social classes meaning essay

What Is Social Class, and Why Does it Matter?

How Sociologists Define and Study the Concept

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Class, economic class, socio-economic class, social class. What's the difference? Each refers to how people are sorted into groups—specifically ranked hierarchies —in society. There are, in fact, important differences among them.

Economic Class

Economic class refers specifically to how one ranks relative to others in terms of income and wealth. Simply put, we are sorted into groups by how much money we have. These groups are commonly understood as lower (the poorest), middle, and upper class (the richest). When someone uses the word "class" to refer to how people are stratified in society, they are most often referring to this.

The model of economic class we use today is a derivation of German philosopher Karl Marx 's (1818–1883) definition of class, which was central to his theory of how society operates in a state of class conflict. In that state, an individual's power comes directly from one's economic class position relative to the means of production—one is either an owner of capitalist entities or a worker for one of the owners. Marx and fellow philosopher Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) presented this idea in " The Manifesto of the Communist Party ," and Marx expounded in much greater length in volume one of his work called "Capital."

Socio-Economic Class

Socio-economic class, also known as socioeconomic status  and often abbreviated as SES, refers to how other factors, namely occupation and education, are combined with wealth and income to rank a person relative to others in society. This model is inspired by the theories of German sociologist Max Weber (1864–1920), who viewed the stratification of society as a result of the combined influences of economic class, social status (the level of a person's prestige or honor relative to others), and group power (what he called "party"). Weber defined "party" as the level of one's ability to get what they want, despite how others may fight them on it. Weber wrote about this in an essay titled "The distribution of power within the political community: Class, status, party," in his 1922 book "Economy and Society," published after his death.

Socio-economic class is a more complex formulation than economic class because it takes into account the social status attached to certain professions considered prestigious, like doctors and professors, for example, and to educational attainment as measured in academic degrees. It also takes into account the lack of prestige or even stigma that may be associated with other professions, like blue-collar jobs or the service sector, and the stigma often associated with not finishing high school. Sociologists typically create data models that draw on ways of measuring and ranking these different factors to arrive at a low, middle, or high SES for a given person.

Social Class

The term "social class" is often used interchangeably with SES, both by the general public and by sociologists alike. Very often when you hear it used, that is what it means. In a technical sense, however, social class is used to refer specifically to the characteristics that are less likely to change, or harder to change, than one's economic status, which is potentially changeable over time. In such a case, social class refers to the socio-cultural aspects of one's life, namely the traits, behaviors, knowledge, and lifestyle that one is socialized into by one's family. This is why class descriptors like "lower," "working," "upper," or "high" can have social as well as economic implications for how we understand the person described.

When someone uses "classy" as a descriptor, they are naming certain behaviors and lifestyle and framing them as superior to others. In this sense, social class is determined strongly by one's level of cultural capital , a concept developed by French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1930–2002) in his 1979 work "Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste." Bourdieu said that levels of class are determined by the attainment of a specific set of knowledge, behaviors, and skills that allow a person to navigate in society.

Why Does It Matter?

So why does class, however you want to name it or slice it, matter? It matters to sociologists because the fact that it exists reflects unequal access to rights, resources, and power in society—what we call social stratification . As such, it has a strong effect on the access an individual has to education, the quality of that education, and how high a level he or she can reach. It also affects who one knows socially, and the extent to which those people can provide advantageous economic and employment opportunities, political participation and power, and even health and life expectancy, among many other things.

Sources and Further Reading

• Cookson Jr., Peter W. and Caroline Hodges Persell. "Preparing for Power: America's Elite Boarding Schools." New York: Basic Books, 1985.
• Marx, Karl. " Capital: A Critique of Political Economy ." Trans. Moore, Samuel, Edward Aveling and Friedrich Engels. Marxists.org, 2015 (1867).
• Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. " The Communist Manifesto ." Trans. Moore, Samuel and Friedrich Engels. Marxists.org, 2000 (1848).
• Weber, Max. "Economy and Society." ed. Roth, Guenther and Claus Wittich. Oakland: University of California Press, 2013 (1922).
• What Is Capitalism?
• What Is Social Stratification, and Why Does It Matter?
• What You Need to Know About Economic Inequality
• Understanding Karl Marx's Class Consciousness and False Consciousness
• The Differences Between Communism and Socialism
• The Sociology of Consumption
• Max Weber's Key Contributions to Sociology
• Introduction to Sociology
• 15 Major Sociological Studies and Publications
• What Does Consumerism Mean?
• What is a Norm? Why Does it Matter?
• Understanding Alienation and Social Alienation
• Visualizing Social Stratification in the U.S.
• Definition of Scapegoat, Scapegoating, and Scapegoat Theory
• What Is Cultural Capital? Do I Have It?
• Understanding Conflict Theory

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Social Class in the United States

Learning objectives.

• Distinguish objective and subjective measures of social class.
• Discuss whether the United States has much vertical social mobility.

Most sociologists define social class as a grouping based on similar social factors like wealth, income, education, and occupation. These factors affect how much power and prestige a person has. Social stratification reflects an unequal distribution of resources. In most cases, having more money means having more power or more opportunities. There is a surprising amount of disagreement among sociologists on the number of social classes in the United States and even on how to measure social class membership. We first look at the measurement issue and then discuss the number and types of classes sociologists have delineated.

Measuring Social Class

We can measure social class either objectively or subjectively . If we choose the objective method, we classify people according to one or more criteria, such as their occupation, education, and/or income. The researcher is the one who decides which social class people are in based on where they stand in regard to these variables. If we choose the subjective method, we ask people what class they think they are in. For example, the General Social Survey asks, “If you were asked to use one of four names for your social class, which would you say you belong in: the lower class, the working class, the middle class, or the upper class?” Figure 8.3 “Subjective Social Class Membership” depicts responses to this question. The trouble with such a subjective measure is that some people say they are in a social class that differs from what objective criteria might indicate they are in. This problem leads most sociologists to favor objective measures of social class when they study stratification in American society.

Figure 8.3 Subjective Social Class Membership

Source: Data from General Social Survey, 2008.

Yet even here there is disagreement between functionalist theorists and conflict theorists on which objective measures to use. Functionalist sociologists rely on measures of socioeconomic status (SES) , such as education, income, and occupation, to determine someone’s social class. Sometimes one of these three variables is used by itself to measure social class, and sometimes two or all three of the variables are combined (in ways that need not concern us) to measure social class. When occupation is used, sociologists often rely on standard measures of occupational prestige. Since the late 1940s, national surveys have asked Americans to rate the prestige of dozens of occupations, and their ratings are averaged together to yield prestige scores for the occupations (Hodge, Siegel, & Rossi, 1964). Over the years these scores have been relatively stable. Here are some average prestige scores for various occupations: physician, 86; college professor, 74; elementary school teacher, 64; letter carrier, 47; garbage collector, 28; and janitor, 22.

Despite SES’s usefulness, conflict sociologists prefer different, though still objective, measures of social class that take into account ownership of the means of production and other dynamics of the workplace. These measures are closer to what Marx meant by the concept of class throughout his work, and they take into account the many types of occupations and workplace structures that he could not have envisioned when he was writing during the 19th century.

For example, corporations have many upper-level managers who do not own the means of production but still determine the activities of workers under them. They thus do not fit neatly into either of Marx’s two major classes, the bourgeoisie or the proletariat. Recognizing these problems, conflict sociologists delineate social class on the basis of several factors, including the ownership of the means of production, the degree of autonomy workers enjoy in their jobs, and whether they supervise other workers or are supervised themselves (Wright, 2000).

The American Class Structure

As should be evident, it is not easy to determine how many social classes exist in the United States. Over the decades, sociologists have outlined as many as six or seven social classes based on such things as, once again, education, occupation, and income, but also on lifestyle, the schools people’s children attend, a family’s reputation in the community, how “old” or “new” people’s wealth is, and so forth (Coleman & Rainwater, 1978; Warner & Lunt, 1941). For the sake of clarity, we will limit ourselves to the four social classes included in Figure 8.3 “Subjective Social Class Membership” : the upper class, the middle class, the working class, and the lower class. Although subcategories exist within some of these broad categories, they still capture the most important differences in the American class structure (Gilbert, 2011). The annual income categories listed for each class are admittedly somewhat arbitrary but are based on the percentage of households above or below a specific income level.

The Upper Class

The upper class is considered the top, and only the powerful elite get to see the view from there. In the United States, people with extreme wealth make up 1 percent of the population, and they own one-third of the country’s wealth (Beeghley 2008).

The upper class in the United States consists of about 1% of all households and possesses much wealth, power, and influence.

Steven Martin – Highland Park Mansion – CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Money provides not just access to material goods, but also access to a lot of power. As corporate leaders, members of the upper class make decisions that affect the job status of millions of people. As media owners, they influence the collective identity of the nation. They run the major network television stations, radio broadcasts, newspapers, magazines, publishing houses, and sports franchises. As board members of the most influential colleges and universities, they influence cultural attitudes and values. As philanthropists, they establish foundations to support social causes they believe in. As campaign contributors, they sway politicians and fund campaigns, sometimes to protect their own economic interests.

U.S. society has historically distinguished between “old money” (inherited wealth passed from one generation to the next) and “new money” (wealth you have earned and built yourself). While both types may have equal net worth, they have traditionally held different social standings. People of old money, firmly situated in the upper class for generations, have held high prestige. Their families have socialized them to know the customs, norms, and expectations that come with wealth. Often, the very wealthy don’t work for wages. Some study business or become lawyers in order to manage the family fortune. Others, such as Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian, capitalize on being a rich socialite and transform that into celebrity status, flaunting a wealthy lifestyle.

However, new-money members of the upper class are not oriented to the customs and mores of the elite. They haven’t gone to the most exclusive schools. They have not established old-money social ties. People with new money might flaunt their wealth, buying sports cars and mansions, but they might still exhibit behaviors attributed to the middle and lower classes.

The Middle Class

Many people consider themselves middle class, but there are differing ideas about what that means. People with annual incomes of $150,000 call themselves middle class, as do people who annually earn $30,000. That helps explain why, in the United States, the middle class is broken into upper and lower subcategories. Upper-middle-class people tend to hold bachelor’s and postgraduate degrees. They’ve studied subjects such as business, management, law, or medicine. Lower-middle-class members hold bachelor’s degrees from four-year colleges or associate’s degrees from two-year community or technical colleges.

The upper-middle class in the United States consists of about 4.4% of all households, with incomes ranging from $150,000 to $199,000.

Alyson Hurt – Back Porch – CC BY-NC 2.0.

Comfort is a key concept to the middle class. Middle-class people work hard and live fairly comfortable lives. Upper-middle-class people tend to pursue careers that earn comfortable incomes. They provide their families with large homes and nice cars. They may go skiing or boating on vacation. Their children receive high-quality education and healthcare (Gilbert 2010).

In the lower middle class, people hold jobs supervised by members of the upper middle class. They fill technical, lower-level management or administrative support positions. Compared to lower-class work, lower-middle-class jobs carry more prestige and come with slightly higher paychecks. With these incomes, people can afford a decent, mainstream lifestyle, but they struggle to maintain it. They generally don’t have enough income to build significant savings. In addition, their grip on class status is more precarious than in the upper tiers of the class system. When budgets are tight, lower-middle-class people are often the ones to lose their jobs.

The Working Class

The working class in the United States consists of about 25% of all households, whose members work in blue-collar jobs and less skilled clerical positions.

Lisa Risager – Ebeltoft – CC BY-SA 2.0.

Working-class households generally work in blue-collar jobs such as factory work, construction, restaurant serving, and less skilled clerical positions. People in the working class typically do not have 4-year college degrees, and some do not have high school degrees. Although most are not living in official poverty, their financial situation is very uncomfortable. A single large medical bill or expensive car repair would be almost impossible to pay without going into considerable debt. Working-class families are far less likely than their wealthier counterparts to own their own homes or to send their children to college. Many of them live at risk for unemployment as their companies downsize by laying off workers even in good times, and hundreds of thousands began to be laid off when the U.S. recession began in 2008.

