Belief in an Unjust World: When Beliefs in a Just World Fail

@article{Lench2007BeliefIA,
  title={Belief in an Unjust World: When Beliefs in a Just World Fail},
  author={Heather C. Lench and Esther S Chang},
  journal={Journal of Personality Assessment},
  year={2007},
  volume={89},
  pages={126 - 135}
}
Belief in a just world, where people get what they deserve, has been hypothesized to underlie a variety of psychological phenomena (Lerner, 1965). Close inspection of individual difference measures of this belief, however, has indicated repeatedly that just world beliefs are not a unidimensional construct. The purpose of this investigation was to elaborate upon the conceptualization of unjust world beliefs as a related but separate construct from just world beliefs. In two studies, the Unjust… 
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42 Citations
Highly Influential Citations
6
Background Citations
16
Methods Citations
3

42 Citations

Tipping the Scales of Justice: The Influence of Victimization on Belief in a Just World
Previous research has suggested that people have a need to believe in a just world in order to function adaptively, even when negative events occur. However, existing work has not examined how…
Beliefs in an Unjust World: Mediating Ethnicity-Related Stressors and Psychological Functioning.
TLDR
Although addressing racism and OGCPS at a systemic level (e.g., policy, prejudice prevention) is needed to reduce ERS, these findings suggest that BUW is one point of possible clinical intervention for individuals who have experienced these stressors.
Catastrophizing Mediates the Relationship Between the Personal Belief in a Just World and Pain Outcomes Among Chronic Pain Support Group Attendees
TLDR
Pain catastrophizing was negatively correlated with the personal just world belief and mediated the relationship between this belief and pain and disability, but not distress, and Suggestions for future research and intervention development are made.
Justifying Inequality: A Cross-Temporal Investigation of U.S. Income Disparities and Just-World Beliefs from 1973 to 2006
This cross-temporal meta-analysis examined 6,120 American college students’ scores on the Belief in a Just World Scale (BJW; Rubin and Peplau, J Soc Issues 31(3):65–90, 1975) across the last three…
Self-Blame and Blaming Others Mediate a Belief in a Just World and Hwa-Byung: a Structural Equation Model
The purpose of this study was to examine the mediating effects of self-blame and the blaming of others on the relationships between Hwa-Byung (meaning “anger illness” in Korean) and beliefs in a just…
The effect of apology on forgiveness: Belief in a just world as a moderator
Beliefs in an unjust world mediate the associations between perceived ethnic discrimination and psychological functioning
Psychometric properties of the polish updated Illinois rape myth acceptance scale
Stereotyped beliefs concerning rape, called rape myths, are a global problem. The aim of the studies was to assess the psychometric properties of the Polish version of the Updated Illinois Rape Myth…
Psychological Adaptation and Beliefs in Targeted Parents: A Study in the Context of Parental Alienation
The main aim of the present study was to examine the psychological adaptation and beliefs of parents who identified themselves as experiencing a situation of parental alienation (targeted parents).…
Justice and foresight: The effect of belief in a just world and sense of control on delay discounting
Discounting rate refers to people’s tendency to reduce the rate of subjective value from delayed benefit over time. The current study investigates the relationship among belief in a just world (BJW),…
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References

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