Antecedents and Consequences of System-Justifying Ideologies
Abstract
According to system justification theory, there is a psychological motive to defend and justify the status quo. There are both dispositional antecedents (e.g., need for closure, openness to experience) and situational antecedents (e.g., system threat, mortality salience) of the tendency to embrace system-justifying ideologies. Consequences of system justification sometimes differ for members of advantaged versus disadvantaged groups, with the former experiencing increased and the latter decreased self-esteem, well-being, and in-group favoritism. In accordance with the palliative function of system justification, endorsement of such ideologies is associated with reduced negative affect for everyone, as well as weakened support for social change and redistribution of resources.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Mortality salience and death anxiety have been identified as antecedents of system justification.
“Mortality salience and death anxiety have been identified as antecedents of system justification (Jost & Hunyady, 2005).”
Cites
Political conservatism as motivated social cognition.
Jost, J. T., Glaser, J., Kruglanski, A. W., & Sulloway, F. J. (2003) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/0033-2909.129.3.339 · Cited by 4,904 · see citing works
Self-citationLerner, M. J. (1980) · doi:10.1007/978-1-4899-0448-5 · Cited by 2,656 · see citing works
The psychology of system justification and the palliative function of ideology
Jost, J., & Hunyady, O. (2003) · European Review of Social Psychology · doi:10.1080/10463280240000046 · Cited by 833 · see citing works
Self-citationLandau, M. J., Solomon, S., Greenberg, J., Cohen, F., Pyszczynski, T., Arndt, J., Miller, C. H., Ogilvie, D. M., & Cook, A. (2004) · Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin · doi:10.1177/0146167204267988 · Cited by 663 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
McLean, K. C., & Syed, M. (2015) · Human Development · doi:10.1159/000445817 · Cited by 743 · see citing works
Bae, S. Y., & Chang, P.-J. (2021) · Current Issues in Tourism · doi:10.1080/13683500.2020.1798895 · Cited by 743 · see citing works
Feygina, I., Jost, J. T., & Goldsmith, R. E. (2010) · Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin · doi:10.1177/0146167209351435 · Cited by 720 · see citing works
Self-citationAre Cultural and Economic Conservatism Positively Correlated? A Large-Scale Cross-National Test
Malka, A., Lelkes, Y., & Soto, C. J. (2019) · British Journal of Political Science · doi:10.1017/s0007123417000072 · Cited by 287 · see citing works
Hennes, E. P., Nam, H. H., Stern, C., & Jost, J. T. (2012) · Social Cognition · doi:10.1521/soco.2012.30.6.669 · Cited by 245 · see citing works
Self-citationAustralian politicians’ beliefs about climate change: political partisanship and political ideology
Fielding, K. S., Head, B. W., Laffan, W., Western, M., & Hoegh-Guldberg, O. (2012) · Environmental Politics · doi:10.1080/09644016.2012.698887 · Cited by 235 · see citing works
Exposure to rising inequality shapes Americans' opportunity beliefs and policy support
McCall, L., Burk, D., Laperrière, M., & Richeson, J. A. (2017) · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · doi:10.1073/pnas.1706253114 · Cited by 226 · see citing works
Nisbet, E. C., Hart, P. S., Myers, T., & Ellithorpe, M. (2013) · Journal of Communication · doi:10.1111/jcom.12040 · Cited by 137 · see citing works
Belief in school meritocracy as a system-justifying tool for low status students
Wiederkehr, V., Bonnot, V., Krauth-Gruber, S., & Darnon, C. (2015) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01053 · Cited by 92 · see citing works
McNamara, R. A., Norenzayan, A., & Henrich, J. (2016) · Religion, Brain & Behavior · doi:10.1080/2153599x.2014.921235 · Cited by 77 · see citing works
van der Toorn, J., Nail, P. R., Liviatan, I., & Jost, J. T. (2014) · Journal of Experimental Social Psychology · doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2014.04.003 · Cited by 76 · see citing works
Self-citationJin, S. V., & Ryu, E. (2022) · Journal of Consumer Affairs · doi:10.1111/joca.12381 · Cited by 52 · see citing works
Self-protection promotes altruism
Chan, E. Y. (2017) · Evolution and Human Behavior · doi:10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2017.05.004 · Cited by 26 · see citing works
- Authors
- Jost, J. T., & Hunyady, O.
- Affiliations
- New York University (US)
- Adelphi University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Jost, John T.
- ORCID
- Jost, John T.
- Venue
- Current Directions in Psychological Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2005-10
- Volume
- 14
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 260-265
- ISSN
- 0963-7214 (ISSN-L)
- 1467-8721
- OpenAlex
- W2006202811
- Cited by
- 1,063
- References
- 4
- Citations by year
- 2026: 43 · 2025: 49 · 2024: 76 · 2023: 70 · 2022: 67 · 2021: 89 · 2020: 68 · 2019: 78 · 2018: 69 · 2017: 61 · 2016: 47 · 2015: 50 · 2014: 49 · 2013: 55 · 2012: 37
- FWCI
- 51.01
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Current Directions in Psychological Science (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social Power and Status Dynamics
- Keywords
- system justification, need for closure, openness to experience, mortality salience, self-esteem, well-being, in-group favoritism, negative affect, resource redistribution
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