The Lower Class

The lower class or poor in the United States constitute about 25% of all households. Many poor individuals lack high school degrees and are unemployed or employed only part time.

Chris Hunkeler – Trailer Homes – CC BY-SA 2.0.

Although lower class is a common term, many observers prefer a less-negative sounding term like the poor, which is used here. Just like the middle and upper classes, the lower class can be divided into subsets: the working class, the working poor, and the underclass. Compared to the lower middle class, lower-class people have less of an educational background and earn smaller incomes. They work jobs that require little prior skill or experience and often do routine tasks under close supervision.

The working poor have unskilled, low-paying employment. However, their jobs rarely offer benefits such as healthcare or retirement planning, and their positions are often seasonal or temporary. They work as sharecroppers, migrant farm workers, house cleaners, and day laborers. Some are high school dropouts. Some are illiterate, unable to read job ads.

How can people work full-time and still be poor? Even working full-time, millions of the working poor earn incomes too meager to support a family. Minimum wage varies from state to state, but in many states it is approaching $8.00 per hour (Department of Labor 2014). At that rate, working 40 hours a week earns $320. That comes to $16,640 a year, before tax and deductions. Even for a single person, the pay is low. A married couple with children will have a hard time covering expenses.

The underclass is the United States’ lowest tier. Members of the underclass live mainly in inner cities. Many are unemployed or underemployed. Those who do hold jobs typically perform menial tasks for little pay. Some of the underclass are homeless. For many, welfare systems provide a much-needed support through food assistance, medical care, housing, and the like.

We will discuss the poor further when we focus later in this chapter on inequality and poverty in the United States.

Social Mobility

Social mobility refers to the ability to change positions within a social stratification system. When people improve or diminish their economic status in a way that affects social class, they experience social mobility.

Individuals can experience upward or downward social mobility for a variety of reasons. Upward mobility refers to an increase—or upward shift—in social class. In the United States, people applaud the rags-to-riches achievements of celebrities like Oprah Winfrey or LeBron James. But the truth is that relative to the overall population, the number of people who rise from poverty to wealth is very small. Still, upward mobility is not only about becoming rich and famous. In the United States, people who earn a college degree, get a job promotion, or marry someone with a good income may move up socially. In contrast, downward mobility indicates a lowering of one’s social class. Some people move downward because of business setbacks, unemployment, or illness. Dropping out of school, losing a job, or getting a divorce may result in a loss of income or status and, therefore, downward social mobility.

Nazareth College – Commencement 2013 – CC BY 2.0.

A key vehicle for upward mobility is formal education. Regardless of the socioeconomic status of our parents, we are much more likely to end up in a high-paying job if we attain a college degree or, increasingly, a graduate or professional degree. Figure 8.4 “Education and Median Earnings of Year-Round, Full-Time Workers, 2007” vividly shows the difference that education makes for Americans’ median annual incomes. Notice, however, that for a given level of education, men’s incomes are greater than women’s. Figure 8.4 “Education and Median Earnings of Year-Round, Full-Time Workers, 2007” thus suggests that the payoff of education is higher for men than for women, and many studies support this conclusion (Green & Ferber, 2008). The reasons for this gender difference are complex and will be discussed further in Chapter 11 “Gender and Gender Inequality” . To the extent vertical social mobility exists in the United States, then, it is higher for men than for women and higher for whites than for people of color.

Figure 8.4 Education and Median Earnings of Year-Round, Full-Time Workers, 2007

Source: Data from U.S. Census Bureau. (2010). Statistical abstract of the United States: 2010 . Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. Retrieved from http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab .

It is not uncommon for different generations of a family to belong to varying social classes. This is known as intergenerational mobility . For example, an upper-class executive may have parents who belonged to the middle class. In turn, those parents may have been raised in the lower class. Patterns of intergenerational mobility can reflect long-term societal changes.

Similarly, intragenerational mobility refers to changes in a person’s social mobility over the course of his or her lifetime. For example, the wealth and prestige experienced by one person may be quite different from that of his or her siblings.

Structural mobility happens when societal changes enable a whole group of people to move up or down the social class ladder. Structural mobility is attributable to changes in society as a whole, not individual changes. In the first half of the twentieth century, industrialization expanded the U.S. economy, raising the standard of living and leading to upward structural mobility. In today’s work economy, the recent recession and the outsourcing of jobs overseas have contributed to high unemployment rates. Many people have experienced economic setbacks, creating a wave of downward structural mobility.

When analyzing the trends and movements in social mobility, sociologists consider all modes of mobility. Scholars recognize that mobility is not as common or easy to achieve as many people think. In fact, some consider social mobility a myth. The American Dream does exist, but it is much more likely to remain only a dream unless we come from advantaged backgrounds. In fact, there is less vertical mobility in the United States than in other Western democracies. As a recent analysis summarized the evidence, “There is considerably more mobility in most of the other developed economies of Europe and Scandinavia than in the United States” (Mishel, Bernstein, & Shierholz, 2009, p. 108).

Key Takeaways

• Several ways of measuring social class exist. Functionalist and conflict sociologists disagree on which objective criteria to use in measuring social class. Subjective measures of social class, which rely on people rating their own social class, may lack some validity.
• Sociologists disagree on the number of social classes in the United States, but a common view is that the United States has four classes: upper, middle, working, and lower. Further variations exist within the upper and middle classes.
• The United States has some vertical social mobility, but not as much as several nations in Western Europe.

Beeghley, Leonard. 2008. The Structure of Social Stratification in the United States . Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Coleman, R. P., & Rainwater, L. (1978). Social standing in America . New York, NY: Basic Books.

Gilbert, D. (2011). The American class structure in an age of growing inequality (8th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.

Green, C. A., & Ferber, M. A. (2008). The long-term impact of labor market interruptions: How crucial is timing? Review of Social Economy, 66 , 351–379.

Hodge, R. W., Siegel, P., & Rossi, P. (1964). Occupational prestige in the United States, 1925–63. American Journal of Sociology, 70 , 286–302.

Mishel, L., Bernstein, J., & Shierholz, H. (2009). The state of working America 2008/2009 . Ithaca, NY: ILR Press [An imprint of Cornell University Press].

Warner, W. L., & Lunt, P. S. (1941). The social life of a modern community . New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Wright, E. O. (2000). Class counts: Comparative studies in class analysis . New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Introduction to Sociology: Understanding and Changing the Social World Copyright © 2016 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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A level sociology revision – education, families, research methods, crime and deviance and more!

Social Class – An Introduction to the Concept

What is social class? Outlining the Registrar General’s Scale, and the New British Class Survey.

Table of Contents

Last Updated on December 13, 2022 by Karl Thompson

Social Class refers to divisions in society based on economic and social status. People in the same social class typically share a similar level of wealth, educational achievement, type of job and income.

Social Class is one of the most important concepts within AS and A Level Sociology because of the relationship between social class background and life chances (or lack of them) and the debate over the extent to which social class background determines an individual’s life chances.

The concept of social class is certainly relevant today – according to the latest 2022 data from YouGov 68% of young people think that their life chances are ‘broadly determined’ by their parents socioeconomic backgrounds…

Many people in the United Kingdom have an idea of what social class is, but Sociologists define the concept in more precise terms.

Below I look at ‘common conceptions’ of social class before moving on to look at two ways of measuring social class – The Registrar General’s Social Class Scale and The New British Class Survey

Common Conceptions of Social Class

The classic formulation of social class in Britain is to see Britain as being divided into three classes: working, middle and upper class. Social Class, is however, open to change, and most agree that the last two decades have seen the emergence of an underclass, with little prospect of full time employment. These four terms are in common usage and we have to start somewhere, so here are some starting definitions which you should aim to move beyond.

According to the UK government’s 2021 Social Mobility Barometer 48% of respondents defined themselves as working class, 36% as middle class and 0% as upper class. 79% of people said they felt there was a large gap between social classes today.

This means that 84% of respondents were prepared to identify themselves with a particular social class background, which suggests that these broad ‘class divisions’ have meaning for people.

The disadvantages of common conceptions of social class is that they lack clarity – although most of us have heard of social class and have some idea of what it means to be a member of a social class, exactly what constitutes middle or working class, for example, is subjective and varies from person to person.

This is precisely why socologists have striven to develop more objective classifications of social class – and below I look at two of these – The registrar General’s Social Class Scale and the New British Class Survey

The Registrar General’s Social Class Scale (1911)

Sociologists use more nuanced categories of social class, than the common sense conceptions above. The way in which sociologists group people into social classes has changed considerably over time, mainly because of the changing occupational structure. To illustrate this just two examples are provided below.

For most of the 20 th Century social class was measured using the Registrar General’s Scale . When this was originally conceived in 1911 it was based on the alleged standing in the community of the different occupational groups.

Occupations were divided into the following:

• Manual occupations – those that involve a fair amount of physical effort. These are also known as blue collar occupations and are seen as working class.
• Non-manual occupations – those that involve more mental effort, such as professions and office work. These are also known as white collar occupations and are seen as middle class.

Strengths and Limitations of the Registrar General’s Social Class Scale 

The problems with the above scale is that the occupational structure in the UK has moved on – there are many more unskilled non manual jobs – in call-centres for example, and there is no room for the long-term or intermittently unemployed in the above scale either.

However, even today the majority of occupations fit pretty unambiguously into one of the categories, and six categories broadly organised along educational achievement and income is very easy to manage if we wish to make comparisons, and if we stick to these six simple categories, there does appear to be a historical relationship between these social class groupings and life chances – especially where life expectancy is concerned.

The New British Class Survey 

The New British Class Survey was an attempt to update the Registrar General’s Social Class Scale and make it more relevant to contemporary Britain.

The survey was conducted by the BBC in 2011, in conjunction with The London School of Economics, recently conducted an online survey of 161 000 people. The survey measured three aspects of social class – economic capital, cultural capital and social capital.

Economic Capital – Measured by a combination of household income, household savings and the value of house owned.

Cultural Capital – The level of engagement in ‘highbrow’ and ’emerging’ culture. The amount of ‘Highbrow’ culture people consumed was measured by scoring how engaged they were with classical music, attending stately homes and so on. How much ’emerging’ cultural capital people owned was measured by scoring engagement with video games, a preference for hip-hop etc.

Social Capital – Measured using the average status or importance of people’s social contacts and the number of occupations people said they knew.

According to this survey, there are now 7 new classes in the United Kingdom…..

• Established Middle Class (25% of the population) Members of this class have high levels of all three capitals although not as high as the Elite. They are a gregarious and culturally engaged class.
• Technical Middle Class (6%) – A new, small class with high economic capital but seem less culturally engaged. They have relatively few social contacts and so are less socially engaged.
• New Affluent Workers (14%) – This class has medium levels of economic capital and higher levels of cultural and social capital. They are a young and active group.
• Emergent Service Workers (15%) This new class has low economic capital but has high levels of ‘emerging’ cultural capital and high social capital. This group are young and often found in urban areas.
• Traditional Working Class (19%) – This class scores low on all forms of the three capitals although they are not the poorest group. The average age of this class is older than the others.

Strengths and Limitations of the New British Class Survey 

This seems to be a clear improvement on previous class scales – it seems to describe social class divisions as they actually are in the UK (you might say it’s a more valid measurement of social class) – and the inclusion of  ‘lowest’ class – the precariat reflects the important fact that many people are in low-paid work are in poverty because of the precarious nature of their flexible and/ or part-time employment. It also includes more indicators (or aspects of class) and reflects the importance of property ownership which only typically comes with age.

However, because it includes more aspects of class and because it is more subjective, it is simply harder to ‘get your head around’ – the divisions aren’t as clear cut, and it’s more difficult to make comparisons – of which there are few available because this is such a new measurement. Still, these aren’t necessarily weaknesses if that’s the way social class really does manifest itself in reality in contemporary Britain.

Related Posts – Mostly on ‘why class matters’

Social Class, Income and Wealth Inequalities

The Reproduction of the Social Class Inequality in Education

Three ways in which family life varies by social class

Research Task – Use this link to do the survey and find out more about your class background (you could either enter your parents‘ details, if you know them, or think about where you think you will be in 5-10 years time and enter those details.

