social and political environment, they experience greater satisfaction and well-being. This phenomenon is known as a palliative effect. Two theoretical approaches that explain support for social and political systems are the beliefs in a just world and system justification approaches. The objective of this review was to analyze the literature published between 2019 and 2023 that addressed the associations of beliefs in a just world and system justification with health-related well-being. The search yielded 2064 potentially eligible articles, 26 of which were ultimately selected. The results showed that beliefs in a just world are associated with a more positive perception of the world and better health outcomes. In addition, people with a greater propensity to justify the system experience higher levels of health-related well-being. This positive association is consistently observed across different social groups and contexts. These findings support the phenomenon of palliative effects attributable to beliefs in a just world and system justification.

System-justifying beliefs buffer against psychological distress during the COVID-19 pandemic

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had a detrimental effect on people's mental health. Drawing on the palliative function of ideologies, we suggest that people rely on system-justifying beliefs to mitigate psychological distress during the pandemic. We conducted three studies with correlational and experimental designs to examine whether and how system-justifying beliefs can buffer against psychological distress during COVID-19, and whether this effect may vary across social classes. The results indicated that (a) system-justifying beliefs alleviated psychological distress during the pandemic, (b) personal control mediated this relationship and (c) this effect was consistent across all social classes. This study provides robust evidence for the palliative function of system-justifying beliefs during a massive global health crisis (i.e. COVID-19).

Impacts of Unethical Behavior on Self-Esteem: A Contingent Dual-Process Model

Previous studies have reported mixed findings on how and why unethical behavior affects self-esteem. To address this issue, a contingent dual-process model is proposed and tested. The model postulates a negative impact of unethical behavior on self-esteem through decreased morality, a positive effect through increased competence, and the relative strength of these two paths depending on system-justifying motives. Studies using unethical behavior for self-interest (Studies 1 and 2), involving ingroup interest (Study 3), and measuring (Studies 1 and 3) and manipulating general system justification (Study 2) provide support for the model. By identifying the effects of system-justifying motives and linking the two competing paths, the model reconciles inconsistencies in previous research regarding how self-esteem is influenced by unethical behavior and reveals the underlying mechanism of this association. Accordingly, the current research constructs a motivational and superordinate framework to clarify the dynamic consequences of unethical behavior.

A Longitudinal Test of the Conservative-Liberal Well-Being Gap

In this article, we test if conservatism predicts psychological well-being longitudinally. We based the study on previous findings showing that conservatives score higher on different measures of well-being, such as life satisfaction and happiness. Most explanations in the literature have assumed that conservatism antecedes well-being without considering the alternative-that well-being may predict conservatism. In Study 1, using multilevel cross-lagged panel models with a two-wave longitudinal sample consisting of data from 19 countries (N = 8,740), we found that conservatism did not predict well-being over time. We found similar results in Study 2 (N = 2,554), using random-intercept cross-lagged panel models with a four-wave longitudinal sample from Chile. We discuss the main implications of these results for the literature examining the association between conservatism and well-being.

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 Income Inequality and the Palliative Function of Meritocracy Belief: The Micro- and the Macro-Levels Both Count

In the current paper, we report the analysis of the relationship between meritocracy belief and subjective well-being using two large international databases, the European Social Survey Program (N = 44,387) and the European Values Study Program (N = 51,752), involving data gathered from 36 countries in total. We investigated whether low status individuals are more likely to psychologically benefit from endorsing meritocratic beliefs, and the same benefits are more pronounced in more unequal societies. Since meritocracy belief can function as a justification for income differences, we assumed that the harsher the objective reality is, the higher level of subjective well-being can be maintained by justifying this harsh reality. Therefore, we hypothesized that the palliative function of meritocracy belief is stronger for both low social status (low income) individuals, and for those living in an unequal social environment (in countries with larger income differences). Our multilevel models showed a positive relationship between meritocracy belief and subjective well-being, which relationship was moderated by both individual-level income status and country-level income differences in both studies. Based on these results, we concluded that the emotional payoff of justifying income inequalities is larger if one is more strongly affected by these inequalities.

Negative emotions in siblings of individuals with developmental disabilities: The roles of early maladaptive schemas and system justification

BACKGROUND

Developmental disabilities (DD) in close family members have profound effects on psychological adjustment of siblings of individuals with DD. One factor that influences the psychological adjustment of siblings is emotions. However, little is known about emotions among siblings of individuals with DD.

