Project Description
Aims and Central Research Question
We aim to describe and explain how perceptions of inequality and fairness develop among children and adolescents, and to analyze their consequences for educational as well as political attitudes and behavior. To do so, we bring together expertise from political science, sociology, linguistics, education science, and psychology. We pay particular attention to the interplay of different explanatory factors: individual characteristics like adolescents’ socio-economic backgrounds and their cognitive and language skills; the social influence of parents, teachers and peers; and the role of the institutional and regional context, e.g. characteristics of the school and neighborhood.
Background
Most existing studies on perceptions of inequality and fairness look at adults rather than students. Moreover, available evidence on students has been done by developmental psychologists and thus focuses on how these perceptions change when children get older. Sociological and psychological educational research has extensively studied structural inequalities in the educational system but has not taken much interest in the perceptions and evaluations by the children themselves, even though these can be expected to affect their motivation and aspirations within the educational system and beyond. Political science has only recently discovered the importance of inequality perceptions – beyond objective inequalities – for political participation and has focused on adults’ perceptions so far. We will move beyond these disciplinary limitations and describe and explain students’ perceptions of educational and societal inequality and fairness and their educational and political consequences. We plan to survey a larger number of students from different family backgrounds and in different institutional and regional settings.
Methods
We will conduct a panel study with younger and older students situated in secondary education in two German federal states. This allows us to analyze how perceptions of inequality and fairness differ across contexts and change over time. To gain a valid measure of students’ inequality perceptions, we will include survey experiments (using vignettes) in the panel study. These vignettes will depict fictional students systematically differing in inequality-related attributes such as their leisure activities, ethnicity, or their parents’ jobs,. In total, we aim to survey up to 330 classes with in total around 3,000 individuals, their parents and their teachers.
Disciplines
Political Science, Sociology, Linguistics, Education Science, Psychology
Starting Date
1 October 2019
Literature
Further Reading
Berti, Chiara, Luisa Molinari, und Giuseppina Speltini. 2010. „Classroom Justice and Psychological Engagement: Students’ and Teachers’ Representations“. Social Psychology of Education 13(4): 541–56.
Bruch, Sarah K., und Joe Soss. 2018. „Schooling as a Formative Political Experience: Authority Relations and the Education of Citizens“. Perspectives on Politics 16(1): 36–57.
Destin, Mesmin, Scott Richman, Fatima Varner, und Jelani Mandara. 2012. „“Feeling” Hierarchy: The Pathway from Subjective Social Status to Achievement“. Journal of Adolescence 35(6): 1571–79.
Diemer, Matthew A., und Luke J. Rapa. 2016. „Unraveling the Complexity of Critical Consciousness, Political Efficacy, and Political Action Among Marginalized Adolescents“. Child Development 87(1): 221–38.
Flanagan, Constance A., und Mariah Kornbluh. 2019. „How Unequal Is the United States? Adolescents’ Images of Social Stratification“. Child Development 90(3): 957–69.
Gingrich, Jane. 2019. „Schools and Attitudes Toward Economic Equality“. Policy Studies Journal 47(2): 324–52.
Janmaat, Jan Germen. 2013. „Subjective Inequality: A Review of International Comparative Studies on People’s Views about Inequality“. European Journal of Sociology / Archives Européennes de Sociologie 54(3): 357–89.
Kam, Cindy D., und Carl L. Palmer. 2008. „Reconsidering the Effects of Education on Political Participation“. The Journal of Politics 70(3): 612–31.
Kim, Chae-Young, und Sharon Gewirtz. 2019. „‘It’s Not Something I Can Change…’: Children’s Perceptions of Inequality and Their Agency in Relation to Their Occupational Choices“. Child Indicators Research 12(6): 2013–34.
Mijs, Jonathan J. B. 2016. „Stratified Failure Educational Stratification and Students’ Attributions of Their Mathematics Performance in 24 Countries“. Sociology of Education 89(2): 137–53.
Trump, Kris-Stella. 2020. „When and Why Is Economic Inequality Seen as Fair“. Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences 34: 46–51.