Top

Social Justice Research

Published in:

25-07-2017

Justice Concerns After School Attacks: Belief in a Just World and Support for Perpetrator Punishment Among Chinese Adults and Adolescents

Authors: Michael Shengtao Wu, Adam B. Cohen

Published in: Social Justice Research | Issue 3/2017

Activate our intelligent search to find suitable subject content or patents.

search-config

AI-assisted search

Off

Abstract

School attacks against children seriously threaten the belief that the world is a just place, in which good people get rewarded and bad people get punished. However, to what extent and in which way belief in a just world (BJW) plays a role in reaction to school attacks have not been investigated, especially in the Chinese context, in which people are traditionally expected to prize harmony over justice. Two studies examined how Chinese people varying in BJW differ in supporting punishment for the perpetrators of school attacks in China in 2010. In Study 1, general BJW among Chinese adults predicted support for perpetrator punishment, and those who paid more attention to the crime news also reported a higher level of punishment support. Study 2 revealed a similar pattern among Chinese adolescents, whose previously measured higher general BJW predicted increasing support for perpetrator punishment, and this effect was mediated via personal distress. In summary, general just-world belief facilitates punishment support among parents and adolescents in the Chinese context.

previous article Socioeconomic Status and the Relationship Between Under-Reward and Distress: Buffering-Resource or Status-Disconfirmation?

next article Observing Others’ Anger and Guilt Can Make You Feel Unfairly Treated: The Interpersonal Effects of Emotions on Justice-Related Reactions

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 102.000 Bücher
über 537 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Automobil + Motoren
Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 67.000 Bücher
über 340 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

For more information about school attacks in China, see the BBC news, 'Social tensions' behind China school attacks, see: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia–pacific/8681873.stm.

As research consultants of these news agencies, we were invited to evaluate parents’ and children’ psychological outcomes in response to such crime news.

Given that empathy was not significantly correlated with perpetrator punishment (as shown in Table 3), the model regarding personal distress as the potential mediator of the relationship between empathy and punishment support was not considered.

Bai, B., Liu, X., & Kou, Y. (2014). Belief in a just world lowers perceived intention of corruption: The mediating role of perceived punishment. PLoS ONE, 9, e97075.CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Bègue, L., & Bastounis, M. (2003). Two spheres of belief in justice: Extensive support for the bidimensional model of belief in a just world. Journal of Personality, 71, 435–463.CrossRefPubMed

Benabou, R., & Tirole, J. (2006). Belief in a just world and redistributive politics. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 121, 699–746.CrossRef

Callan, M. J., Harvey, A. J., Dawtry, R. J., & Sutton, R. M. (2013). Through the looking glass: Focusing on long-term goals increases immanent justice reasoning. British Journal of Social Psychology, 52, 377–385.CrossRefPubMed

Chen, J. (2007). The relationship among empathy, its arousal mechanisms, and empathic outcomes. Beijing: Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Chen, T., & Li, Y. (2016). Campus security: Situations, crux, and policy. Educational Research and Experiment, 35, 15–20. (in Chinese).

Cohen, A. B., Wu, M. S., & Miller, J. (2016). Religion and culture: Individualism and collectivism in the east and west. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 47, 1236–1249.CrossRef

Connors, J., & Heaven, P. C. (1987). Authoritarianism and just world beliefs. The Journal of Social Psychology, 127, 345–346.CrossRef

Dalbert, C. (1999). The world is more just for me than generally: About the personal belief in a just world scale’s validity. Social Justice Research, 12, 79–98.CrossRef

Darley, J. M. (2002). Just punishments: Research on retributional justice. In M. Ross & D. T. Miller (Eds.), The justice motive in everyday life (pp. 314–333). New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRef

Davis, M. H. (1983). Measuring individual-differences in empathy: Evidence for a multidimensional approach. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44, 113–126.CrossRef

Dowler, K. (2003). Media consumption and public attitudes toward crime and justice: The relationship between fear of crime, punitive attitudes, and perceived police effectiveness. Journal of Criminal Justice and Popular Culture, 10, 109–126.

Eisenberg, N. (2010). Emotion, regulation, and moral development. Annual Review of Psychology, 51, 655–697.