Further Sources 

• Social Stratification – Wikipedia entry
• The Registrar General’s Class Scale – includes problems with it

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2 thoughts on “Social Class – An Introduction to the Concept”

Fair point. All schemes have their limitations. Thanks for the comment and link!

‘Seems to be more valid’ is not a very strong argument in support for a scheme that has been widely criticised. e.g. Mills, Great British Class Fiasco… http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0038038513519880

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9.5A: Consequences of Social Class

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One’s position in the the social class hierarchy has far-reaching effects on their health, family life, education, etc.

Learning Objectives

• Describe how socioeconomic status (SES) relates to the distributiuon of social opportunities and resources
• While sociologists debate exactly how social classes are divided, there is substantial evidence that socioeconomic status is tied to tangible advantages and outcomes.
• Social class in the United States is a controversial issue, with social scientists disagreeing over models, definitions, and even the basic question of whether or not distinct classes exist.
• Many Americans believe in a simple three-class model that includes the rich or upper class, the middle class, and the poor or working class.
• hierarchy : Any group of objects ranked so that everyone but the topmost is subordinate to a specified group above it.
• socioeconomic : Of or pertaining to social and economic factors.

In the United States, a person’s social class has far-reaching consequences. Social class refers to the the grouping of individuals in a stratified hierarchy based on wealth, income, education, occupation, and social network (though other factors are sometimes considered). One’s position in the social class hierarchy may impact, for example, health, family life, education, religious affiliation, political participation, and experience with the criminal justice system.

Social class in the United States is a controversial issue, with social scientists disagreeing over models, definitions, and even the basic question of whether or not distinct classes exist. Many Americans believe in a simple three-class model that includes the rich or upper class, the middle class, and the poor or working class. More complex models that have been proposed by social scientists describe as many as a dozen class levels. Regardless of which model of social classes used, it is clear that socioeconomic status (SES) is tied to particular opportunities and resources. Socioeconomic status refers to a person’s position in the social hierarchy and is determined by their income, wealth, occupational prestige, and educational attainment.

While social class may be an amorphous and diffuse concept, with scholars disagreeing over its definition, tangible advantages are associated with high socioeconomic status. People in the highest SES bracket, generally referred to as the upper class, likely have better access to healthcare, marry people of higher social status, attend more prestigious schools, and are more influential in politics than people in the middle class or working class. People in the upper class are members of elite social networks, effectively meaning that they have access to people in powerful positions who have specialized knowledge. These social networks confer benefits ranging from advantages in seeking education and employment to leniency by police and the courts. Sociologists may dispute exactly how to model the distinctions between socioeconomic statuses, but the higher up the class hierarchy one is in America, the better health, educational, and professional outcomes one is likely to have.

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The psychology of social class: How socioeconomic status impacts thought, feelings, and behaviour

Antony s. r. manstead.

1 Cardiff University, UK

Drawing on recent research on the psychology of social class, I argue that the material conditions in which people grow up and live have a lasting impact on their personal and social identities and that this influences both the way they think and feel about their social environment and key aspects of their social behaviour. Relative to middle‐class counterparts, lower/working‐class individuals are less likely to define themselves in terms of their socioeconomic status and are more likely to have interdependent self‐concepts; they are also more inclined to explain social events in situational terms, as a result of having a lower sense of personal control. Working‐class people score higher on measures of empathy and are more likely to help others in distress. The widely held view that working‐class individuals are more prejudiced towards immigrants and ethnic minorities is shown to be a function of economic threat, in that highly educated people also express prejudice towards these groups when the latter are described as highly educated and therefore pose an economic threat. The fact that middle‐class norms of independence prevail in universities and prestigious workplaces makes working‐class people less likely to apply for positions in such institutions, less likely to be selected and less likely to stay if selected. In other words, social class differences in identity, cognition, feelings, and behaviour make it less likely that working‐class individuals can benefit from educational and occupational opportunities to improve their material circumstances. This means that redistributive policies are needed to break the cycle of deprivation that limits opportunities and threatens social cohesion.

We are all middle class now. John Prescott, former Labour Deputy Prime Minister, 1997

Class is a Communist concept. It groups people as bundles and sets them against one another. Margaret Thatcher, former Conservative Prime Minister, 1992

One of the ironies of modern Western societies, with their emphasis on meritocratic values that promote the notion that people can achieve what they want if they have enough talent and are prepared to work hard, is that the divisions between social classes are becoming wider, not narrower. In the United Kingdom, for example, figures from the Equality Trust ( 2017 ) show that the top one‐fifth of households have 40% of national income, whereas the bottom one‐fifth have just 8%. These figures are based on 2012 data. Between 1938 and 1979, income inequality in the United Kingdom did reduce to some extent, but in subsequent decades, this process has reversed. Between 1979 and 2009/2010, the top 10% of the population increased its share of national income from 21% to 31%, whereas the share received by the bottom 10% fell from 4% to 1%. Wealth inequality is even starker than income inequality. Figures from the UK's Office for National Statistics (ONS, 2014 ) show that in the period 2012–2014, the wealthiest 10% of households in Great Britain owned 45% of household wealth, whereas the least wealthy 50% of households owned <9%. How can these very large divisions in material income and wealth be reconciled with the view that the class structure that used to prevail in the United Kingdom until at least the mid‐20th century is no longer relevant, because the traditional working class has ‘disappeared’, as asserted by John Prescott in one of the opening quotes, and reflected in the thesis of embourgeoisement analysed by Goldthorpe and Lockwood ( 1963 )? More pertinently for the present article, what implications do these changing patterns of wealth and income distribution have for class identity, social cognition, and social behaviour?

The first point to address concerns the supposed disappearance of the class system. As recent sociological research has conclusively shown, the class system in the United Kingdom is very much still in existence, albeit in a way that differs from the more traditional forms that were based primarily on occupation. In one of the more comprehensive recent studies, Savage et al . ( 2013 ) analysed the results of a large survey of social class in the United Kingdom, the BBC's 2011 Great British Class Survey, which involved 161,400 web respondents, along with the results of a nationally representative sample survey. Using latent class analysis, the authors identified seven classes, ranging from an ‘elite’, with an average annual household income of £89,000, to a ‘precariat’ with an average annual household income of £8,000. Among the many interesting results is the fact that the ‘traditional working‐class’ category formed only 14% of the population. This undoubtedly reflects the impact of de‐industrialization and is almost certainly the basis of the widely held view that the ‘old’ class system in the United Kingdom no longer applies. As Savage et al .'s research clearly shows, the old class system has been reconfigured as a result of economic and political developments, but it is patently true that the members of the different classes identified by these researchers inhabit worlds that rarely intersect, let alone overlap. The research by Savage et al . revealed that the differences between the social classes they identified extended beyond differences in financial circumstances. There were also marked differences in social and cultural capital, as indexed by size of social network and extent of engagement with different cultural activities, respectively. From a social psychological perspective, it seems likely that growing up and living under such different social and economic contexts would have a considerable impact on people's thoughts, feelings and behaviours. The central aim of this article was to examine the nature of this impact.

One interesting reflection of the complicated ways in which objective and subjective indicators of social class intersect can be found in an analysis of data from the British Social Attitudes survey (Evans & Mellon, 2016 ). Despite the fact that there has been a dramatic decline in traditional working‐class occupations, large numbers of UK citizens still describe themselves as being ‘working class’. Overall, around 60% of respondents define themselves as working class, and the proportion of people who do so has hardly changed during the past 33 years. One might reasonably ask whether and how much it matters that many people whose occupational status suggests that they are middle class describe themselves as working class. Evans and Mellon ( 2016 ) show quite persuasively that this self‐identification does matter. In all occupational classes other than managerial and professional, whether respondents identified themselves as working class or middle class made a substantial difference to their political attitudes, with those identifying as working class being less likely to be classed as right‐wing. No wonder Margaret Thatcher was keen to dispense with the concept of class, as evidenced by the quotation at the start of this paper. Moreover, self‐identification as working class was significantly associated with social attitudes in all occupational classes. For example, these respondents were more likely to have authoritarian attitudes and less likely to be in favour of immigration, a point I will return to later. It is clear from this research that subjective class identity is linked to quite marked differences in socio‐political attitudes.

A note on terminology

In what follows, I will refer to a set of concepts that are related but by no means interchangeable. As we have already seen, there is a distinction to be drawn between objective and subjective indicators of social class. In Marxist terms, class is defined objectively in terms of one's relationship to the means of production. You either have ownership of the means of production, in which case you belong to the bourgeoisie, or you sell your labour, in which case you belong to the proletariat, and there is a clear qualitative difference between the two classes. This worked well when most people could be classified either as owners or as workers. As we have seen, such an approach has become harder to sustain in an era when traditional occupations have been shrinking or have already disappeared, a sizeable middle‐class of managers and professionals has emerged, and class divisions are based on wealth and social and cultural capital.

An alternative approach is one that focuses on quantitative differences in socioeconomic status (SES), which is generally defined in terms of an individual's economic position and educational attainment, relative to others, as well as his or her occupation. As will be shown below, when people are asked about their identities, they think more readily in terms of SES than in terms of social class. This is probably because they have a reasonable sense of where they stand, relative to others, in terms of economic factors and educational attainment, and perhaps recognize that traditional boundaries between social classes have become less distinct. For these reasons, much of the social psychological literature on social class has focused on SES as indexed by income and educational attainment, and/or on subjective social class, rather than social class defined in terms of relationship to the means of production. For present purposes, the terms ‘working class’, which tends to be used more by European researchers, and ‘lower class’, which tends to be used by US researchers, are used interchangeably. Similarly, the terms ‘middle class’ and ‘upper class’ will be used interchangeably, despite the different connotations of the latter term in the United States and in Europe, where it tends to be reserved for members of the land‐owning aristocracy. A final point about terminology concerns ‘ideology’, which will here be used to refer to a set of beliefs, norms and values, examples being the meritocratic ideology that pervades most education systems and the (related) ideology of social mobility that is prominent in the United States.

Socioeconomic status and identity

Social psychological analyses of identity have traditionally not paid much attention to social class or SES as a component of identity. Instead, the focus has been on categories such as race, gender, sexual orientation, nationality and age. Easterbrook, Kuppens, and Manstead ( 2018 ) analysed data from two large, representative samples of British adults and showed that respondents placed high subjective importance on their identities that are indicative of SES. Indeed, they attached at least as much importance to their SES identities as they did to identities (such as ethnicity or gender) more commonly studied by self and identity researchers. Easterbrook and colleagues also showed that objective indicators of a person's SES were robust and powerful predictors of the importance they placed on different types of identities within their self‐concepts: Those with higher SES attached more importance to identities that are indicative of their SES position, but less importance on identities that are rooted in basic demographics or related to their sociocultural orientation (and vice versa).

To arrive at these conclusions, Easterbook and colleagues analysed data from two large British surveys: The Citizenship Survey (CS; Department for Communities and Local Government, 2012 ); and Understanding Society: The UK Household Longitudinal Study (USS; Buck & McFall, 2012 ). The CS is a (now discontinued) biannual survey of a regionally representative sample of around 10,000 adults in England and Wales, with an ethnic minority boost sample of around 5,000. The researchers analysed the most recent data, collected via interviews in 2010–2011. The USS is an annual longitudinal household panel survey that began in 2009. Easterbrook and colleagues analysed Wave 5 (2013–2014), the more recent of the two waves in which the majority of respondents answered questions relevant to class and other social identities.

