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Full-Text Articles in Psychology
Subjective Socioeconomic Status Moderates How Resting Heart Rate Variability Predicts Pain Response, Jacinth Jia Xin Tan, Chin Hong Tan, Michael W. Kraus
Subjective Socioeconomic Status Moderates How Resting Heart Rate Variability Predicts Pain Response, Jacinth Jia Xin Tan, Chin Hong Tan, Michael W. Kraus
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Higher resting heart rate variability (HRV)—an index of more flexible response to environmental stressors, including noxious stimuli—has been linked to reduced perception of experimentally induced pain. However, as stress responses are adapted to one’s chronic environments, we propose that chronic exposure to threats captured by one’s subjective socioeconomic status (SSS) may shape different adaptations that produce distinct pain responses linked to higher resting HRV. Specifically, lower SSS individuals with more threat exposures may prioritize threat detection by upregulating sensitivity to stressors, such as acute pain. Therefore, higher HRV would predict greater perceived acute pain among lower SSS individuals. In contrast, …
Effects Of Economic Uncertainty And Socioeconomic Status On Reproductive Timing: A Life History Approach, Kenneth Tan, Norman P. Li, Andrea. M. Meltzer, Joel L. J. Chin, Kai Lin Lynn Tan, Amy J. Lim, Steven. L Neuberg, Mark Van Vugt
Effects Of Economic Uncertainty And Socioeconomic Status On Reproductive Timing: A Life History Approach, Kenneth Tan, Norman P. Li, Andrea. M. Meltzer, Joel L. J. Chin, Kai Lin Lynn Tan, Amy J. Lim, Steven. L Neuberg, Mark Van Vugt
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Why do some people have children earlier compared to others who delay reproduction? Drawing from an evolutionary, life history theory perspective, we posited that reproductive timing could be influenced by economic uncertainty and childhood socioeconomic status (SES). For individuals lower in childhood SES, economic uncertainty influenced the desire to reproduce earlier compared to individuals higher in childhood SES. Furthermore, the decision regarding reproductive timing was influenced by tradeoffs between earlier reproduction or furthering one's education or career. Overall, economic uncertainty appears to shift individuals into different life history strategies as a function of childhood SES, suggesting how ecological factors and …
The Association Between Objective And Subjective Socioeconomic Standing And Subjective Well-Being: A Meta-Analysis, Jacinth J. X. Tan, Michael W. Kraus, Nichelle C. Carpenter, Nancy E. Adler
The Association Between Objective And Subjective Socioeconomic Standing And Subjective Well-Being: A Meta-Analysis, Jacinth J. X. Tan, Michael W. Kraus, Nichelle C. Carpenter, Nancy E. Adler
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This meta-analysis tested if the links between socioeconomic status (SES) and subjective well-being (SWB) differ by whether SES is assessed objectively or subjectively. The associations between measures of objective SES (i.e., income and educational attainment), subjective SES (i.e., the MacArthur ladder SES and perceived SES), and SWB (i.e., happiness and life satisfaction) were synthesized across 357 studies, totaling 2,352,095 participants. Overall, the objective SES and subjective SES measures were moderately associated (r = .32). The subjective SES-SWB association (r = .22) was larger than the objective SES-SWB association (r = .16). The income-SWB association (r = .23) was comparable with …
The Psychology Of Pro-Environmental Support: A Global Problem In Need Of Global Solutions, Kimin Eom, Viki Papadakis, David K. Sherman, Heejung S. Kim
The Psychology Of Pro-Environmental Support: A Global Problem In Need Of Global Solutions, Kimin Eom, Viki Papadakis, David K. Sherman, Heejung S. Kim
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
We review research that provides a sociocultural perspective on proenvironmental support. Despite the increasing volume of psychological research on proenvironmental action, there has been a relative dearth of consideration of sociocultural contexts, which poses critical theoretical and practical limitations to understanding and fostering proenvironmental actions across diverse populations. The sociocultural perspective posits that the primary motives driving action are context dependent. Building on this perspective, our research examines significant divergence in key determinants of proenvironmental support, focusing on several sociocultural variables, including national culture (individualism-collectivism), socioeconomic status, and religion. This program of research shows that personal environmental beliefs more directly …
Judgments Of Interpersonal Warmth Predict Class-Based Differences In Political Candidate Support, Jacinth J. X. Tan, Michael W. Kraus
Judgments Of Interpersonal Warmth Predict Class-Based Differences In Political Candidate Support, Jacinth J. X. Tan, Michael W. Kraus
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
