How can successful people share their goodness with the world: The psychological mechanism underlying the upper social classes’ redistributive preferences and the role of humility

Abstract

A large number of studies conducted in Europe and the Americas have explored the negative relationships between social class and redistributive preferences in recent years. However, few studies have addressed the cross-cultural consistency or explored the internal mechanism and intervention strategies of the effects of social class on redistributive preferences. The present study aimed to systematically and deeply explore the relationships between social class and redistributive preferences through three studies in the context of Chinese society. Study 1 explored the direct relationship between social class and redistributive preferences. Based on national data from the Chinese General Social Survey of 2015, 8376 participants from all provinces and autonomous regions of China and indexes of measuring social class and redistributive preferences were obtained. Based on the inequality maintenance model of social class, Study 2 further explored the mediating role of attribution for the rich–poor gap between social class and redistributive preferences. 621 urban and rural residents were investigated by using objective and subjective socioeconomic status (SES) scales, a rich–poor attribution questionnaire, and a redistributive preferences scale. Study 3 was devoted to exploring the intervention effect of humility on the redistributive preferences of the upper social classes. A sample of 103 undergraduates from the upper social class were randomly assigned to humility priming group or control group. The results showed that all social class indexes can strongly and negatively predict redistributive preferences, meaning that, as in Western society, upper social-class Chinese individuals also tend to have lower redistributive preferences than those from lower social classes. In addition, the influences of social class on redistributive preferences could be partly mediated through the attribution for the rich–poor gap. Compared with individuals from a subjectively lower class, upper-class individuals tended to attribute the gap between rich and poor to internal causes. That is to say, they tended to attribute the rich–poor gap to personal factors, such as abilities, efforts, and ambition. This attitude lowered upper-class individuals’ redistributive preferences even further. Finally, a short video was used to prime participants’ feelings of humility. Compared with a control group that watched a neutral video, those upper-class undergraduates who watched life stories of people with humble qualities experienced higher states of emotional humility. Priming a humble state lowered their tendency to attribute the gap between rich and poor to internal causes, and further improved their redistributive preferences to a significant extent. In conclusion, these three studies deeply explore the relationships between social class and redistributive preferences in the context of Chinese society. Combined with other studies performed in Western societies, these results showed that, to some extent, the negative relationship between social class and redistributive preferences is cross-cultural. The exploration of this mechanism provides supporting data and enrichment for the inequality maintenance model of social class. The finding that humility is an important intervention strategy will further insight into social redistribution. These results suggest that, in order to render the benefits of economic development accessible to more people, social governance could cultivate individual humility through moral education, cultural development, and fostering a community spirit.