Both the CS and the USS included a question about the extent to which respondents incorporated different identities into their sense of self. Respondents were asked how important these identities were ‘to your sense of who you are’. The CS included a broad range of identities, including profession, ethnic background, family, gender, age/life stage, income and education. The USS included a shorter list of identities, including profession, education, ethnic background, family, gender and age/life stage. When the responses to these questions were factor analysed, Easterbrook and colleagues found three factors that were common to the two datasets: SES‐based identities (e.g., income), basic‐demographic identities (e.g., age), and identities based on sociocultural orientation (e.g., ethnic background). In both datasets, the importance of each of these three identities was systematically related to objective indicators of the respondents’ SES: As the respondent's SES increased, the subjective importance of SES‐related identities increased, whereas the importance of basic‐demographic and (to a lesser extent) sociocultural identities decreased. Interestingly, these findings echo those of a qualitative, interview‐based study conducted with American college students: Aries and Seider ( 2007 ) found that affluent respondents were more likely than their less affluent counterparts to acknowledge the importance of social class in shaping their identities. As the researchers put it, ‘The affluent students were well aware of the educational benefits that had accrued from their economically privileged status and of the opportunities that they had to travel and pursue their interests. The lower‐income students were more likely to downplay class in their conception of their own identities than were the affluent students’ (p. 151).

Thus, despite SES receiving relatively scant attention from self and identity researchers, there is converging quantitative and qualitative evidence that SES plays an important role in structuring the self‐concept.

Contexts that shape self‐construal: Home, school, and work

Stephens, Markus, and Phillips ( 2014 ) have analysed the ways in which social class shapes the self‐concept through the ‘gateway contexts’ of home, school, and work. With a focus on the United States, but with broader implications, they argue that social class gives rise to culture‐specific selves and patterns of thinking, feeling, and acting. One type of self they label ‘hard interdependence.’ This, they argue, is characteristic of those who grow up in low‐income, working‐class environments. As the authors put it, ‘With higher levels of material constraints and fewer opportunities for influence, choice, and control, working‐class contexts tend to afford an understanding of the self and behavior as interdependent with others and the social context’ (p. 615). The ‘hard’ aspect of this self derives from the resilience that is needed to cope with adversity. The other type of self the authors identify is ‘expressive independence’, which is argued to be typical of those who grow up in affluent, middle‐class contexts. By comparison with working‐class people, those who grow up in middle‐class households ‘need to worry far less about making ends meet or overcoming persistent threats … Instead, middle‐class contexts enable people to act in ways that reflect and further reinforce the independent cultural ideal – expressing their personal preferences, influencing their social contexts, standing out from others, and developing and exploring their own interests’ (p. 615). Stephens and colleagues review a wide range of work on socialization that supports their argument that the contexts of home, school and workplace foster these different self‐conceptions. They also argue that middle‐class schools and workplaces use expressive independence as a standard for measuring success, and thereby create institutional barriers to upward social mobility.

The idea that schools are contexts in which social class inequalities are reinforced may initially seem puzzling, given that schools are supposed to be meritocratic environments in which achievement is shaped by ability and effort, rather than by any advantage conferred by class background. However, as Bourdieu and Passeron ( 1990 ) have argued, the school system reproduces social inequalities by promoting norms and values that are more familiar to children from middle‐class backgrounds. To the extent that this helps middle‐class children to outperform their working‐class peers, the ‘meritocratic’ belief that such performance differences are due to differences in ability and/or effort will serve to ‘explain’ and legitimate unequal performance. Consistent with this argument, Darnon, Wiederkehr, Dompnier, and Martinot ( 2018 ) primed the concept of merit in French fifth‐grade schoolchildren and found that this led to lower scores on language and mathematics tests – but that this only applied to low‐SES children. Moreover, the effect of the merit prime on test performance was mediated by the extent to which the children endorsed meritocratic beliefs. Here, then, is evidence that the ideology of meritocracy helps to reproduce social class differences in school settings.

Subjective social class

Stephens et al .’s ( 2014 ) conceptualization of culture‐specific selves that vary as a function of social class is compatible with the ‘subjective social rank’ argument advanced by Kraus, Piff, and Keltner ( 2011 ). The latter authors argue that the differences in material resources available to working‐ and middle‐class people create cultural identities that are based on subjective perceptions of social rank in relation to others. These perceptions are based on distinctive patterns of observable behaviour arising from differences in wealth, education, and occupation. ‘To the extent that these patterns of behavior are both observable and reliably associated with individual wealth, occupational prestige, and education, they become potential signals to others of a person's social class’ (Kraus et al ., 2011 , p. 246). Among the signals of social class is non‐verbal behaviour. Kraus and Keltner ( 2009 ) studied non‐verbal behaviour in pairs of people from different social class backgrounds and found that whereas upper‐class individuals were more disengaged non‐verbally, lower‐class individuals exhibited more socially engaged eye contact, head nods, and laughter. Furthermore, when naïve observers were shown 60‐s excerpts of these interactions, they used these disengaged versus engaged non‐verbal behavioural styles to make judgements of the educational and income backgrounds of the people they had seen with above‐chance accuracy. In other words, social class differences are reflected in social signals, and these signals can be used by individuals to assess their subjective social rank. By comparing their wealth, education, occupation, aesthetic tastes, and behaviour with those of others, individuals can determine where they stand in the social hierarchy, and this subjective social rank then shapes other aspects of their social behaviour. More recent research has confirmed these findings. Becker, Kraus, and Rheinschmidt‐Same ( 2017 ) found that people's social class could be judged with above‐chance accuracy from uploaded Facebook photographs, while Kraus, Park, and Tan ( 2017 ) found that when Americans were asked to judge a speaker's social class from just seven spoken words, the accuracy of their judgments was again above chance.

The fact that there are behavioural signals of social class also opens up the potential for others to hold prejudiced attitudes and to engage in discriminatory behaviour towards those from a lower social class, although Kraus et al . ( 2011 ) focus is on how the social comparison process affects the self‐perception of social rank, and how this in turn affects other aspects of social behaviour. These authors argue that subjective social rank ‘exerts broad influences on thought, emotion, and social behavior independently of the substance of objective social class’ (p. 248). The relation between objective and subjective social class is an interesting issue in its own right. Objective social class is generally operationalized in terms of wealth and income, educational attainment, and occupation. These are the three ‘gateway contexts’ identified by Stephens et al . ( 2014 ). As argued by them, these contexts have a powerful influence on individual cognition and behaviour who operate within them, but they do not fully determine how individuals developing and living in these contexts think, feel, and act. Likewise, there will be circumstances in which individuals who objectively are, say, middle‐class construe themselves as having low subjective social rank as a result of the context in which they live.

There is evidence from health psychology that measures of objective and subjective social class have independent effects on health outcomes, with subjective social class explaining variation in health outcomes over and above what can be accounted for in terms of objective social class (Adler, Epel, Castellazzo, & Ickovics, 2000 ; Cohen et al ., 2008 ). For example, in the prospective study by Cohen et al . ( 2008 ), 193 volunteers were exposed to a cold or influenza virus and monitored in quarantine for objective and subjective signs of illness. Higher subjective class was associated with less risk of becoming ill as a result of virus exposure, and this relation was independent of objective social class. Additional analyses suggested that the impact of subjective social class on likelihood of becoming ill was due in part to differences in sleep quantity and quality. The most plausible explanation for such findings is that low subjective social class is associated with greater stress. It may be that seeing oneself as being low in subjective class is itself a source of stress, or that it increases vulnerability to the effects of stress.

Below I organize the social psychological literature on social class in terms of the impact of class on three types of outcome: thought , encompassing social cognition and attitudes; emotion , with a focus on moral emotions and prosocial behaviour; and behaviour in high‐prestige educational and workplace settings. I will show that these impacts of social class are consistent with the view that the different construals of the self that are fostered by growing up in low versus high social class contexts have lasting psychological consequences.

Social cognition and attitudes

The ways in which these differences in self‐construal shape social cognition have been synthesized into a theoretical model by Kraus, Piff, Mendoza‐Denton, Rheinschmidt, and Keltner ( 2012 ). This model is shown in Figure  1 . They characterize the way lower‐class individuals think about the social environment as ‘contextualism’, meaning a psychological orientation that is motivated by the need to deal with external constraints and threats; and the way that upper‐class people think about the social environment as ‘solipsism’, meaning an orientation that is motivated by internal states such as emotion and by personal goals. One way in which these different orientations manifest themselves is in differences in responses to threat. The premise here is that lower‐class contexts are objectively characterized by greater levels of threat, as reflected in less security in employment, housing, personal safety, and health. These chronic threats foster the development of a ‘threat detection system’, with the result that people who grow up in such environments have a heightened vigilance to threat.

Model of the way in which middle‐ and working‐class contexts shape social cognition, as proposed by Kraus et al . ( 2012 ). From Kraus et al . ( 2012 ), published by the American Psychological Association. Reprinted with permission.

Another important difference between the contextualist lower‐class orientation and the solipsistic upper‐class one, according to Kraus et al . ( 2012 ), is in perceived control. Perceived control is closely related to other key psychological constructs, such as attributions. The evidence shows very clearly that those with lower subjective social class are also lower in their sense of personal control, and it also suggests that this reduced sense of control is related to a preference for situational (rather than dispositional) attributions for a range of social phenomena, including social inequality. The logic connecting social class to perceptions of control is straightforward: Those who grow up in middle‐ or upper‐class environments are likely to have more material and psychological resources available to them, and as a result have stronger beliefs about the extent to which they can shape their own social outcomes; by contrast, those who grow up in lower‐class environments are likely to have fewer resources available to them, and as a result have weaker beliefs about their ability to control their outcomes. There is good empirical support for these linkages. In a series of four studies, Kraus, Piff, and Keltner ( 2009 ) found that, by comparison with their higher subjective social class counterparts, lower subjective social class individuals (1) reported lower perceived control and (2) were more likely to explain various phenomena, ranging from income inequality to broader social outcomes like getting into medical school, contracting HIV, or being obese, as caused by external factors, ones that are beyond the control of the individual. Moreover, consistent with the authors’ reasoning, there was a significant indirect effect of subjective social class on the tendency to see phenomena as caused by external factors, via perceived control.

Another important social cognition measure in relation to social class is prejudice. There are two aspects of prejudice in this context. One is prejudice against people of a different class than one's own and especially attitudes towards those who are poor or unemployed; the other is the degree to which people's prejudiced attitudes about other social groups are associated with their own social class. Regarding attitudes to people who belong to a different social class, the UK evidence clearly shows that attitudes to poverty have changed over the last three decades, in that there is a rising trend for people to believe that those who live in need do so because of a lack of willpower, or because of laziness, accompanied by a corresponding decline in the belief that people live in need because of societal injustice (Clery, Lee, & Kunz, 2013 ). Interestingly, in their analysis of British Social Attitudes data over a period of 28 years, Clery et al . conclude that ‘there are no clear patterns of change in the views of different social classes, suggesting changing economic circumstances exert an impact on attitudes to poverty across society, not just among those most likely to be affected by them’ (p. 18). Given the changing attitudes to poverty, it is unsurprising to find that public attitudes to welfare spending and to redistributive taxation have also changed in a way that reflects less sympathy for those living in poverty. For example, attitudes to benefits for the unemployed have changed sharply in the United Kingdom since 1997, when a majority of respondents still believed that benefits were too low. By 2008, an overwhelming majority of respondents believed that these benefits were too high (Taylor‐Gooby, 2013 ). The way in which economic austerity has affected attitudes to these issues was the subject of qualitative research conducted by Valentine ( 2014 ). Interviews with 90 people in northern England, drawn from a range of social and ethnic backgrounds, showed that many respondents believed that unemployment is due to personal, rather than structural, failings, and that it is a ‘lifestyle choice’, leading interviewees to blame the unemployed for their lack of work and to have negative attitudes to welfare provision. Valentine ( 2014 , p. 2) observed that ‘a moralised sense of poverty as the result of individual choice, rather than structural disadvantage and inequality, was in evidence across the majority of respondents’, and that ‘Negative attitudes to welfare provision were identified across a variety of social positions and were not exclusively reserved to individuals from either working class or middle class backgrounds’.

