scholarly journals Speculations on the Evolutionary Origins of System Justification

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 147470491876534 ◽  
Author(s):  
John T. Jost ◽  
Robert M. Sapolsky ◽  
H. Hannah Nam
Keyword(s):  
Social Economic ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
System Justification ◽  
Anterior Cingulate ◽  
Social Stability ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
System Justification Theory ◽  
Evolutionary Origins ◽  
The Social

For centuries, philosophers and social theorists have wondered why people submit voluntarily to tyrannical leaders and oppressive regimes. In this article, we speculate on the evolutionary origins of system justification, that is, the ways in which people are motivated (often nonconsciously) to defend and justify existing social, economic, and political systems. After briefly recounting the logic of system justification theory and some of the most pertinent empirical evidence, we consider parallels between the social behaviors of humans and other animals concerning the acceptance versus rejection of hierarchy and dominance. Next, we summarize research in human neuroscience suggesting that specific brain regions, such as the amygdala and the anterior cingulate cortex, may be linked to individual differences in ideological preferences concerning (in)equality and social stability as well as the successful navigation of complex, hierarchical social systems. Finally, we consider some of the implications of a system justification perspective for the study of evolutionary psychology, political behavior, and social change.

On Social Stability and Social Change

2011 ◽  
Vol 20 (6) ◽  
pp. 360-364 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aaron C. Kay ◽  
Justin Friesen
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Personal Control ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
System Justification ◽  
Social Stability ◽  
System Justification Theory ◽  
The Status ◽  
System Threat ◽  
Do So

More than a decade of research from the perspective of system-justification theory (Jost & Banaji, 1994) has demonstrated that people engage in motivated psychological processes that bolster and support the status quo. We propose that this motive is highly contextual: People do not justify their social systems at all times but are more likely to do so under certain circumstances. We describe four contexts in which people are prone to engage in system-justifying processes: (a) system threat, (b) system dependence, (c) system inescapability, and (d) low personal control. We describe how and why, in these contexts, people who wish to promote social change might expect resistance.

scholarly journals “The New State That We Are Building”: Authoritarianism and System-Justification in an Illiberal Democracy

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan-Erik Lönnqvist ◽  
Zsolt Péter Szabó ◽  
László Kelemen
Keyword(s):  
Status Quo ◽  
System Justification ◽  
High Status ◽  
Strong Version ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Authoritarian Personality ◽  
System Justification Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Beliefs And Attitudes ◽  
Representative Samples

The authoritarian personality is characterized by unquestionining obedience and respect to authority. System justification theory (SJT) argues that people are motivated to defend, bolster, and justify aspects of existing social, economic, and political systems. Commitment to the status quo is also a key characteristic of the authoritarian personality. It can be argued that the social context matters for how an underlying latent authoritarian character is expressed. This means that authoritarian regimes could be expected to lead to increased authoritarianism and stronger system-justification. We investigated this hypothesis in two representative samples of Hungarians, collected before (2010) and after (2018) 8 years of Fidesz’ rule (N = 1,000 in both samples). Moreover, the strong version of SJT argues that members of disadvantaged groups are likely to experience the most cognitive dissonance and that the need to reduce this dissonance makes them the most supportive of the status quo. This argument dovetails nicely with claims made by the political opposition to Fidesz, according to which Fidesz is especially popular among low-status members of society. We found that measures assessing authoritarian tendencies did not change between 2010 and 2018. However, more specific beliefs and attitudes did change, and these effects were especially pronounced among Fidesz supporters. Their belief in a just world and a just system has grown stronger, while their attitudes toward migrants had hardened. Low status was associated with lower levels of system-justifying ideologies. However, low status Fidesz voters justified the system more than high status opposition voters in 2018, lending some support for the strong version of SJT. Our results suggest that beliefs and attitudes of Hungarians have changed between 2010 and 2018, and that political leadership played a crucial role in this.

scholarly journals Revisiting 25 years of system motivation explanation for system justification from the perspective of social identity model of system attitudes

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chuma Kevin Owuamalam ◽  
Mark Rubin ◽  
Russell Spears
Keyword(s):  
Social Identity ◽  
Cognitive Dissonance ◽  
Social System ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
System Justification ◽  
System Justification Theory ◽  
Knowing That ◽  
Parsimonious Explanation ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Identity Model

Do the disadvantaged have an autonomous system justification motivation that operates against their personal and group interests? System justification theory (SJT; Jost & Banaji, 1994) proposes that they do, and that this motivation helps to (a) reduce cognitive dissonance and associated uncertainties and (b) 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). 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 (a) in order to acknowledge social reality, (b) when they perceive the wider social system to constitute a superordinate ingroup, and (c) 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.

