Social class, sense of control, and social explanation

Lower social class is associated with diminished resources and perceived subordinate rank. On the basis of this analysis, the authors predicted that social class would be closely associated with a reduced sense of personal control and that this association would explain why lower class individuals f...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of personality and social psychology Vol. 97; no. 6; p. 992
Main Authors: Kraus, Michael W, Piff, Paul K, Keltner, Dacher
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: United States 01.12.2009
Subjects:
Analysis of Variance
Emotions - physiology
Ethnic Groups - psychology
Ethnic Groups - statistics & numerical data
Facial Expression
Female
Humans
Internal-External Control
Judgment - physiology
Male
Personal Satisfaction
Social Class
Social Environment
Social Perception
Students - psychology
ISSN:1939-1315, 1939-1315
Online Access:Get more information
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Summary:Lower social class is associated with diminished resources and perceived subordinate rank. On the basis of this analysis, the authors predicted that social class would be closely associated with a reduced sense of personal control and that this association would explain why lower class individuals favor contextual over dispositional explanations of social events. Across 4 studies, lower social class individuals, as measured by subjective socioeconomic status (SES), endorsed contextual explanations of economic trends, broad social outcomes, and emotion. Across studies, the sense of control mediated the relation between subjective SES and contextual explanations, and this association was independent of objective SES, ethnicity, political ideology, and self-serving biases. Finally, experimentally inducing a higher sense of control attenuated the tendency for lower subjective SES individuals to make more contextual explanations (Study 4). Implications for future research on social class as well as theoretical distinctions between objective SES and subjective SES are discussed.
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ISSN:1939-1315
1939-1315
DOI:10.1037/a0016357