Turning to the attitudes to broader social issues held by members of different social classes, there is a long tradition in social science of arguing that working‐class people are more prejudiced on a number of issues, especially with respect to ethnic minorities and immigrants (e.g., Lipset, 1959 ). Indeed, there is no shortage of evidence showing that working‐class white people do express more negative attitudes towards these groups. One explanation for this association is that working‐class people tend to be more authoritarian – a view that can be traced back to the early research on the authoritarian personality (Adorno, Frenkel‐Brunswik, Levinson, & Sanford, 1950 ). Recent research providing evidence in favour of this view is reported by Carvacho et al . ( 2013 ). Using a combination of cross‐sectional surveys and longitudinal studies conducted in Europe and Chile, these authors focused on the role of ideological attitudes, in the shape of right‐wing authoritarianism (RWA; Altemeyer, 1998 ) and social dominance orientation (SDO; Sidanius & Pratto, 1999 ), as mediators of the relation between social class and prejudice. To test their predictions, the researchers analysed four public opinion datasets: one based on eight representative samples in Germany; a second based on representative samples from four European countries (France, Germany, Great Britain, and the Netherlands); a third based on longitudinal research in Germany; and a fourth based on longitudinal research in Chile. Consistent with previous research, the researchers found that income and education, the two indices of social class that they used, predicted higher scores on a range of measures of prejudice, such that lower income and education were associated with greater prejudice – although education proved to be a more consistently significant predictor of prejudice than income did. RWA and SDO were negatively associated with income and education, such that higher scores on income and education predicted lower scores on RWA and SDO. Finally, there was also evidence consistent with the mediation hypothesis: The associations between income and education, on the one hand, and measures of prejudice, on the other, were often (but not always) mediated by SDO and (more consistently) RWA. Carvacho and colleagues concluded that ‘the working class seems to develop and reproduce an ideological configuration that is generally well suited for legitimating the social system’ (p. 283).

Indeed, a theme that emerges from research on social class and attitudes is that ideological factors have a powerful influence on attitudes. The neoliberal ideology that has dominated political discourse in most Western, industrialized societies in the past three decades has influenced attitudes to such an extent that even supporters of left‐of‐centre political parties, such as the Labour Party in the United Kingdom, regard poverty as arising from individual factors and tend to hold negative beliefs about the level of welfare benefits for the unemployed. Such attitudes are shared to a perhaps surprising extent by working‐class people (Clery et al ., 2013 ) and, as we have seen, the research by Carvacho et al . ( 2013 ) suggests that working‐class people endorse ideologies that endorse and preserve a social system that materially disadvantages them.

The notion that people who are disadvantaged by a social system are especially likely to support it is known as the ‘system justification hypothesis’, which holds that ‘people who suffer the most from a given state of affairs are paradoxically the least likely to question, challenge, reject, or change it’ (Jost, Pelham, Sheldon, & Sullivan, 2003 , p. 13). The rationale for this prediction derives in part from cognitive dissonance theory (Festinger, 1957 ), the idea being that it is psychologically inconsistent to experience oppression but not to protest against the system that causes it. One way to reduce the resulting dissonance is to support the system even more strongly, in the same way that those who have to go through an unpleasant initiation rite in order to join a group or organization become more strongly committed to it.

Two large‐scale studies of survey data (Brandt, 2013 ; Caricati, 2017 ) have cast considerable doubt on the validity of this hypothesis, showing that any tendency for people who are at the bottom of a social system to be more likely to support the system than are their advantaged counterparts is, at best, far from robust. Moreover, it has been argued that there is in any case a basic theoretical inconsistency between system justification theory and cognitive dissonance theory (Owuamalam, Rubin, & Spears, 2016 ). However, the fact that working‐class people may not be more supportive of the capitalist system than their middle‐ and upper‐class counterparts does not mean that they do not support the system. Thus, the importance of Carvacho et al .'s ( 2013 ) findings is not necessarily undermined by the results reported by Brandt ( 2013 ) and Caricati ( 2017 ). Being willing to legitimate the system is not the same thing as having a stronger tendency to do this than people who derive greater advantages from the system.

The finding that there is an association between social class and prejudice has also been explained in terms of economic threat. The idea here is that members of ethnic minorities and immigrants also tend to be low in social status and are therefore more likely to be competing with working‐class people than with middle‐class people for jobs, housing, and other services. A strong way to test the economic threat explanation would be to assess whether higher‐class people are prejudiced when confronted with immigrants who are highly educated and likely to be competing with them for access to employment and housing. Such a test was conducted by Kuppens, Spears, Manstead, and Tausch ( 2018 ). These researchers examined whether more highly educated participants would express negative attitudes towards highly educated immigrants, especially when threat to the respondents’ own jobs was made salient, either by drawing attention to the negative economic outlook or by subtly implying that the respondents’ own qualifications might be insufficient in the current job market. Consistent with the economic threat hypothesis, a series of experimental studies with student participants in different European countries showed that attitudes to immigrants were most negative when the immigrants also had a university education.

The same researchers also combined US census data with American National Election Study survey data to examine whether symbolic racism was higher in areas where there was a higher number of Blacks with a similar education to that of the White participants. In areas where Blacks were on average less educated, a higher number Blacks was associated with more symbolic racism among Whites who had less education, but in areas where Blacks were on average highly educated, a higher number of Blacks was associated with more symbolic racism on the part of highly educated White people. Again, these findings are consistent with the view that prejudice arises from economic threat.

Research reported by Jetten, Mols, Healy, and Spears ( 2017 ) is also relevant to this issue. These authors examined how economic instability affects low‐SES and high‐SES people. Unsurprisingly, they found that collective angst was higher among low‐SES participants. However, they also found that high‐SES participants expressed anxiety when they were presented with information suggesting that there was high economic instability, that is, that the ‘economic bubble’ might be about to burst. Moreover, they were more likely to oppose immigration when economic instability was said to be high, rather than low. These results reflect the fact that high‐SES people have a lot to lose in times of economic crisis, and that this ‘fear of falling’ is associated with opposition to immigration.

Together, these results provide good support for an explanation of the association between social class and prejudice in terms of differential threat to the group (see also Brandt & Henry, 2012 ; Brandt & Van Tongeren, 2017 ). Ethnic minorities and immigrants typically pose most threat to the economic well‐being of working‐class people who have low educational qualifications, and this provides the basis for the observation that working‐class people are more likely to be prejudiced. The fact that higher‐educated and high‐SES people express negative views towards ethnic minorities and immigrants when their economic well‐being is threatened shows that it is perceived threat to one's group's interests that underpins this prejudice. It is also worth noting that the perception of threat to a group's economic interests is likely to be greater during times of economic recession.

Emotion and prosocial behaviour

A strong theme emerging from research investigating the relation between social class and emotion is that lower‐class individuals score more highly on measures of empathy. The rationale for expecting such a link is that because lower‐class individuals are more inclined to explain events in terms of external factors, they should be more sensitive to the ways in which external events shape the emotions of others, and therefore better at judging other people's emotions. A complementary rationale is that the tendency for lower social class individuals to be more socially engaged and to have more interdependent social relationships should result in greater awareness of the emotions experienced by others. This reasoning was tested in three studies reported by Kraus, Côté, and Keltner ( 2010 ).

In the first of these studies, the authors examined the relation between educational attainment (a proxy for social class) and scores on the emotion recognition subscale of the Mayer‐Salovey‐Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (Mayer, Salovey, & Caruso, 2002 ). High‐school‐educated participants attained a higher score than did their college‐educated counterparts. In a second study, pairs of participants took part in a hypothetical job interview in which an experimenter asked each of them a set of standard questions. This interaction provided the basis for the measure of empathic accuracy, in that each participant was asked to rate both their own emotions and their partner's emotions during the interview. Subjective social class was again related to empathic accuracy, with lower‐class participants achieving a higher score. Moreover, lower‐class participants were more inclined to explain decisions they made in terms of situational rather than dispositional factors, and the relation between subjective social class and empathy was found to be mediated by this tendency to explain decisions in terms of situational factors. The researchers conducted a third study in which they manipulated subjective social class. This time they assessed empathic accuracy using the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (Baron‐Cohen, Wheelwright, Hill, Raste, & Plumb, 2001 ). Participants who were temporarily induced to experience lower social class were better at recognizing emotions from the subtle cues available from the eye region of the face.

These findings are compatible with the view that lower social class individuals are more sensitive to contextual variation and more inclined to explain events in situational terms. However, some aspects of the results are quite surprising. For example, there seems to be no compelling reason to predict that greater sensitivity to contextual variation would be helpful in judging static facial expressions, which were the stimuli in Studies 1 and 3 of Kraus et al .'s ( 2010 ) research. Thus, the relation between social class and emotion recognition in these studies would seem to depend on the notion that the greater interdependence that is characteristic of lower‐class social environments fosters greater experience with, and therefore knowledge of, the relation between facial movement and subjective emotion, although it still seems surprising that a temporary induction of lower subjective social class, as used in Study 3, should elicit the same effect as extensive real‐life experience of inhabiting lower‐class environments.

If lower‐class individuals are more empathic than their higher‐class counterparts, and are therefore better at recognizing the distress or need of others, this is likely to influence their behaviour in settings where people are distressed and/or in need. This, indeed, is what the evidence suggests. In a series of four studies, Piff, Kraus, Côté, Cheng, and Keltner ( 2010 ) found a consistent tendency for higher‐class individuals to be less inclined to help others than were their lower‐class counterparts. In Study 1, participants low in subjective social class made larger allocations in a dictator game (a game where you are free to allocate as much or as little of a resource to another person as you want) played with an anonymous other than did participants high in subjective social class. In Study 2, subjective social class was manipulated by asking participants to compare themselves to people either at the very top or very bottom of the status hierarchy ladder, the idea being that subjective social class should be lower for those making upward comparisons and higher for those making downward comparisons. Prosocial behaviour was measured by asking participants to indicate the percentage of income that people should spend on a variety of goods and services, one of which was charitable donations. Participants who were induced to experience lower subjective social class indicated that a greater percentage of people's annual salary should be spent on charitable donations compared to participants who were induced to experience higher subjective social class. In Study 3, the researchers used a combination of educational attainment and household income to assess social class and used social value orientation (Van Lange, De Bruin, Otten, & Joireman, 1997 ) as a measure of egalitarian values. These two variables were used to predict behaviour in a trust game. Consistent with predictions, lower‐class participants showed greater trust in their anonymous partner than did their higher‐class counterparts, and this relation was mediated by egalitarian values. In their final study, the researchers manipulated compassion by asking participants in the compassion condition to view a 46‐s video about child poverty. Higher‐ and lower‐class participants were then given the chance to help someone in need. The researchers predicted that helping would only be moderated by compassion among higher‐class participants, on the grounds that lower‐class participants would already be disposed to help, and the results were consistent with this prediction. Overall, these four studies are consistent in showing that, relative to higher‐class people, lower‐class people are more generous, support charity to a greater extent, are more trusting towards a stranger, and more likely to help a person in distress.

The reliability of this finding has been called into question by Korndörfer, Egloff, and Schmukle ( 2015 ), who found contrary evidence in a series of studies. One way to resolve these apparently discrepant findings is to argue, as Kraus and Callaghan ( 2016 ) did, that the relation between social class and prosocial behaviour is moderated by a number of factors, including whether the context is a public or private one. To test this idea, Kraus and Callaghan ( 2016 ) conducted a series of studies in which they manipulated whether donations made to an anonymous other in a dictator game were made in a private or public context. In the private context, the donor remained anonymous. In the public context, the donor's name and city of residence were announced, along with the donation. Lower‐class participants were more generous in private than in public, whereas the reverse was true for higher‐class participants. Interestingly, higher‐class participants were more likely to expect to feel proud about acting prosocially, and this difference in anticipated pride mediated the effect of social class on the difference between public and private donations.