Sickness and the social brain: How the immune system regulates behavior across species

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin A. Devlin ◽  
Caroline J. Smith ◽  
Staci D. Bilbo
Keyword(s):  
Immune System ◽  
Social Behavior ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Behavior Changes ◽  
Social Brain ◽  
Evolutionary Origins ◽  
Immune Mediators ◽  
The Social ◽  
Sickness Behaviors ◽  
The Brain

Many instances of sickness critically involve the immune system. The immune system talks to the brain in a bi-directional loop. This discourse affords the immune system immense control, such that it can influence behavior and optimize recovery from illness. These behavioral responses to infection are called sickness behaviors and can manifest in many ways, including changes in mood, motivation, or energy. Fascinatingly, most of these changes are conserved across species, and most organisms demonstrate some form of sickness behaviors. One of the most interesting sickness behaviors, and not immediately obvious, is altered sociability. Here, we discuss how the immune system impacts social behavior, by examining the brain regions and immune mediators involved in this process. We first outline how social behavior changes in response to infection in various species. Next, we explore which brain regions control social behavior and their evolutionary origins. Finally, we describe which immune mediators establish the link between illness and social behavior, in the context of both normal development and infection. Overall, we hope to make clear the striking similarities between the mechanisms that facilitate changes in sociability in derived and ancestral vertebrate, as well as invertebrate, species.

scholarly journals Is a System Motive Really Necessary to Explain the System Justification Effect? A Response to Jost (2019) and Jost, Badaan, Goudarzi, Hoffarth, and Mogami (2019)

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chuma Kevin Owuamalam ◽  
Mark Rubin
Keyword(s):  
Social Identity ◽  
Social Reality ◽  
Conclusive Evidence ◽  
System Justification ◽  
Ingroup Bias ◽  
Special System ◽  
System Justification Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Identity Model ◽  
Identity Motives

The debate between the proponents of SIMSA and SJT does not pivot on whether system justification occurs – we all agree that system justification does occur. The issue is why it occurs? System justification theory (SJT; Jost & Banaji, 1994) assumes that system justification is motivated by a special system justification motive. In contrast, the social identity model of system attitudes (SIMSA; Owuamalam, Rubin, & Spears, 2018) argues that there is insufficient conclusive evidence for this special system motive, and that system justification can be explained in terms of social identity motives, including the motivation to accurately reflect social reality and the search for a positive social identity. Here, we respond to criticisms of SIMSA, including criticisms of its social reality, ingroup bias and hope for future ingroup status explanations of system justification. We conclude that SJT theorists should decide whether system justification is oppositional to, or compatible with social identity motives, and that this dilemma could be resolved by relinquishing the theoretically problematic notion of a system justification motivation.

scholarly journals Public Health in Different Political Systems of the State

2014 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-27
Author(s):  
Andrzej Pawłucki
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Political System ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
The State ◽  
The Body ◽  
Physical Culture ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Health Culture ◽  
The Social ◽  
Health Related

Abstract The goal of this paper is to explain the dependence between the political system of the state: collectivist, conservative, and liberal in a postmodern society, and public health-related practice. In the consideration of different systems of physical culture, including the system of health culture known as public health, Niklas Luhmann’s theory of social systems has been used. The social system of health culture, hitherto known as the system of public health, is acknowledged as a variety of social systems of physical culture, whereas the health gymnasion is one of many possible centers of habilitation, recreation, and rehabilitation of the body. It is argued that an educating society can only persist successfully if the state does not lose control in the struggle against the ideologues of neoliberal forces hostile to the solidarity-based and welfare state.

SPRAWIEDLIWOŚĆ JAKO KRYTERIUM OCENY SYSTEMU EKONOMICZNO-POLITYCZNEGO

2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-30
Author(s):  
Krystyna Skarżyńska
Keyword(s):  
Data Collection ◽  
Educational Level ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Current System ◽  
Social World ◽  
Demographic Variables ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Psychological Variables ◽  
Telephone Interviews ◽  
The Social

Justice is a widely used evaluation criterion applied to both particular decisions and behavioursas well as to whole social, economic and political systems. The paper presents research results fromthe representative sample of adult Poles conducted in September 2014. The goal of the research wasto investigate the relationships between different schemata of world perception and the evaluationof the justice of the current socio-economic system. The method of the data collection was computerassisted telephone interviews. The results indicate that the evaluations of justice of the politicalsystem are lower when: political cynicism is higher, interpersonal distrust is higher and whenrespondents held a stronger belief that the social world is full of uncontrollable danger. Also thelower evaluations of justice of the current system were accompanied by acceptance of aggressionin politics. Socio-demographic variables were less correlated with the evaluations of the justiceof the system then were psychological variables. Only age and educational level significantly butweakly differentiated the evaluations of justice.

