Increasing wealth inequality may increase interpersonal hostility: The relationship between personal relative deprivation and aggression

2017/01/31 by Tobias Greitemeyer, Christina Sagioglou · 2 citations
Psychology · Social Sciences · #Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion #Health disparities and outcomes #Psychological Well-being and Life Satisfaction

paper · pdf · doi:10.1080/00224545.2017.1288078

openalex publication_date 2017/01/31 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23

Abstract

In most Western societies, wealth inequality is increasing, which in turn could increase people's belief that one's standing is relatively disadvantaged. Based on relative deprivation theory, we argue that such an experience of personal relative deprivation should causally lead to greater interpersonal hostility. Indeed, three experiments show that participants in a personal relative deprivation condition reported higher levels of aggressive affect and behaved more aggressively than participants in a personal relative gratification condition. Compared to a control condition, participants experiencing personal relative deprivation were more aggressive rather than participants experiencing personal relative gratification being less aggressive. However, personal relative deprivation increased aggressive behavior only toward targets that were the source for participants' experience of disadvantage, but it did not increase aggression toward neutral targets.

Citations

• A model of egoistical relative deprivation.
• The Social Ladder: A Rank-Based Perspective on Social Class
• Inside the Turk
• Gambling as a Search for Justice: Examining the Role of Personal Relative Deprivation in Gambling Urges and Gambling Behavior

Cited by

• The impact of personal relative deprivation on aggression over time
• They shouldn’t be richer than me: How visual wealth exposure on social media increases relative deprivation