The Relationship Between Subjective Social Class And Subjective Well-being: The Role Of Just World Belief And Intergenerational Mobility Of Education

Happiness is the ultimate pursuit of human life and subjective well-being has always been a hot research topic in positive psychology.Although many studies have shown that objective social class is related to happiness,more and more researchers have found that individuals’ perception of their own social status,that is,subjective social class,is a stronger predictor of happiness.The belief of a just world represents an individual’s judgment of whether the world is just or not.According to the just world theory,fairness and justice are also one of the basic needs of human beings and one of the preconditions for happiness.There are differences in the views of justice among different social classes,but the opposite results are found in the research on the belief of justice of lower social classes,and some researchers believe that the mobility level of individuals may play a moderating role.Mobility means that the individual’s social position changes,which will have a certain impact on their cognition and behavior,and the intergenerational educational mobility is closely related to class mobility.Therefore,this study aims to explore the role of just world belief in subjective social class and subjective well-being,and the role of education intergenerational mobility in subjective social class and just world belief.Using data from the 2019 Comprehensive Survey of China’s Social Conditions,the first study explored the relationship between subjective social class,intergenerational mobility of education,social justice and life satisfaction.The results show that subjective social class positively predicts subjective well-being,social justice partially mediates the relationship between subjective social class and subjective well-being,and education intergenerational mobility distance moderates the relationship between subjective social class and perceived social justice.In study 2,questionnaires were used to further verify that subjective social class influenced subjective well-being through belief in a just world,and that intergenerational mobility of education moderated the first half of the pathway.The results show that belief in a just world partially mediates the relationship between subjective social class and subjective well-being,and the intergenerational mobility distance of education moderates the relationship between subjective social class and belief in a just world in the future of self and present of others.Specifically,with the increase of educational mobility distance,Subjective social class plays a decreasing role in predicting belief in self future and present justice of others.The results of this study show that there is a positive relationship between perceived social class and subjective well-being,and the sense of social justice and belief in a just world can play a partial mediating role between them,and this mediating role will be moderated by the intergenerational mobility of education.That is,the increase of educational intergenerational mobility distance helps to mitigate the negative impact of low subjective social class on the sense of social justice,and the negative impact of low subjective social class on the belief of self’s future and others’ present just world.