The present research examines how warmth communications shape classbased patterns of political candidate support. Drawing on theory and evidence that lower-class individuals are more attuned to others, we predicted that, relative to upper-class individuals, they will modulate their trust and support in response to communications of warmth generated by and about political figures. In Experiment 1, lower-class compared to upper-class participants reported less trust and support for a political candidate who communicated his warmth in a campaign video, while no class differences emerged when he communicated competence or hostility to an opponent instead. In Experiment 2, lower-class compared to upper-class …
Signs Of Social Class: The Experience Of Economic Inequality In Everyday Life, Michael W. Kraus, Jun Won Park, Jacinth J. X. Tan
Signs Of Social Class: The Experience Of Economic Inequality In Everyday Life, Michael W. Kraus, Jun Won Park, Jacinth J. X. Tan
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
By some accounts, global economic inequality is at its highest point on record. The pernicious effects of this broad societal trend are striking: Rising inequality is linked to poorer health and well-being across countries, continents, and cultures. The economic and psychological forces that perpetuate inequality continue to be studied, and in this theoretical review, we examine the role of daily experiences of economic inequality—the communication of social class signals between interaction partners—in this process. We theorize that social class signals activate social comparison processes that strengthen group boundaries between the haves and have nots in society. In particular, we argue …
Lay Theories About Social Class Buffer Lower-Class Individuals Against Poor Self-Rated Health And Negative Affect, Jacinth J. X. Tan, Michael W. Kraus
Lay Theories About Social Class Buffer Lower-Class Individuals Against Poor Self-Rated Health And Negative Affect, Jacinth J. X. Tan, Michael W. Kraus
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
The economic conditions of one’s life can profoundly and systematically influence health outcomes over the life course. Our present research demonstrates that rejecting the notion that social class categories are biologically determined—a nonessentialist belief—buffers lower-class individuals from poor self-rated health and negative affect, whereas conceiving of social class categories as rooted in biology—an essentialist belief—does not. In Study 1, lower-class individuals self-reported poorer health than upper-class individuals when they endorsed essentialist beliefs but showed no such difference when they rejected such beliefs. Exposure to essentialist theories of social class also led lower-class individuals to report greater feelings of negative self-conscious …
Americans Overestimate Social Class Mobility, Michael W. Kraus, Jacinth J. X. Tan
Americans Overestimate Social Class Mobility, Michael W. Kraus, Jacinth J. X. Tan
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
In this research we examine estimates of American social class mobility—the ability to move up or down in education and income status. Across studies, overestimates of class mobility were large and particularly likely among younger participants and those higher in subjective social class—both measured (Studies 1–3) and manipulated (Study 4). Class mobility overestimates were independent of general estimation errors (Study 3) and persisted after accounting for knowledge of class mobility assessed in terms of educational attainment and self-ratings. Experiments revealed that mobility overestimates were shaped by exposure to information about the genetic determinants of social class—a faux science article suggesting …
Economic Inequality Is Linked To Biased Self-Perception, Steve Loughnan, Peter Kuppens, Juri Allik, Katalin Balazs, Soledad De Lemus, Kitty Dumont, Rafael Gargurevich, Istvan Hidegkuti, Bernhard Leidner, Jennifer Yuk-Yue Tong
Economic Inequality Is Linked To Biased Self-Perception, Steve Loughnan, Peter Kuppens, Juri Allik, Katalin Balazs, Soledad De Lemus, Kitty Dumont, Rafael Gargurevich, Istvan Hidegkuti, Bernhard Leidner, Jennifer Yuk-Yue Tong
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
People’s self-perception biases often lead them to see themselves as better than the average person (a phenomenon known as self-enhancement). This bias varies across cultures, and variations are typically explained using cultural variables, such as individualism versus collectivism. We propose that socioeconomic differences among societies—specifically, relative levels of economic inequality—play an important but unrecognized role in how people evaluate themselves. Evidence for self-enhancement was found in 15 diverse nations, but the magnitude of the bias varied. Greater self-enhancement was found in societies with more income inequality, and income inequality predicted cross-cultural differences in self-enhancement better than did individualism/ collectivism. These …