Eisenberg, N., Fabes, R. A., Miller, P. A., Fultz, J., Mathy, R. M., Shell, R., et al. (1989). The relations of sympathy and personal distress to prosocial behavior: A multimethod study. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 5, 55–66.CrossRef

Furnham, A. (1985). Just world beliefs in an unjust society: A cross cultural comparison. European Journal of Social Psychology 15, 363–366.CrossRef

Furnham, A. (1993). Just world beliefs in twelve societies. The Journal of Social Psychology, 133, 317–329.CrossRef

Gelfand, M. J., Raver, J. L., Nishii, L., Leslie, L. M., Lun, J., Lim, B. C., et al. (2011). Differences between tight and loose cultures: A 33-nation study. Science, 332, 1100–1104.CrossRefPubMed

Gerbasi, K. C., Zuckerman, M., & Reis, H. T. (1977). Justice needs a new blindfold: A review of mock jury research. Psychological Bulletin, 84, 323–345.CrossRef

Gollwitzer, M., & Bücklein, K. (2007). Are “we” more punitive than “me”? Self-construal styles, justice-related attitudes, and punitive judgments. Social Justice Research, 20, 457–478.CrossRef

Hafer, C. L., & Gosse, L. (2010). Preserving the belief in a just world: When and for whom are different strategies preferred? In D. R. Bobocel, A. C. Kay, M. P. Zanna, & J. M. Olson (Eds.), The psychology of justice and legitimacy: The Ontario symposium (Vol. 11, pp. 79–102). New York: Psychology Press.

Hayes, A. F. (2013). Introduction to mediation, moderation, and conditional process analysis: A regression-based approach. New York: Guilford Press.

Henrich, J., Ensminger, J., McElreath, R., Barr, A., Barrett, C., Bolyanatz, A., et al. (2010). Markets, religion, community size, and the evolution of fairness and punishment. Science, 327, 1480–1484.CrossRefPubMed

Kaiser, C., Vick, S., & Major, B. (2004). A prospective investigation of the relationship between just-world beliefs and the desire for revenge after September 11, 2001. Psychological Science, 15, 503–506.CrossRefPubMed

Lambert, A., Burroughs, T., & Nguyen, T. (1999). Perceptions of risk and the buffering hypothesis: The role of just world beliefs and right-wing authoritarianism. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 25, 643–656.CrossRef

Lerner, M. (1980). The belief in a just world: A fundamental delusion. New York: Plenum Press.CrossRef

Lerner, M. J. (2003). The justice motive: Where social psychologists found it, how they lost it, and why they may not find it again. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 7, 388–399.CrossRef

Lerner, J. S., Goldberg, J., & Tetlock, P. (1998). Sober second thoughts: The effects of accountability, anger, and authoritarianism on attributions of responsibility. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 24, 563–574.CrossRef

Lerner, M., & Miller, D. (1978). Just world research and the attribution process: Looking back and ahead. Psychological Bulletin, 85, 1030–1051.CrossRef

Lucas, T., Kamble, S. V., Wu, M. S., Zhdanova, L., & Wendorf, C. A. (2015). Distributive and procedural justice for self and others: Measurement invariance and links to life satisfaction in four cultures. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 47, 234–248.CrossRef

Lucas, T., Young, J. D., Zhdanova, L., & Alexander, S. (2010). Self and other justice beliefs, impulsivity, rumination, and forgiveness: Justice beliefs can both prevent and promote forgiveness. Personality and Individual Differences, 49, 851–856.CrossRef

McCullough, M. E., Bellah, C. G., Kilpatrick, S. D., & Johnson, J. L. (2001). Vengefulness: Relationships with forgiveness, rumination, well-being, and the Big Five. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 601–610.CrossRef

Mohr, P. B., & Luscri, G. (1995). Blame and punishment: Attitudes to juvenile and criminal offending. Psychological Reports, 77, 1091–1096.CrossRefPubMed

Oppenheimer, L. (2006). The belief in a just world and subjective perceptions of society: A developmental perspective. Journal of Adolescence, 29, 655–669.CrossRefPubMed

Poon, K.-T., & Chen, Z. (2014). When justice surrenders: The effect of just-world beliefs on aggression following ostracism. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 52, 101–112.CrossRef

Raney, A. A. (2005). Punishing media criminals and moral judgment: The impact on enjoyment. Media Psychology, 7, 145–163.CrossRef

Rubin, Z., & Peplau, L. A. (1975). Who believes in a just world? Journal of Social Issues, 31, 65–89.CrossRef

