People tend to underestimate how much income inequality exists. Much research has attributed this widespread underestimation to differential access to information, variance in exposure to inequality, or motivated attention to different aspects of inequality. In our research, we suggest that the motivation to believe that the current socioeconomic system is fair and legitimate (i.e., system justification) can shape how much inequality people see in the first place, leading them to perceive otherwise identical income gaps as smaller in magnitude. Across eight studies ( = 4113, including a pre-registered sample representative of the U.S. population on key benchmarks), we provide correlational and experimental evidence for a causal association between system justification and perceptions of the magnitude of income gaps. We examine the mediating role of fairness judgments and test this mechanism against other mediators. We also manipulate system justification mindset to test for its causal effect on perceptions of the magnitude of identical income gaps. We contrast the predictive ability of system justification with that of a related motive—social dominance orientation, showing preliminary evidence that system justification is a better predictor of how much inequality people perceive in contexts that overlay the economic inequality with intergroup inequality (e.g., racial inequality). Finally, across three of these studies, we assess policy related downstream consequences of the effect of system justification on perceived magnitude of inequality, providing evidence that this effect uniquely contributes to decreased support for redistributive policies.

中文翻译：

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制度合理性使收入差距显得更小


人们往往会低估收入不平等的程度。许多研究将这种普遍的低估归因于信息获取的差异、不平等风险的差异，或引起对不平等不同方面的关注。在我们的研究中，我们认为，相信当前社会经济制度公平合法的动机（即制度合理性）可以决定人们首先看到的不平等程度，导致他们认为其他方面相同的收入差距在幅度上更小。通过八项研究（= 4113，包括在关键基准上代表美国人口的预先注册样本），我们为制度合理性与收入差距大小的看法之间的因果关系提供了相关性和实验证据。我们研究公平判断的中介作用，并针对其他调解者测试该机制。我们还操纵系统论证心态来测试其对相同收入差距大小的看法的因果影响。我们将系统合理性的预测能力与相关动机——社会支配取向的预测能力进行了对比，初步证据表明，系统合理性可以更好地预测人们在经济不平等与群体间不平等（例如种族不平等）叠加的情况下感知到的不平等程度。 ）。最后，在其中三项研究中，我们评估了制度合理性对不平等程度的影响与政策相关的下游后果，提供了证据表明这种效应独特地导致了对再分配政策的支持减少。