Models of Understanding
Just World Hypothesis: Theory and a Natural Field Experiment
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session James Konow
The Just World Hypothesis (JWH) posits that people are motivated to believe that the actual rules of their world are fair. An implication of the JWH is that people will adjust their beliefs about fairness toward actual rules, when beliefs are endogenous and diverge from the prevailing rules. We formulate a theory of distributive preferences in which beliefs about the fair rule are endogenous and based on two possible rules, equity (i.e., proportionality to contributions) and equality (i.e., equal splits). We test the theory with a natural field experiment conducted in Ethiopia in which participants work over a two week period under either equal or equitable pay rules. The behavioral and questionnaire results are consistent with the predicted adjustment of beliefs about fair pay toward actual pay. Specifically, worker productivity shifts in ways that are not predicted by models of self-interest or stable fairness preferences.
Subjectivity in the Social Sciences
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Steven Brown
Subjectivity is ubiquitous and implies perspectives that range in scope from the intrapersonal (as in individual musings and daydreams) to the intercultural (as in communication between and among identities) and in sophistication from the inchoate babblings of infants to the theoretical pronouncements of philosophers and mathematicians. Q methodology is a philosophical and conceptual framework that, in tandem with its technical and analytical procedures, provides the basis for a science of subjectivity that is applicable across all humanities and sciences as well as their extensions into public policy, and that has implications for all themes in this conference. This paper will introduce the basic principles and procedures of Q methodology (rooted in the fundamentals of factor-analytic developments of the past century) and will demonstrate its applicability to a variety of subject-matter domains, such as literary interpretation, strategic planning and decision making, scientific creativity, educational and psychological assessment, and the intensive analysis of single cases.
Social Community in Bhutan: Gross National Happiness and Buddhism in View
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Yuki Tashiro
This paper investigates the changes in Gross National Happiness and how GNH and its concept is penetrated and inherited by people. We visited the Kingdom of Bhutan (hereinafter "Bhutan") for the study. Due to the influence of modernization, consumer trends are appearing in urban areas such as Thimphu (especially among young people), and this cannot be avoided. This is what actually happens in Bhutan, but at the same time, the government is trying to improve the situation, and they seem to have flexibility and accept changes as necessity. The current government regime is occupied by people from rural areas and they know what actual life is like in rural areas. However, in the future, those people would be replaced by people who are born and raised in urban areas. When this generational change happens, will the balance of the GNH's four pillars be kept or will it be overtaken by materialism? It is important to keep an eye on the future of Bhutan and its people. As for the research method and relevant theory, the "socion theory," which has been developed in Japan under the influence of sociologist Niklas Luhmann's (1995) "Social Systems" (Stanford University Press), is applied to elucidate complex social-psychological linkages among diverse stakeholders in and around the country of Bhutan.
