Continuities in Theories of Status Consistency and Cognitive Dissonance
James A. Geschwender Wayne State University
Social Forces, Vol. 46, No. 2 (Dec., 1967), 160-171

  1. Abstract
  2. Social Certitude and Expectancy Congruence
  3. Evaluation of Social Certitude and Expectancy Congruence
  4. The Theory of Distributive Justice
    1. Certain status dimentions could be viewed as investments into a social situation while others could be viewed as rewards received from that situation.
      1. Achieved investments
        1. Education
      2. Ascribed investments
        1. Ethnicity
      3. Social rewards
        1. Occupation (quality)
      4. Material rewards
        1. Income
    2. Using these definitions, it could be concluded that a state of distributive justice exists when individuals who possess greater investments (higher education and /or ethnicity) also possess greater rewards (higher occupation and/or income).
    3. Those persons whose investments are higher than rewards (level of occupation and/or income below the level of ethnicity and/or education) will experience injustice and feel anger.
    4. It is reasonable to assume that this anger may be directed against the society which fails to maintain distributive justice and may lead to behavior designed to change society in order to eliminate this inequity.
    5. Those persons whose investments are lower than their rewards (education and/or ethnicity below level of occupation and/or income) would experience a felt injustice and feel guilt.
      1. It may be assumed that individuals who are over-rewarded will not attempt to reduce guilt feelings by lowering their reward level. It is more likely that they will develop a political philosophy which, if implimented, would ameliorade the consequences of being short-changed for those who are under-rewarded.
      2. They might also develop a polotical philosophy which defines ascribed investments as irrelevant to rewards. In short, they may become political liberals.
      3. If educational investment is the low dimention they may either attempt to raise their level of education to one consistent with rewards received or else develop a definition of education as being "ivory tower" and impractical, which would lead to anti-intellectualism.
  5. Relation of Distributive Justice to Dissonance Theory
    1. It is possible to incorporate the Theory of Distributive Justice into dissonance theory with the addition of a few assumptions.
      1. Every individual includes within his cognitive set cognitions concerning his status level in the educational, occupational, ethnic, and income hierarchies.
      2. He possesses cognitions defining education as an achieved investment, ethnicity as an ascribed investment, occupation as a social reward, and income as a material reward.
      3. He possesses cognitions which define the proper relation that should hold between investment and reward dimentions.
      4. This definition of the proper relation between investment and rewards would be based upon the individual's perception of that relation which normally exists in society.
    2. Thus, experiencing a state of felt injustice is reduced to experiencing cognitive dissonance resulting from inconsistency among simultaneously held cognitions. The empirical consequences of felt injustice may be seen as behavioral attempts to reduce dissonance.
    3. Congruent sets of expectations facilitate the development of satisfying patterns of social interaction and incongruent sets of expectations impede this development.
    4. Other behavioral responses may be non-coping responses indicating an inability to reduce dissonance.
  6. Evaluation in Relation to Findings
    1. The research literature had demonstrated six different types of response to status inconsistency.
      1. Mobility Striving
        1. Individuals are ranked or have status on three major dimensional hierarchies:
          1. Economic
          2. Political
          3. Prestige
        2. Homans cash posters and ledger clerks: Cash posters and ledger clerks were paid the same, yet it was perceived by the ledger clerks that their job was more important. Theycomplained for higher wages to reflect their perceived superior status.
        3. Persons experiencing dissonance resulting from status inconsistency may attempt to reduce this dissonance by altering their ranking on one or more of the dimentions of status.
      2. Political Liberalism
        1. Certain patterns of inconsistency were more closely associated with liberalism than others.
          1. A person of low ethnic status and high income, occupational or educational status, tended to be more liberal than the reverse combination.
          2. Individuals with low educational and high occupational statuses tended to be more politically liberal that did those with the opposite combination.
          3. An inconsistent with high occupational and low income status was more likely to be liberal than was the reverse combination.
          4. The high income low occupation inconsistent was less likely to be liberal than were consistents.
        2. These findings suggest that a person who experiences dissonance resulting from status inconsistency may try to reduce his dissonance through the development of a liberal political outlook.
        3. Categorized as over-rewarded, they would be expected to feel guilt and their attempts to reduce dissonance might take the form of ameliorating the consequences for others of their getting more than their share, and to develop a belief that ethnicity should not be related to rewards. Both of these are indications of political liberalism.
      3. Social Isolation
        1. Status inconsistency creates a situation in which there exists conflicting sets of behavioral expectations. This interferes with the development of fluid tension-free interaction.
          1. Interactions become unpleasant and tends to be broken off.
          2. The earliest stage of this process is found in the other person avoiding the inconsistent and in the inconsistent resorting to joking.
          3. Withdrawal on the part of the inconsistent may represent the final acceptance on his part of the impossibility of creating satisfying patterns of interaction.
          4. Suicide is the most extreme form of withdrawal. Gibbs and Martin found a relationship between status inconsistency and propensity toward suicide.
      4. Preference for Social Change
        1. Benoit-Smulyan: "There are historical grounds for supposing that when legal, customary, or other barriers seriously hamper the equilibrating tendency, social tensions of revolutionary magnitude may be generated."
        2. Low ethnicity-high occupation inconsistents support leftist movements.
        3. High occupation-low income inconsistents support rightest movements.
        4. Under-rewarded inconsistents with a high level of education tend to take an extremist position in reacting against the social order.
        5. Over-rewarded inconsistents with a low ethnic status tend to take a more moderate reformist position when reacting against the social order.
        6. Anger is a stronger emotion than guilt. The angry (under-rewarded) inconsistent would be expected to experience a sharper form of dissonance and a more extreme reaction than would guilty (over-rewarded) inconsistents.
      5. Psychosomatic Symptoms
        1. High ethnicity combined with either low occupation or low education had high rates of psychosomatic symptoms.
          1. Only a slight tendency toward political liberalism.
          2. Tend to see themselves as failures.
          3. Direct their response to stress inward.
        2. Low ethnicity combined with high education or high occupation did not have symptom rates which differed from that of status consistents.
          1. Strong tendencies toward political liberalism.
          2. Tend to see themselves as successful.
          3. Direct their response to stress outward.
        3. High occupation and low educational statuses have higher symptom rates than status consistents.
          1. Unlikely to see future opportunities for mobility. More mobility would create greater inconsistency.
        4. High educational ans low occupational statuses have lower symptom rates than status consistents.
          1. Likely to see the possibility of future mobility opportunities.
      6. Prejudice
        1. Perception of status reduction by increasing competititon and superiority by a perceived ethnic subordinate.
  7. Discussion
    All persons hold sets of cognitions which include the following
    Reality based cognitions Normative cognitions
    The Existing state of affairs. The state of affairs which should exist.
    perceptions of one's status in the educational, occupational, income, and ethnic hierarchies. beliefs regarding the proper relation that should exist among the various status positions. Including the belief that rewards received should be proportional to investments

    Any set of cognitions may stand under the following conditions
    Dissonance Consonance Irrelevence
         
  8. Conclusion
FOR MORE INFORMATION SEE:
A Conceptual Framework and Some Empirical Data Regarding Comparisons of Social Rewards
Martin Patchen
Sociometry, Vol. 24, No. 2
(Jun., 1961), 136-156.