Cultural values, system justification, meritocratic beliefs, and evaluations of governments' performance in handling the COVID‐19 crisis

System justification and meritocratic beliefs legitimize the status quo of economic, social, and political arrangements, and may correlate with favourable evaluations of governments' performance during the COVID‐19 pandemic. This study furthers research on this topic by examining (1) the cultur...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Asian journal of social psychology 2023-09, Vol.26 (3), p.374-384
Main Authors: Zhai, Yida, Wu, Qidi, Lu, Yizhen
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Beliefs
collectivist values
COVID-19
COVID‐19 pandemic
Cultural values
government performance
Intergroup relations
Meritocracy
system justification
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Summary:System justification and meritocratic beliefs legitimize the status quo of economic, social, and political arrangements, and may correlate with favourable evaluations of governments' performance during the COVID‐19 pandemic. This study furthers research on this topic by examining (1) the cultural value antecedents of system justification and meritocratic beliefs, and (2) the differential effects of these on attitudes toward ingroups and outgroups from an intergroup perspective. The results show that collectivist values positively predict system justification and meritocratic beliefs, whereas a similar effect was not observed for individualist values. As hypothesized, system justification motivation was positively associated with favourable evaluation of the Chinese government (an ingroup). By contrast, system justification and meritocratic beliefs were negatively associated with evaluation of the American government (an outgroup). We discussed the implications for understandings of the cultural value bases of system justification and meritocratic beliefs, and the relevance of the lens of intergroup relations in studying those beliefs.
ISSN:1367-2223
1467-839X
DOI:10.1111/ajsp.12565