The fact that lower‐class people have been found to hold more egalitarian values and to be more likely to help regardless of compassion level suggests that it is the greater resources of higher‐class participants that makes them more selfish and therefore less likely to help others. This ‘selfishness’ account of the social class effect on prosocial behaviour is supported by another series of studies reported by Piff, Stancato, Côté, Mendoza‐Denton, and Keltner ( 2012 ), who found that, relative to lower‐class individuals, higher‐class people were more likely to show unethical decision‐making tendencies, to take valued goods from others, to lie in a negotiation, to cheat to increase their chances of winning a prize and to endorse unethical behaviour at work. There was also evidence that these unethical tendencies were partly accounted for by more favourable attitudes towards greed among higher‐class people. Later research shows that the relation between social class and unethical behaviour is moderated by whether the behaviour benefits the self or others. Dubois, Rucker, and Galinsky ( 2015 ) varied who benefited from unethical behaviour and showed that the previously reported tendency for higher‐class people to make more unethical decisions was only observed when the outcome was beneficial to the self. These findings are consistent with the view that the greater resources enjoyed by higher‐class individuals result in a stronger focus on the self and a reduced concern for the welfare of others.

Interestingly, this stronger self‐focus and lesser concern for others’ welfare on the part of higher‐class people are more evident in contexts characterized by high economic inequality. This was shown by Côté, House, and Willer ( 2015 ), who analysed results from a nationally representative US survey and showed that higher‐income respondents were only less generous in the offers they made to an anonymous other in a dictator game than their lower‐income counterparts in areas that were high in economic inequality, as reflected in the Gini coefficient. Indeed, in low inequality areas, there was evidence that higher‐income respondents were more generous than their lower‐income counterparts. To test the causality of this differential association between income and generosity in high and low inequality areas, the authors conducted an experiment in which participants were led to believe that their home state was characterized by high or low degree of economic inequality and then played a dictator game with an anonymous other. High‐income participants were less generous than their low‐income counterparts in the high inequality condition but not in the low inequality condition.

A possible issue with Côté et al . ( 2015 ) research in the current context is that it focuses on income rather than class. Although these variables are clearly connected, class is generally thought to be indexed by more than income. The research nevertheless suggests that economic inequality plays a key role in shaping the attitudes and behaviours of higher‐class individuals. There are at least three (not mutually exclusive) explanations for this influence of inequality. One is that inequality increases the sense of entitlement in higher‐class people, because they engage more often in downward social comparisons. Another is that higher‐class people may be more concerned about losing their privileged position in society if they perceive a large gap between the rich and the poor. A final explanation is that higher‐class people may be more highly motivated to justify their privileged position in society when the gap between rich and poor is a large one. Whichever of these explanations is correct – and they may all be to some extent – the fact that prosocial behaviour on the part of higher‐class individuals decreases under conditions of high economic inequality is important, given that the United States is one of the most economically unequal societies in the industrialized world. In unequal societies, then, it seems safe to conclude that on average, higher‐class individuals are less likely than their lower‐class counterparts to behave prosocially, especially where the prosocial behaviour is not public in nature.

Universities and workplaces

The selective nature of higher education (HE), involving economic and/or qualification requirements to gain entry, makes a university a high‐status context. Working‐class people seeking to attain university‐level qualifications are therefore faced with working in an environment in which they may feel out of place. Highly selective universities such as Oxford and Cambridge in the United Kingdom, or Harvard, Stanford, and Yale in the United States, are especially likely to appear to be high in status and therefore out of reach. Indeed, the proportion of working‐class students at Oxford and Cambridge is strikingly low. According to the UK's Higher Education Statistics Agency , the percentage of students at Oxford and Cambridge who were from routine/manual occupational backgrounds was 11.5 and 12.6, respectively, in the academic year 2008/9. This compares with an ONS figure of 37% of all people aged between 16 and 63 in the United Kingdom being classified with such backgrounds. The figures for Oxford and Cambridge are extreme, but they illustrate a more general phenomenon, both in the United Kingdom and internationally: students at elite, research‐led universities are more likely to come from middle‐ and upper‐class backgrounds than from working‐class backgrounds (Jerrim, 2013 ).

The reasons for the very low representation of working‐class students at these elite institutions are complex (Chowdry, Crawford, Dearden, Goodman, & Vignoles, 2013 ), but at least one factor is that many working‐class students do not consider applying because they do not see themselves as feeling at home there. They see a mismatch between the identity conferred by their social backgrounds and the identity they associate with being a student at an elite university. This is evident from ethnographic research. For example, Reay, Crozier, and Clayton ( 2010 ) interviewed students from working‐class backgrounds who were attending one of four HE institutions, including an elite university (named Southern in the report). A student at Southern said this about her mother's reaction to her attending this elite university: ‘I don't think my mother really approves of me going to Southern. It's not what her daughter should be doing so I don't really mention it when I go home. It's kind of uncomfortable to talk about it’ (p. 116). In a separate paper, Reay, Crozier, and Clayton ( 2009 ) focus on the nine students attending Southern, examining whether these students felt like ‘fish out of water’. Indeed, there was evidence of difficulty in adjusting to the new environment, both socially and academically. One student said, ‘I wasn't keen on Southern as a place and all my preconceptions were “Oh, it's full of posh boarding school types”. And it was all true … it was a bit of a culture shock’ (p. 1111), while another said, ‘If you were the best at your secondary school … you're certainly not going to be the best here’ (p. 1112). A similar picture emerges from research in Canada by Lehmann ( 2009 , 2013 ), who interviewed working‐class students attending a research‐intensive university, and found that the students experienced uncomfortable conflicts between their new identities as university students and the ties they had with family members and non‐student friends.

Such is the reputation of elite, research‐intensive universities that working‐class high‐school students are unlikely to imagine themselves attending such institutions, even if they are academically able. Perceptions of these universities as elitist are likely to deter such students from applying. Evidence of this deterrence comes from research conducted by Nieuwenhuis, Easterbrook, and Manstead ( 2018 ). They report two studies in which 16‐ to 18‐year‐old secondary school students in the United Kingdom were asked about the universities they intended to apply to. The studies were designed to test the theoretical model shown in Figure  2 , which was influenced by prior work on the role of identity compatibility conducted by Jetten, Iyer, Tsivrikos, and Young ( 2008 ). According to the model in Figure  2 , SES influences university choice partly through its impact on perceived identity compatibility and anticipated acceptance at low‐ and high‐status universities.

Theoretical model of the way in which the socioeconomic status ( SES ) influences application to high‐status universities as a result of social identity factors and academic achievement, as proposed by Nieuwenhuis et al . ( 2018 ).

In the first study conducted by Nieuwenhuis and colleagues, students who were 6 months away from making their university applications responded to questions about their perceptions of two universities, one a research‐intensive, selective university (SU), the other a less selective university (LSU). Both universities were located in the same geographical region, not far from the schools where the participants were recruited. In the second study, students who were 6 weeks away from making their university applications responded to similar questions, but this time about three universities in the region, two of which were the same as those in Study 1, while the third was a highly selective institution (HSU). The questions put to respondents measured their perceptions of identity compatibility (e.g., consistency between family background and decision to go to university) and anticipated acceptance (e.g., anticipated identification with students at the university in question). Measures of parental education and academic achievement in previous examinations were taken, as well as the three universities to which they would most like to apply, which were scored in accordance with a published national league table.

In both studies, it was found that relatively disadvantaged students (whose parents had low levels of educational attainment) scored lower on identity compatibility and that low scores on identity compatibility were associated with lower anticipated acceptance at the SU (Study 1) or at the HSU (Study 2). These anticipated acceptance scores, in turn, predicted the type of university to which participants wanted to apply, with those who anticipated feeling accepted at more selective universities being more likely to apply to higher status universities. All of these relations were significant while controlling for academic achievement. Together, the results of these studies show that perceptions of acceptance at different types of university are associated with HE choices independently of students’ academic ability. This helps to explain why highly able students from socially disadvantaged backgrounds are more likely to settle for less prestigious universities.

Alternatively, working‐class students may opt out of HE altogether. Hutchings and Archer ( 2001 ) interviewed young working‐class people who were not participating in HE and found that a key reason for their non‐participation was a perception that the kinds of HE institutions that were realistically available to them were second‐rate: ‘[O]ur respondents constructed two very different pictures of HE. One was of Oxbridge and campus universities, pleasant environments in which middle‐class students … can look forward to achieving prestigious degrees and careers. The second construction was of rather unattractive buildings in which “skint” working‐class students … have to work hard under considerable pressure, combining study with a job and having little time for social life. This second picture was the sort of HE that our respondents generally talked about as available to them, and they saw it as inferior to ‘real’ HE’ (p. 87).

Despite the deterrent effect of perceived identity incompatibility and lack of psychological fit, some working‐class students do gain entry to high‐status universities. Once there, they are confronted with the same issues of fit. Stephens, Fryberg, Markus, Johnson, and Covarrubias ( 2012 ) describe this as ‘cultural mismatch’, arguing that the interdependent norms that characterize the working‐class backgrounds of most first‐generation college students in the United States do not match the middle‐class independent norms that prevail in universities offering 4‐year degrees and that this mismatch leads to greater discomfort and poorer academic performance. Their cultural mismatch model is summarized in Figure  3 .

Model of cultural mismatch proposed by Stephens, Fryberg, Markus, et al . ( 2012 ). The mismatch is between first‐generation college students’ norms, which are more interdependent than those of continuing‐generation students, and the norms of independence that prevail in universities. From Stephens, Fryberg, Markus, et al . ( 2012 ), published by the American Psychological Association. Reprinted with permission.

To test this model, Stephens, Fryberg, Markus, et al . ( 2012 ) surveyed university administrators at the top 50 national universities and the top 25 liberal arts colleges. The majority of the 261 respondents were deans. They were asked to respond to items expressing interdependent (e.g., learn to work together with others) or independent (e.g., learn to express oneself) norms, selecting those that characterized their institution's culture or choosing statements reflecting what was more often emphasized by the institution. More than 70% of the respondents chose items reflecting a greater emphasis on independence than on interdependence. Similar results were found in a follow‐up study involving 50 administrators at second‐tier universities and liberal arts colleges, showing that this stronger focus on independence was not only true of elite institutions. Moreover, a longitudinal study of first‐generation students found that this focus on independence did not match the students’ interdependent motives for going to college, in that first‐generation students selected fewer independent motives (e.g., become an independent thinker) and twice as many interdependent motives (e.g., give back to the community), compared to their continuing‐generation counterparts, and that this greater focus on interdependent motives was associated with lower grades in the first 2 years of study, even after controlling for race and SAT scores.

As Stephens and her colleagues have shown elsewhere (e.g., Stephens, Brannon, Markus, & Nelson, 2015 ), there are steps that can be taken to reduce working‐class students’ perception that they do not fit with their university environment. These authors argue that ‘a key goal of interventions should be to fortify and to elaborate school‐relevant selves – the understanding that getting a college degree is central to “who I am”, “who I hope to become”, and “the future I envision for myself”’ (p. 3). Among the interventions that they advocate as ways of creating a more inclusive culture at university are: providing working‐class role models; diversifying the way in which university experience is represented, so that university culture also provides ways of achieving interdependent goals that may be more compatible with working‐class students’ values; and ensuring that working‐class students have a voice, for example, by providing forums in which they can express shared interests and concerns.

Although there is a less well‐developed line of work on the ways in which high‐status places of work affect the aspirations and behaviours of working‐class employees, there is good reason to assume that the effects and processes identified in research on universities as places to study generalize to prestigious employment organizations as places to work (Côté, 2011 ). To the extent that many workplaces are dominated by middle‐class values and practices, working‐class employees are likely to feel out of place (Ridgway & Fisk, 2012 ). This applies both to gaining entry to the workplace, by negotiating the application and selection process (Rivera, 2012 ), and (if successful) to the daily interactions between employees in the workplace. In the view of Stephens, Fryberg, and Markus ( 2012 ), many workplaces are characterized by cultures of expressive independence, where working‐class employees are less likely to feel at home. As Stephens et al . ( 2014 , p. 626) argue, ‘This mismatch between working‐class employees and their middle‐class colleagues and institutions could also reduce employees’ job security and satisfaction, continuing the cycle of disadvantage for working‐class employees.’

