Institute for Psychology, University of Innsbruck.
J Pers Soc Psychol. 2016 Aug;111(2):178-94. doi: 10.1037/pspi0000058. Epub 2016 Jun 6.
Seven studies (overall N = 3690) addressed the relation between people's subjective socioeconomic status (SES) and their aggression levels. Based on relative deprivation theory, we proposed that people low in subjective SES would feel at a disadvantage, which in turn would elicit aggressive responses. In 3 correlational studies, subjective SES was negatively related to trait aggression. Importantly, this relation held when controlling for measures that are related to 1 or both subjective SES and trait aggression, such as the dark tetrad and the Big Five. Four experimental studies then demonstrated that participants in a low status condition were more aggressive than were participants in a high status condition. Compared with a medium-SES condition, participants of low subjective SES were more aggressive rather than participants of high subjective SES being less aggressive. Moreover, low SES increased aggressive behavior toward targets that were the source for participants' experience of disadvantage but also toward neutral targets. Sequential mediation analyses suggest that the experience of disadvantage underlies the effect of subjective SES on aggressive affect, whereas aggressive affect was the proximal determinant of aggressive behavior. Taken together, the present research found comprehensive support for key predictions derived from the theory of relative deprivation of how the perception of low SES is related to the person's judgments, emotional reactions, and actions. (PsycINFO Database Record
七项研究(总 N = 3690)探讨了人们主观社会经济地位(SES)与攻击水平之间的关系。基于相对剥夺理论,我们提出,主观 SES 低的人会感到处于劣势,从而引发攻击反应。在三项相关性研究中,主观 SES 与特质攻击呈负相关。重要的是,当控制与主观 SES 和特质攻击相关的措施时,这种关系仍然存在,例如黑暗四人格和大五人格。四项实验研究随后表明,处于低地位条件下的参与者比处于高地位条件下的参与者更具攻击性。与中 SES 条件相比,低主观 SES 的参与者更具攻击性,而不是高主观 SES 的参与者攻击性较低。此外,低 SES 会增加对导致参与者处于劣势体验的目标的攻击行为,也会增加对中性目标的攻击行为。序列中介分析表明,劣势体验是主观 SES 对攻击情绪影响的基础,而攻击情绪是攻击行为的近端决定因素。综上所述,本研究全面支持了相对剥夺理论的关键预测,即 SES 感知与个体的判断、情绪反应和行为之间的关系。