Schmitt, M. J. (1998). Methodological strategies in research to validate measures of belief in a just world. In L. Montada & M. J. Lerner (Eds.), Responses to victimizations and belief in a just world (pp. 187–216). New York: Plenum.CrossRef

Schmitt, M., Gollwitzer, M., Maes, J., & Arbach, D. (2005). Justice sensitivity: Assessment and location in the personality space. European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 21, 202–211.CrossRef

Schuller, R. A., Smith, V. L., & Olson, J. M. (1994). Juror’s decisions in trial of battered women who kill: The role of prior beliefs and expert testimony. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 24, 316–337.CrossRef

Stankov, L. (2010). Unforgiving Confucian culture: A breeding ground for high academic achievement, test anxiety and self-doubt? Learning and Individual Differences, 20, 555–563.CrossRef

Strelan, P., & Sutton, R. M. (2011). When just-world beliefs promote and when they inhibit forgiveness. Personality and Individual Differences, 50, 163–168.CrossRef

Sutton, R., & Douglas, K. (2005). Justice for all, or just for me? More evidence of the importance of the self-other distinction in just-world beliefs. Personality and Individual Differences, 39, 637–645.CrossRef

Sutton, R., & Winnard, E. (2007). Looking ahead through lenses of justice: The relevance of just-world beliefs to intentions and confidence in the future. British Journal of Social Psychology, 46, 649–666.CrossRefPubMed

Towers, S., Gomez-Lievano, A., Khan, M., Mubayi, A., & Castillo-Chavez, C. (2015). Contagion in mass killings and school shootings. PLoS ONE, 10, e0117259.CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Triandis, H. C., McCusker, C., & Hui, C. H. (1990). Multimethod probes of individualism and collectivism. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 1006–1020.CrossRef

Vossekuil, B., Fein, R. A., Reddy, M., Rorum, R., & Modzeleski, W. (2004). The final report and findings of the safe school initiative: Implications for the prevention from school attacks in the United States. Washington, DC: United States Secret Service and United States Department of Education.

Wang, Z., Xia, C.-Y., Meloni, S., Zhou, C.-S., & Moreno, Y. (2013). Impact of social punishment on cooperative behavior in complex networks. Scientific Reports, 3, srep03055.

Wenzel, M., & Thielmann, I. (2006). Why we punish in the name of justice: Just desert versus value restoration and the role of social identity. Social Justice Research, 19, 450–470.CrossRef

Wu, M. S., Pan, X., Wang, P., Li, H., & Nudelman, G. (2016). Research bias in justice motive: A meta-analysis of belief in a just world among Chinese (in Chinese). Chinese Social Psychology Review, 11, 162–178.CrossRef

Wu, M. S., Sutton, R. M., Yan, X., Zhou, C., Chen, Y., Zhu, Z., et al. (2013). Time frame and justice motive: Future perspective moderates the adaptive function of general belief in a just world. PLoS ONE, 8, e80668.CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Wu, M. S., Yan, X., Zhou, C., Chen, Y., Li, J., Shen, X., et al. (2011). General belief in a just world and resilience: Evidence from a collectivistic culture. European Journal of Personality, 25, 431–442.CrossRef

Zillmann, D. (1995). Mechanisms of emotional involvement with drama. Poetics, 23, 33–51.CrossRef

Zillmann, D., Taylor, K., & Lewis, K. (1998). News as nonfiction theater: How dispositions toward the public cast of characters affect reactions. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 42, 153–169.CrossRef

Title: Justice Concerns After School Attacks: Belief in a Just World and Support for Perpetrator Punishment Among Chinese Adults and Adolescents
Authors: Michael Shengtao Wu
Adam B. Cohen
Publication date: 25-07-2017
Publisher: Springer US
Published in: Social Justice Research / Issue 3/2017
Print ISSN: 0885-7466
Electronic ISSN: 1573-6725
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11211-017-0286-1

Springer Professional

Abstract

Please log in to get access to your license.

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Other articles of this Issue 3/2017

Socioeconomic Status and the Relationship Between Under-Reward and Distress: Buffering-Resource or Status-Disconfirmation?

The ‘Complex Human Problem’ that is Prejudice: A Review of the Cambridge Handbook of the Psychology of Prejudice

Observing Others’ Anger and Guilt Can Make You Feel Unfairly Treated: The Interpersonal Effects of Emotions on Justice-Related Reactions

‘Selvations’ in Social Motivation