Towards an integrative model

The work reviewed here provides the basis for an integrative model of how social class affects thoughts, feelings, and behaviour. The model is shown in Figure  4 and builds on the work of others, especially that of Nicole Stephens and colleagues and that of Michael Kraus and colleagues. At the base of the model are differences in the material circumstances of working‐class and middle‐class people. These differences in income and wealth are associated with differences in social capital, in the form of friendship networks, and cultural capital, in the form of tacit knowledge about how systems work, that have a profound effect on the ways in which individuals who grow up in these different contexts construe themselves and their social environments. For example, if you have family members or friends who have university degrees and/or professional qualifications, you are more likely to entertain these as possible futures than if you do not have these networks; and if through these networks you have been exposed to libraries, museums, interviews, and so on, you are more likely to know how these cultural institutions work, less likely to be intimidated by them, and more likely to make use of them. In sum, a middle‐class upbringing is more likely to promote the perception that the environment is one full of challenges that can be met rather than threats that need to be avoided. These differences in self‐construal and models of interpersonal relations translate into differences in social emotions and behaviours that are noticeable to self and others, creating the opportunity for people to rank themselves and others, and for differences in norms and values to emerge. To the extent that high‐status institutions in society, such as elite universities and prestigious employers, are characterized by norms and values that are different from those that are familiar to working‐class people, the latter will feel uncomfortable in such institutions and will perform below their true potential.

Integrative model of how differences in material conditions generate social class differences and differences in social cognition, emotion, and behaviour.

Also depicted in Figure  4 is the way in which ideology moderates the relations between social class, on the one hand, and social cognition and social behaviour, on the other, and the ways in which economic inequality and threat moderate the relations between psychological dispositions and social behaviour. Although there is good evidence for many of the proposed relations depicted in the model, there is relatively little hard evidence concerning the moderating roles of ideology and economic inequality and threat. There is evidence that economic threat is associated with prejudice (e.g., Billiet, Meuleman, & De Witte, 2014 ), and that this also applies to higher‐educated people (e.g., Kuppens et al ., 2018 ). There is also evidence that high economic inequality increases the tendency for high‐income people to be less generous to others (Côté et al ., 2015 ), but these are influences that need further examination. Likewise, there is evidence of the moderating impact of ideology on the translation from social class to social cognition and behaviour (e.g., Wiederkehr, Bonnot, Krauth‐Gruber, & Darnon, 2015 ), but this, too, is an influence that merits additional investigation. A further point worth making is that much of the work on which this integrative model is based was conducted in the United States, which raises the question of the extent to which it is applicable to other contexts. There are some differences between the United States and other Western, industrialized countries that are relevant to the model. For example, the United States is more economically unequal than virtually every other industrialized country (Piketty & Saez, 2014 ). At the same time, the perceived degree of social mobility is greater in the United States than in other countries (Isaacs, 2008 ) – although the reality is that social mobility is lower in the United States (and indeed in the United Kingdom; see Social Mobility Commission, 2017 ) than in many other industrialized counties (Isaacs, 2008 ). These differences in economic inequality and ideology mean that the moderating roles played by these factors may vary from one country to another. For example, there is evidence that those in Europe who are poor or on the left of the political spectrum are more concerned with and unhappy about inequality than are their American counterparts, which may be related to different beliefs about social mobility (Alesina, Di Tella, & MacCulloch, 2004 ). Although there seems to be no good reason to question the generalizability of the other relations posited in the model, there is an obvious need to expand the research base on which the model is founded.

Prospects for social change

The cycle of disadvantage that starts with poor material conditions and ends with lower chances of entering and succeeding in the very contexts (universities and high‐status workplaces) that could increase social mobility is not going to be changed in the absence of substantial pressure for social change. It is therefore interesting that when people are asked about social inequality, they generally say that they are in favour of greater equality.

Norton and Ariely ( 2011 ) asked a nationally representative sample of more than 5,500 Americans to estimate the (then) current wealth distribution in the United States and also to express their preferences for how wealth should be distributed. The key findings from this research were (1) that respondents greatly underestimated the degree of wealth inequality in the United States, believing that the wealthiest 20% of the population owned 59% of the wealth, where the actual figure is 84% and (2) that their preferred distribution of wealth among citizens was closer to equality than even their own incorrect estimations of the distribution (e.g., they expressed a preference that the top 20% should own 32% of the nation's wealth). This also held for wealthy respondents and Republican voters – albeit to a lesser extent than their poorer and Democrat counterparts. Similar results for Australian respondents were reported by Norton, Neal, Govan, Ariely, and Holland ( 2014 ).

These studies have been criticized on the grounds that the ‘quintile’ methodology they use provides respondents with an anchor (20%) from which they adjust upwards or downwards. However, when Eriksson and Simpson ( 2012 ) used a different methodology, they found that although American respondents’ preferences for wealth distribution were more unequal than those found using the quintile methodology, they were still much more egalitarian than the actual distribution. Similar conclusions were reached in a study of American adolescents conducted by Flanagan and Kornbluh ( 2017 ), where participants expressed a strong preference for a much more egalitarian society than the degree of stratification they perceived to exist in the United States. It is also worth noting that similar findings have been reported in a study of preferences for income inequality (Kiatpongsan & Norton, 2014 ), where it was found that American respondents underestimated the actual difference in income between CEOs and unskilled workers (354:1), and that their preferences regarding this difference (7:1) were more egalitarian than were their estimates (30:1).

Given the evidence that citizens consistently express a preference for less wealth and income inequality than what currently prevails in many societies, it is worth considering why there is not greater support for redistributive policies. It is known that one factor that weakens support for such policies is a belief in social mobility. American participants have been found to overestimate the degree of social mobility in the United States (Davidai & Gilovich, 2015 ; Kraus & Tan, 2015 ), and Shariff, Wiwad, and Aknin ( 2016 ) have shown, using a combination of survey and experimental methods, that higher perceived mobility leads to greater acceptance of income inequality. These authors also showed that the effect of their manipulation of perceived income mobility on tolerance for inequality was mediated by two factors: the expectation that respondents’ children would be upwardly mobile; and perceptions of the degree to which someone's economic standing was the result of effort, rather than luck. This suggests that people's attitudes to income inequality – and therefore their support for steps to reduce it – are shaped by their perceptions that (1) higher incomes are possible to achieve, at least for their children, and (2) when these higher incomes are achieved, they are deserved. It follows that any intervention that reduces the tendency to overestimate income mobility should increase support for redistributive policies.

Another factor that helps to account for lack of support for redistribution is people's perceptions of their own social standing or rank. Brown‐Iannuzzi, Lundberg, Kay, and Payne ( 2015 ) have shown that subjective status is correlated with support for redistributive policies, and that experimentally altering subjective status leads to changes in such support. In both cases, lower subjective status was associated with stronger support for redistribution, even when actual resources and self‐interest were held constant. So one's perception of one's own relative social rank influences support for redistribution. This points to the importance of social comparisons and suggests that those who compare themselves with others who have a lower social standing are less likely to be supportive of redistribution.

Evidence that people's attitudes to inequality and to policies that would reduce it can be influenced by quite straightforward interventions comes from research reported by McCall, Burk, Laperrière, and Richeson ( 2017 ). In three studies, these researchers show that exposing American participants to information about the rising economic inequality, compared to control information, led to stronger perceptions that economic success is due to structural factors rather than individual effort. In the largest of the three studies, involving a representative sample of American adults, it was also found that information about rising inequality led to greater endorsement of policies that could be implemented by government and by business to reduce inequality. This research shows that, under the right conditions, even those living in a society that is traditionally opposed to government intervention would support government policies to reduce inequality.

Also relevant to the likelihood of people taking social action on this issue is how descriptions of inequality are framed. Bruckmüller, Reese, and Martiny ( 2017 ) have shown that relatively subtle variations in such framing, such as whether an advantaged group is described as having more or a disadvantaged group is described as having less, influence perceptions of the legitimacy of these differences; larger differences between groups were evaluated as less legitimate when the disadvantaged group was described as having less. Perceptions of the illegitimacy of inequality in group outcomes are likely to evoke group‐based anger, which in turn is known to be one of the predictors of collective action (Van Zomeren, Spears, Fischer, & Leach, 2004 ).

There is solid evidence that the material circumstances in which people develop and live their lives have a profound influence on the ways in which they construe themselves and their social environments. The resulting differences in the ways that working‐class and middle‐ and upper‐class people think and act serve to reinforce these influences of social class background, making it harder for working‐class individuals to benefit from the kinds of educational and employment opportunities that would increase social mobility and thereby improve their material circumstances. At a time when economic inequality is increasing in many countries, this lack of mobility puts a strain on social cohesion. Most people believe that economic inequality is undesirable and, when presented with the evidence of growing inequality, say that they would support government policies designed to reduce it. Given that the social class differences reviewed here have their origins in economic inequality, it follows that redistributive (or ‘predistributive’; Taylor‐Gooby, 2013 ) policies are urgently needed to create greater equality.

Acknowledgements

Thanks are due to Colin Foad, Matt Easterbrook, Russell Spears and John Drury for their helpful comments on a previous version of this paper.

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2 Social Class, Classism, and Social Justice

Rebecca L. Toporek, Department of Counseling, Career and College Counseling Specializations, San Francisco State University

• Published: 01 May 2013
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A central challenge to counseling and psychology professionals committed to social justice is an examination of intent, motivation, and philosophy as well as broad-based skills beyond individual therapy and traditional research methods. The purpose of this chapter is to explore the relationship between social class and social justice as a practice and advocacy path for helping professionals. To this end, this chapter will discuss the connection and conflict between social justice, social class, and other cultural identity statuses. The role of classism and privilege in the practice of counseling and psychology will be highlighted. The chapter includes a focused discussion of vocational counseling and career counseling given that work and employment are two of the most significant venues through which individuals experience inequity and hope for greater access to resources.

If you have come to help me you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together . Lilla Watson & Aboriginal Activists Group, as cited by Our Consumer Place (2010 , p. 111) 1

The premise of this chapter is that counseling and counseling psychology has a responsibility to work toward greater equity and human rights in society. On the surface, this seems undeniable. When examined more closely, the implications of this statement are far reaching. This chapter begins with the above quote because a central challenge to counseling and psychology professionals committed to social justice requires an examination of intent, motivation, and philosophy as well as broad-based skills beyond individual therapy and traditional research methods. The purpose of this chapter is to explore the relationship between social class and social justice as a practice and advocacy path for helping professionals. To this end, I will discuss the connection and conflict between social justice, social class, and other cultural identity statuses. Further, I hope to pay particular attention to the role of classism and privilege in the practice of counseling and psychology. In addition to a broad discussion of social class and social justice, I will focus specifically on vocational and career counseling given my experience in these areas and belief that work and employment are two of the most significant venues through which individuals experience inequity and hope for greater access to resources in society today.

The spirit and theme throughout the chapter is one of action with the presumption that inequity is not an acceptable condition and that helping professionals are in an important position to make a difference.

This Is What I Mean When I Say Social Class, Classism, and Social Justice

Of all the identity statuses, social class is perhaps the most ambiguous. It is important to clarify the definition here because the focus of social justice action may be different depending on the definition of social class the actor is using. Social class has been defined in numerous ways with various indicators including income, education level, occupation, and other external factors primarily related to access to economic and social capital. Relatively recently, a number of authors have advocated for considering social class as a psychological construct (e.g., Liu et al., 2004 ). Liu (2001) defined social class as one’s position within an “economic hierarchy determined by his or her income, education level, and occupation; the individual is also aware of his or her place in the economic hierarchy and of others who may share a similar position” (Liu, p. 8). In this chapter I maintain that social class reflects both an external and internal identity. Externally, social class cues may influence the way one is treated and subsequent privileges that are afforded to her or him based on others’ perceptions. Internally, individuals also have a sense of their own social class; a complex mix of their social class perceptions from their youth, social class transitions that they may have made throughout life, and social class perceptions that they assume in their comparison of themselves to others.

