Department of Sociology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14850, USA.
European University Institute, Political and Social Sciences, Florence, Italy.
Sci Adv. 2019 Jul 17;5(7):eaau1156. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.aau1156. eCollection 2019 Jul.
Growing disparities of income and wealth have prompted extensive survey research to measure the effects on public beliefs about the causes and fairness of economic inequality. However, observational data confound responses to unequal outcomes with highly correlated inequality of opportunity. This study uses a novel experiment to disentangle the effects of unequal outcomes and unequal opportunities on cognitive, normative, and affective responses. Participants were randomly assigned to positions with unequal opportunities for success. Results showed that both winners and losers were less likely to view the outcomes as fair or attributable to skill as the level of redistribution increased, but this effect of redistribution was stronger for winners. Moreover, winners were generally more likely to believe that the game was fair, even when the playing field was most heavily tilted in their favor. In short, it's not just how the game is played, it's also whether you win or lose.
收入和财富差距的不断扩大促使人们进行了广泛的调查研究，以衡量其对公众关于经济不平等原因和公平性看法的影响。然而，观察性数据将对不平等结果的反应与机会不平等高度相关的情况混淆在一起。本研究使用一项新颖的实验来区分不平等结果和不平等机会对认知、规范和情感反应的影响。参与者被随机分配到成功机会不平等的职位上。结果表明，随着再分配水平的提高，无论是赢家还是输家，都不太可能认为结果是公平的或归因于技能，而这种再分配的效果对赢家更强。此外，即使在对他们最有利的情况下，游戏场地严重倾斜，赢家通常也更有可能认为游戏是公平的。简而言之，重要的不仅是游戏的规则，还有你是赢还是输。
