- Title
- Revisiting 25 years of system motivation explanation for system justification from the perspective of social identity model of system attitudes
- Creator
- Owuamalam, Chuma Kevin; Rubin, Mark; Spears, Russell
- Relation
- British Journal of Social Psychology Vol. 58, Issue 2, p. 362-381
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/bjso.12285
- Publisher
- John Wiley & Sons
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2019
- Description
- Do the disadvantaged have an autonomous system justification motivation that operates against their personal and group interests? System justification theory (SJT; Jost & Banaji, 1994, Br. J. Soc. Psychol, 33, 1) proposes that they do and that this motivation helps to (1) reduce cognitive dissonance and associated uncertainties and (2) soothe the pain that is associated with knowing that one's group is subject to social inequality. However, 25 years of research on this system justification motivation has given rise to several theoretical and empirical inconsistencies. The present article argues that these inconsistencies can be resolved by a social identity model of system attitudes (SIMSA; Owuamalam, Rubin, & Spears, 2018, Curr. Dir. Psychol. Sci, 27, 91). SIMSA assumes that instances of system justification are often in alignment with (rather than opposed to) the interests of the disadvantaged. According to SIMSA, the disadvantaged may support social systems (1) in order to acknowledge social reality, (2) when they perceive the wider social system to constitute a superordinate ingroup, and (3) because they hope to improve their ingroup's status through existing channels in the long run. These propositions are corroborated by existing and emerging evidence. We conclude that SIMSA offers a more coherent and parsimonious explanation for system justification than does SJT.
- Subject
- personal and collective interests; SIMSA; social inequality; system justification theory; SDG 10; Sustainable Development Goals
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1443832
- Identifier
- uon:42114
- Identifier
- ISSN:0144-6665
- Language
- eng
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Goal 10: Reduced Inequalities
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