1. Demography is destiny … or not

2018 ◽  
pp. 1-5
Author(s):  
Sarah Harper
Keyword(s):  
Population Change ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Dynamic Processes ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Global Level ◽  
Static Characteristics ◽  
The Social ◽  
And Migration ◽  
The Relationship

It is increasingly recognized that population change plays a key role in our political systems, economies, and societies at the local, national, regional, and global level. ‘Demography is destiny … or not’ explains that demography has at its core the notion of drivers of population change—mortality, fertility, and migration—and how these then interact to change populations. Contemporary demography is divided into three separate areas of study: the characteristics of past or current populations, with regard to their size and make-up; the different demographic drivers that directly influence this composition, primarily fertility, mortality, and migration; and the relationship between these static characteristics and dynamic processes and the social, economic, and cultural environments within which they interact.

Justifying new employees’ trials by fire: workplace hazing

2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 381-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin J. Thomas ◽  
Patricia Meglich
Keyword(s):  
Repeated Measures ◽  
Blind Spot ◽  
System Justification ◽  
Content Type ◽  
New Employees ◽  
System Justification Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Dependent Variables ◽  
New Employee ◽  
Current Sample

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to test the explanatory effects of the system justification theory on reactions to new employee hazing.Design/methodology/approachThree studies (N= 107, 121 and 128), all using experimental assignment, vignettes of workplace hazing and two-level repeated measures ANCOVA designs, with dispositional variables included as covariates and justification of workplace hazing processes as dependent variables, were conducted.FindingsOnlookers are more likely to justify long-standing (cf. recently adopted) hazing systems and hazing systems used by highly cohesive (cf. loosely cohesive) teams, supporting the application of the system justification theory to workplace hazing reactions.Research limitations/implicationsThe use of vignette research and onlookers (cf. hazed employees) may limit inferences drawn about employee reactions in workplaces that use hazing.Practical implicationsDespite its negative associations, hazing at work persists, with 25 percent of current sample reported being hazed at work. The system justification theory, which the authors applied to hazing, offers an explanation for stakeholders’ willingness to sustain and perpetuate hazing, and onlookers’ seeming blind-spot regarding outrage over workplace hazing. This theory holds promise for combatting passive responses to workplace hazing.Originality/valueThis is the first paper to empirically test explanations for workplace hazing’s perpetuation, by applying the system justification theory to the social system of workplace hazing. Moreover, it is the first paper to offer empirical evidence of hazing’s prevalence across at least 25 percent of sampled industries and organizational rank.

The power of social structure: how we became an intelligent lineage

2010 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marina Resendes de Sousa António ◽  
Dirk Schulze-Makuch
Keyword(s):  
Social Behavior ◽  
Social Structure ◽  
New World ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Great Apes ◽  
Male Competition ◽  
Advanced Technology ◽  
Social Stability ◽  
New Findings ◽  
The Social

AbstractNew findings pertinent to the human lineage origin (Ardipithecus ramidus) prompt a new analysis of the extrapolation of the social behavior of our closest relatives, the great apes, into human ‘natural social behavior’. With the new findings it becomes clear that human ancestors had very divergent social arrangements from the ones we observe today in our closest genetic relatives.The social structure of chimpanzees and gorillas is characterized by male competition. Aggression and the instigation of fear are common place. The morphology of A. ramidus points in the direction of a social system characterized by female-choice instead of male–male competition. This system tends to be characterized by reduced aggression levels, leading to more stable arrangements. It is postulated here that the social stability with accompanying group cohesion propitiated by this setting is favorable to the investment in more complex behaviors, the development of innovative approaches to solve familiar problems, an increase in exploratory behavior, and eventually higher intelligence and the use of sophisticated tools and technology.The concentration of research efforts into the study of social animals with similar social systems (e.g., New World social monkeys (Callitrichidae), social canids (Canidae) and social rodents (Rodentia)) are likely to provide new insights into the understanding of what factors determined our evolution into an intelligent species capable of advanced technology.

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