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Just-World Beliefs, Development of

This entry explores the developmental impact of justice concerns in general and the developmental trajectories and consequences of the belief in a just world (BJW) in particular. It shows that the belief in justice is an important resource that enables adolescents to cope with difficult developmental tasks. In the first section, which presents the theoretical background to the entry, the justice motive theory and the just-world hypothesis are outlined. In the next section, the general functions of BJW and its consequences in adolescence are described. The developmental trajectories of BJW from childhood to young adulthood are mapped out in the third section. The entry closes with some concluding remarks on developmental interventions during adolescence.

Theoretical Background

Individuals experience unfairness and the accompanying emotion—anger—on a daily basis, from everyday inconveniences to fundamental societal problems. There are great individual differences in reactions to unfairness and in the striving for justice, however, and the meaning of justice concerns changes across the life span. Two approaches to the explanation of justice, one content oriented, the other motivational, aim to elucidate these differences. The content-oriented approach starts with the question of what is seen as (un-)just. The rules of distributive and procedural justice are defined, and the situational conditions and personal characteristics guiding the application of specific rules are described. However, the content of justice matters only if one actually cares about justice. In this sense, the motivational approach, which explains why people are concerned with justice and how this motive guides their actions, is the more basic one. In the following, the functions of the justice motive and its developmental trajectories are described.

Psychological research highlighting the motivational functions of justice concerns is rooted in the “belief in a just world” hypothesis formulated by Melvin J. Lerner (e.g., Lerner, 1980; for a review, see Furnham, 2003). Lerner states that people need to believe in a just world, in which everybody gets what they deserve, because this enables them to deal with the physical and social environment as if it were stable and orderly. Because observed or experienced injustices threaten these adaptive functions, individuals suffer greatly when confronted with unfairness and thus do their best to avoid it.

The Three Functions of BJW

Dalbert (2001) identified three main functions of BJW: First, individuals high in BJW are able to place more trust in others, that is, to believe that they will be treated fairly by others and will not fall victim to unforeseeable disasters. In achievement situations, for example, individuals high in BJW expect to be confronted only with fair tasks. They thus feel less stressed and consequently perform better, as has been shown in both laboratory (Tomaka & Blascovich, 1994) and school studies (e.g., see Dalbert & Sallay, in press). Moreover, people high in BJW are more likely to invest in their futures because they are confident that their investments will be fairly rewarded. For example, adolescent school leavers and young male prisoners high in BJW are more sure of attaining their personal goals (e.g., see Dalbert & Sallay, in press). Consequently, they are more likely to display persistent goal-directed behavior. The second function of BJW is that it provides a conceptual framework that helps individuals to interpret the events of their personal lives in meaningful ways. When individuals high in BJW either observe or experience injustice, they usually try to restore justice or—if they see no way to compensate for the injustice in reality—to assimilate this experience to their BJW, for example, by justifying an experienced unfairness as being at least partly self-inflicted, by playing down the injustice or explaining the perpetrator's actions as unintentional, and by avoiding self-focused rumination (e.g., Hafer & Correy, 1999). Assimilating unfairness to one's BJW promotes the adaptive coping processes of finding meaning in one's life, allaying feelings of anger, and enhancing mental health (e.g., Dalbert, 2001). Consequently, adolescents and young adults with a strong BJW are more satisfied with their lives, and they experience more positive affect, both in daily life and when coping with critical life events, such as early unemployment (e.g., see Dalbert & Sallay, in press). Furthermore, they experience less anger and are better able to control their angry reactions, in particular, outburst behavior (see Dalbert & Sallay, in press). The third function is that in a just world, a positive future is not the gift of a benevolent world, but a reward for the individual's behavior and character. Consequently, individuals high in BJW try to behave fairly whenever possible; they try to establish justice in reality (e.g., Bierhoff, Klein, & Kramp, 1991), and their own unjust behavior will be censured, for example, by a decrease in self-esteem (see Dalbert, 2001).

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