Social mobility attributions in east asian and pacific cultures: Power distance and individualism as moderators of self-attribution bias

College

College of Liberal Arts

Department/Unit

Psychology

Document Type

Article

Source Title

Journal of Pacific Rim Psychology

Volume

12

Publication Date

1-1-2018

Abstract

© The Author(s) 2018. Self-attribution bias operates in social mobility attributions, with positive circumstances triggering individualist (attributed to one's merits) and negative circumstances triggering structural attributions (attributed to one’s race, religion, sex, social connections). Analyses of East Asian and Pacific data of the International Social Survey Programme’s Social Inequality Module show that perceived social inequality (PSI) leads to structural attributions, while high subjective social position (SSP) leads to individualist attributions. Cultural contexts, however, support or temper self-attribution bias, thus modifying the effects of PSI and SSP. Cross-level interactions show that the effect of PSI on structural attributions is larger in small power-distance countries, while the effect of SSP on individualist attributions is larger in countries with small power distance, high individualism, and low country average for SSP. That a small power distance strengthens the effects of PSI on structural attributions and of SSP on individualist attributions suggests contrasting scenarios, where disadvantaged groups devalue their competencies for mobility, while privileged groups believe themselves deserving of better outcomes. The context-dependency of the SSP effect suggests the modifiability of individualist attributions. These results help explain why mobility attribution profiles of Australia and New Zealand differ from those of China, Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, and Taiwan.

html

Digitial Object Identifier (DOI)

10.1017/prp.2017.17

Upload File

wf_yes

This document is currently not available here.

Share

COinS