Since we were little we have been inoculated with the idea that life is fair. And we absolutely believe in it, many times ignoring the evidence that shows that this is not the case. We are victims of the “belief in a just world”, a psychological bias that prevents us from taking note of the contrary evidence.
This belief in a just world gives us security, tranquility and comfort because, unconsciously, we think that if we do nothing bad, nothing bad will happen to us. Obviously, this is not the case.
Life is not fair or unfair, simply because that concept doesn’t exist. In fact, decades of research indicate that the belief in a just world could make us “worse people” or more insensitive to suffering and inequalities.
We look for a legitimate reason that explains the bad things
In 1966 the psychologists Melvyn Lerner and Carolyn Simmons discovered a strange phenomenon. They showed a series of people live images of a woman receiving painful electric shocks every time she failed a memory test.
When the participants were given the option to end her suffering, almost everyone did. However, when they were denied the possibility of intervening to stop the punishment by becoming mere bystanders, the participants changed their views on the woman and convinced themselves that her pain was not so terrible and that probably she was not so innocent.
As a general rule, when we face an injustice our first impulse is to try to alleviate it, but if we cannot and we feel powerless, we will look for reasons to convince ourselves that, after all, the world is not as unfair as it seems. We convince ourselves that “something must have done” that person to deserve this “punishment.”
In other words, we readjust our view of the victim to maintain our belief in a just world. This is the psychological mechanism that underlies the blame of the victim and makes us think that he or she “deserved it”.
We put in place a rationalization mechanism that leads us to look for valid reasons for this injustice. In fact, it is something we do continuously. Our brain is always trying to find a meaning to what happens to us to fit these experiences into our mental schemes.
We continually generate explanations for the facts and patterns that we perceive, without worrying too much about their being true and/or accurate. To find these answers quickly, we tend to hold on to the first things that we see or that go through our mind, without reflecting too much on them. In fact, most of our explanations do not really seek the essence, but are based on the characteristics of the things we are trying to explain.
Researchers at New York University found that when they asked people to explain various status disparities, they preferred explanations that were based on inherent traits rather than those that referred to past events or contextual influences.
For example, they were more likely to say that a certain group with a high social status achieved these advantages because they “were better” or “more intelligent”, without taking into account aspects such as the fact that they lived in a prosperous area or that they come from a wealthy family. Interestingly, the stronger a participant’s preference for inherent explanations, the stronger his or her belief in a just world, thus assuming that inequalities were just and fair.
The “adverse effects” of the belief in a just world
The desire to believe that things happen for a reason leads to attitudes that contribute to reinforcing injustice, rather than reducing it. A study conducted at the University of Washington, revealed that people who strongly believe that the world is a fair place are more likely to oppose affirmative action plans designed to help women or minorities.
In practice, the more we believe that success comes exclusively from hard work and that people get what they deserve, the less likely we are to support programs that favor disadvantaged groups. In fact, we do not even have to be racist, xenophobic or homophobic to develop this bias, it is enough to hold on to the conviction that the world is a basically fair place.
So why do we cling to the belief in a just world?
“People believe in a just world because it is too difficult to accept the vagaries of the universe. The belief in a fundamentally fair world, a place where you are unlikely to be killed unless you are a gang member, you are unlikely to go bankrupt unless you are foolish, and you are also unlikely to be raped unless ‘you want ‘it’s comfortable”, wrote journalist Nicholas Hune-Brown.
We avoid the fear that causes us thinking that it could also happen to us, because it is not enough with behaving well or being good people for escapeing bad things. Without the belief in a just world, life seems an intolerably chaotic, terrifying and meaningless nightmare.
Facing the truth, the fact that in the world there is violence, poverty and discrimination in a capricious way is simply terrifying. Because, if there is no good reason why a specific person is suffering, it is much more difficult to escape the terrifying conclusion that it could be us.
“It is a way of maintaining the vital illusion that we, the healthy and prosperous, are not only lucky, but somehow we deserve it. We all want to live in a just world. Without a doubt. However, if we want to achieve it, the first step will be to overcome the magical thought that this world already exists”, stated Hune-Brown.
Hussak, L. J., & Cimpian, A. (2015) An Early-Emerging Explanatory Heuristic Promotes Support for the Status Quo. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology; 109(5).
Hune, N. (2015) The Monstrous Cruelty of a Just World. In: Hazlitt.
Wilkins, V. M. & Wenger, J. B. (2014) Belief in a Just World and Attitudes Toward Affirmative Action. PSJ; 42(3): 325-343.
Lerner, M. J. & Simmons, C. H. (1966) Observer’s reaction to the «innocent victim»: Compassion or rejection? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology; 4(2): 203–210.