AIMS

This study sought to examine negative emotions of adolescent siblings of individuals with DD and focus on the roles of individual- and system-related factors, namely early maladaptive schemas (EMS) and system justification.

METHODS AND PROCEDURES

A cross-sectional study including adolescent 72 siblings of individuals with DD and 109 adolescent siblings of individuals without DD was conducted.

OUTCOMES AND RESULTS

The siblings of individuals with DD had higher scores on the Other-Directedness schema domain and system justification than the siblings of individuals without DD. However, the frequency of negative emotions did not differ between groups. Lower scores on EMS and higher scores on system justification were associated with less frequent negative emotions.

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

Negative emotions seem to be common in adolescents regardless of having a sibling with DD or not. Nevertheless, EMS and system justification tendencies in siblings of individuals with DD may act as vulnerability factors for negative emotions.

Expressive suppression as an obstacle to social change: Linking system justification, emotion regulation, and collective action

Research on system justification theory suggests that justifying the societal status quo decreases negative emotions, leading to less collective action. In this investigation, we propose that the degree to which negative emotions mediate the link between system justification and collective action may depend upon whether individuals tend to suppress the expression of their negative emotions. We tested this hypothesis in the diverse socio-political contexts of Turkey, Israel, and the U.S. In one correlational study (Study 1) and three experimental studies (Studies 2-4), we observed that the link between system justification and willingness to participate in collective action through anger (Studies 1-2 and 4) and guilt (Study 3) was moderated by expressive suppression. We found that negative emotions mediated the association between system justification and collective action among those who suppress the expression of their emotions less frequently, but not those who use expressive suppression more frequently. These findings suggest that emotion regulation may undermine, rather than facilitate, efforts to engage in collective action even among people who are low in system justification.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11031-021-09883-5.

Honesty-Humility and unethical behavior in adolescents: The mediating role of moral disengagement and the moderating role of system justification

INTRODUCTION

Honesty-Humility represents the tendency to be fair, genuine, and cooperative in social interactions. Although previous evidence has demonstrated that Honesty-Humility is related to decreased unethical behavior, little is known about the mediating and moderating mechanisms underlying this relationship, especially among adolescents. Based on social cognitive theory and system justification theory, the present study aims to examine the mediating role of moral disengagement and the moderating role of system justification in the relationship between Honesty-Humility and unethical behavior among Chinese adolescents.

METHODS

A large sample of Chinese adolescents (N = 2,576, 47% boys; M_age = 17.00 years, SD = 1.07) was recruited from four senior high schools. The participants completed questionnaires regarding Honesty-Humility, moral disengagement, system justification, and unethical behavior.

RESULTS

The findings suggested that Honesty-Humility was negatively associated with adolescents' unethical behavior, and moral disengagement partially mediated this negative association. Furthermore, system justification moderated the mediation model. Specifically, the negative relationships between Honesty-Humility and moral disengagement/unethical behavior were stronger among adolescents who perceive the society as fair.

CONCLUSION

These findings advance the understanding of when and how Honesty-Humility prevents adolescents from unethical behavior. The theoretical and practical implications of the current study as well as future research directions are discussed.

Examining the relational underpinnings and consequences of system-justifying beliefs: Explaining the palliative effects of system justification

People often perceive social systems as fair and legitimate in order to satisfy existential, epistemic, and relational needs. Although much work has examined the existential and epistemic roots to system justification, the relational motives underlying the tendency to justify the system have received comparatively less attention. We addressed this oversight by examining the associations approach and avoidance relational goals have with system justification in a national probability sample (N = 21,938). Consistent with the thesis that the need to belong motivates system justification, avoidance goals (i.e., the desire to avoid social conflict) correlated positively with system justification (approach goals also unexpectedly correlated positively with system justification). Also as hypothesized, system justification mediated the relationship between avoidance goals and belongingness. Moreover, system justification mediated the relationship between avoidance goals and belongingness. Finally, sequential mediation analyses revealed that avoidance goals predicted higher well-being via system justification and belongingness. This study is the first to demonstrate that system justification confers palliative benefits by satisfying two different relational goals.