Which social comparisons influence happiness with unequal pay?
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Accepted manuscript
Date
2020-09-24
Authors
Putnam-Farr, Eleanor
Morewedge, Carey K.
Version
Accepted manuscript
OA Version
Citation
Eleanor Putnam-Farr, Carey K Morewedge. 2020. "Which social comparisons influence happiness with unequal pay?." J Exp Psychol Gen, https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0000965
Abstract
We examine which social comparisons most affect happiness with pay that is unequally distributed (e.g., salaries and bonuses). We find that ensemble representation-attention to statistical properties of distributions such as their range and mean-makes the proximal extreme (i.e., the maximum or minimum) and distribution mean salient social comparison standards. Happiness with a salary or bonus is more affected by how it compares to the distribution mean and proximal extreme than by exemplar-based properties of the payment, like its comparison to the nearest payment or its distribution rank. This holds for randomly assigned and performance-based payments. Process studies demonstrate that ensemble representations lead people to spontaneously select these statistical properties of pay distributions as comparison standards. Exogenously increasing the salience of less extreme exemplars moderates the influence of the maximum on happiness with pay, but exogenously increasing the salience of the distribution maximum does not. As with other social comparison standards, top-down information moderates their selection. Happiness with a bonus payment is influenced by the largest payment made to others who solve the same math problems, for instance, but not by the largest payment made to others who solve different verbal problems. Our findings yield theoretical and practical insights about which members of groups are selected as social comparison standards, effects of relative income on happiness, and the attentional processes involved in ensemble representation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).
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© 2020, American Psychological Association. This paper is not the copy of record and may not exactly replicate the final, authoritative version of the article. Please do not copy or cite without authors' permission. The final article will be available, upon publication, via its DOI: 10.1037/xge0000965