A related concept is classism , or prejudice or discrimination based on social class. Liu and his colleagues (2004) argued that people along the entire continuum of the social class stratification can perpetuate classism shaping others’ behavior based on their own social class values, biases, and beliefs. Alternatively, Smith (2008) argued that while social class prejudice may be seen at all levels of the stratification, classism is distinct in that it represents social class actions by those who maintain institutional power within society. Collins and Yeskel (as cited in Smith) defined classism as

the assignment of characteristics of worth and ability based on social class; the attitudes, policies, and practices that maintain this unequal valuing; and “the systematic oppression of subordinated groups (people without endowed or acquired economic power, social influence, or privilege) by the dominant groups (those who have access to control of the necessary resources by which other people make their living).” ( Smith, p. 900 )

In this chapter, I adhere to this latter definition that also reflects Liu’s (2002) concept of downward classism and acknowledge that, although prejudice and discrimination may occur in any group, classism is framed as the enactment of classism by those holding more institutional and societal power than others. Classism is an important condition that links social justice to social class.

Social justice has been defined in a number of ways, with most definitions referring to a condition in which there is equal access to resources. Referring specifically to the context of counseling psychology, Fouad, Gerstein, and Toporek (2006) stated that,

Social justice in counseling psychology focuses on helping to ensure that opportunities and resources are distributed fairly and helping to ensure equity when resources are distributed unfairly or unequally. This includes actively working to change social institutions, political and economic systems, and governmental structures that perpetuate unfair practices, structures, and policies in terms of accessibility, resource distribution, and human rights. (p. 1)

Within the field of counseling, Counselors for Justice, a division of the American Counseling Association, provided an elaborated definition with more specifics regarding the implementation of social justice oriented practice in counseling:

Social justice counseling represents a multifaceted approach to counseling in which practitioners strive to simultaneously promote human development and the common good through addressing challenges related to both individual and distributive justice. Social justice counseling includes empowerment of the individual as well as active confrontation of injustice and inequality in society as they impact clientele as well as those in their systemic contexts. (Counselors for Social Justice)

Social justice, therefore, in relation to social class, involves equitable distribution of resources including economic and social capital as well as privileges afforded by that access. Relevant to this chapter, we suggest that social justice also reflects how counseling and human services are provided, to whom service is provided, and the context in which the professional provides it. In other words, one aspect that determines social class, in part, is one’s resources and the power to determine how those resources are distributed. The way in which counseling provides services is shaped by structures and systems often created by those who have more economic and social power than the populations they are serving. This can be a form of social justice and redistribution when equal access is the result. Yet, because there is this differential power, some have also cautioned that the process may be a means of preserving the status quo by helping people adjust to unjust circumstances rather than challenging the circumstances (see Halleck, 1971 ).

Social justice is rooted throughout the history of counseling and psychology, yet the acknowledgment and commitment to this endeavor has fluctuated. For example, the work of Frank Parsons with youth, unemployed, underemployed, and homeless individuals in the early 1900s has been identified as a significant precursor of much of counseling and vocational psychology ( O’Brien, 2001 ). Advocates of civil rights, multicultural counseling, feminist counseling, disability rights, and attention to other marginalized populations have made significant advances for social justice ( Toporek, Lewis, & Crethar, 2009 ). Yet at the same time, the pull to define the profession through a medical model that focused on pathology, individual change, and Western perspectives of health and normality often neglected attention to barriers and has been criticized for functioning to maintain inequities ( Prilleltensky, 1997 ). As with medical services, access to counseling and psychology has varied greatly depending on the resources of clientele. In addition, with focus on individual and intrapsychic etiologies of distress and internal foci for treatment, social issues have only been peripherally addressed. Despite this variance, there have been some significant social justice efforts at the hands of individuals, and small groups of practitioners, educators, and researchers as well as limited efforts within professional associations. The multicultural counseling, community counseling, and feminist counseling specializations have been strong advocates for social justice and have advanced discourse regarding the influence of discrimination and systemic oppression on health and well-being. Yet, until recently, social class and classism have been relatively neglected aspects of this equation. Disciplines such as social work and public health have been more directly visible in addressing social justice issues, particularly related to poverty. These fields have also experienced struggles of trying to maintain this perspective. Nonetheless, they have a history of articulating this commitment in ethics codes, professional identity, and other visible means.

It is important to note that social class is not an isolated variable. Instead, social class is only meaningful within the context of other aspects of identity. The framework of social class as a socially and psychologically constructed variable applies to race, gender, and other aspects of identity as well. In reality, identity is constructed of a complex interplay of many different aspects of self and self in relation to others ( Andersen & Collins, 2010 ). For example, in the United States, someone who is economically wealthy and a person of color may have a social class experience that is different from someone who is economically wealthy and is White. Both the external and internal aspects of social class are influenced by other aspects of identity that carry certain expectations, worldview beliefs, privileges, and liabilities. Further, there is considerable research indicating that stereotypes, discrimination, and attributions mix perceptions of race, ethnicity, social class, and gender ( Chronister, 2006 ; Limbert & Bullock, 2005 ; Toporek & Pope-Davis, 2005 ).

Social Location: Historical Narrative as Backdrop

Historically, literature in counseling and psychology tends to assume an objective position, framing literature reviews and research conclusions as unbiased reports of the work, rather than the person doing the work. However, as the construct of worldview implies, the way that information is processed, synthesized, and reported is influenced by the person or persons involved. Further, in areas of writing where there are clear power differentials between groups, it is relevant to consider the background of the writers. For example, when a well-educated and economically privileged person writes about issues of poverty, her or his description, interpretation, and conclusions regarding poverty unavoidably are at least somewhat influenced by her or his perspective as a privileged person. Therefore, I believe that it may be helpful to have some understanding of my experiences, worldview, and motivations as they influence my relationship to social class, classism, and social justice. Similarly, a historical and sociopolitical context of the relevant disciplines also helps to provide social location and insight into the frame through which these constructs are viewed.

I grew up in a relatively socioracially White and economically homogeneous, midsized, Midwestern, university town in one house from age three until I graduated high school. I always felt that our family was different from everyone else, and I never quite felt like I fit. As a child, my understanding of social class was somewhat confusing. My father had an advanced degree in architecture and taught at the university, my mother did not complete high school until I was a teenager when she completed her GED. I understood as a child that I would be attending college. I remember my mother saying often, “Don’t get married until you have your career.”

Although we lived in a university town, the area where we rented our house was made up mostly of working-class families, few of whom had college education. However, they always seemed more financially well off to me (and in my eyes, higher social class). Because my parents believed in living simply, compared to our neighbors and childhood friends, it seemed to me that we had few of the same material belongings (e.g., television, car, popular toys, name brand clothing, etc.). I assumed it was because we did not have enough money to buy any of those things. Food in my house was equally split into six portions (four children and 2 adults). Gifts and other luxuries were distributed equally among the four children so that no one received more or less than any other. This sense of equality and fairness clearly influenced my expectations as an adult. My family also instilled a sense of social justice framed through Catholic and Jesuit teachings and my family engaged with various marginalized individuals and groups who had minimal social support; for example people with disabilities in institutional living, older adults living alone and in nursing homes, and international students.

Upon completing my undergraduate degree, I moved west to Oregon and then the San Francisco Bay Area, where my awareness of myself as a college-educated White person focused on multicultural counseling became a central part of my personal and professional growth. I am also aware that my educational and employment experience and opportunities were influenced by White privilege. Now, as a mother of two children, new social class and social justice understandings and challenges arise. San Francisco is a metropolitan area with a very high cost of living, and I am with a partner who has secure employment in a well-paid occupation. Provided that neither of us loses our job, I feel secure that we will have housing, food, enough money to travel occasionally, and resources to pay for our kids to participate in sports programs. Because my professional interest and research is in the areas of equity, social justice, and multiculturalism, I am often reflecting and struggling with reconciling the privilege that my job and family security holds and how that is discrepant from many of the populations I work with.

My conviction and belief in the importance of acknowledging and reflecting on our social class background, beliefs, assumptions, and challenges in relation to our work and our clients overpowers my struggle with being so transparent. In other words, acknowledging social class privilege and oppression feels vulnerable because it raises feelings of guilt, the uncomfortable reality that there is unfairness, self-doubt about inadvertent ways I may perpetuate class oppression, and uncertainty about my credibility in this work. Yet, the process of understanding and being honestly self-reflective in this reality is essential, because these experiences and positions influence motivations, worldview, and the very real interaction between me and those with whom I work. By not acknowledging and exploring this aspect of cultural identity, counselors may inadvertently do harm (e.g., Goodman et al., 2004 ; Toporek & Liu, 2001 ).

Historical and Social Location of Counseling and Psychology

Psychology was founded by privileged White men who could afford to travel to Germany in the late 1800s and early 1900s to study with Wundt. They returned to build the psychology departments and psychological clinics that would set the course of American psychology. They were embedded in and embraced a Eurocentric majority culture with its own cultural, educational, political, and social values. The faculty and students of the newly emerging discipline were almost exclusively men within a patriarchical power structure that kept others such as women, immigrants, and minorities on the outside. ( Strickland, 2000 , p. 331)

This history of psychology is relevant as we consider the influence of social class in the very foundation of the field. This framework has not only dictated who has entered the field, but also the theories and practices that have been built since its inception. One of the most striking consequences of this framework was outlined by Strickland (2000) as she chronicled the early attempts of psychology to define and measure intelligence and the public policy implications of these efforts. These attempts clearly identified marginalized populations, including women, immigrants, ethnic and sexual minorities, and “ne’er do wells” (as cited by Strickland, 2000 , p. 333) as substandard and put into motion efforts to implement forced sterilization, among other programs. Further, theories of counseling have been largely based on the perspectives of White, middle-class and wealthy individuals. For example, Zandy (as cited by Harley, Jolivette, McCormick, & Tice, 2002 ) described “the link between visibility and knowledge as the exclusion of the working poor during the formation of knowledge, with elite intellentsia as the primary developers. Thus, the formation of both knowledge and theories typically has not included the histories and experiences of the working poor in any significant manner” (p. 226).

This history highlights just a few of the ways in which counseling and psychology have participated in maintaining power differentials in society as well as perpetuating institutional oppression of a number of groups. To be certain, statistics regarding poverty and its relation to high mortality rates, low graduation rates, health problems, and other maladies have been well documented. However, the concentrated study and integration of this meaning into the work of psychology and counseling has tended to be relegated to social and community psychology and more recently prevention rather than applied in practice. Within the field at large, practice has focused on individual level change with less consideration of the need for structural change.

However, throughout the history of counseling and counseling psychology, there have been some individuals and organizational efforts toward correcting economic and social inequities in society (for a review see Fouad et al., 2006 ). The American Psychological Association (APA) has initiated a few efforts to address poverty, most notably the development of the Committee on Socioeconomic Status and the Socioeconomic Status Office through the Public Interest Directorate “responsible for directing, overseeing, facilitating and promoting psychology’s contribution to the understanding of SES and the lives and well-being of the poor” ( APA, 2010a ). In addition to soliciting and encouraging research on socioeconomic status, this office and committee have also been involved in legislative advocacy on issues of poverty and homelessness. The intentions of this effort are outlined in APA’s recent adoption of the Resolution on Poverty and Socioeconomic Status ( APA, 2010b ).

As an organization, the American Counseling Association (ACA) has taken few explicit actions to address social class and poverty in counseling. One exception is a human rights resolution that was passed in 2005. This resolution called for “promoting a socially responsible approach to counseling” ( Counselors for Social Justice [CSJ], 2009 ). And, regarding other social justice issues, stated, “Given the substantial body of empirical knowledge that describes the negative effect that poverty has on human development, it is resolved that the socially-responsible approach to mental health-care that Dr. King advocated is necessary to eradicate these toxic social-environmental conditions in our society” ( CSJ, 2009 ). There have been several divisions within ACA that have taken more active approaches to addressing economic inequities and recommending the involvement of counselors in this; for example, Association for Multicultural Counseling and Development, Counselors for Social Justice, American School Counseling Association, and the American School Counseling Association, to name a few.

Attention to social class and classism has come more visibly to the forefront in the past 5–10 years (e.g., Liu, 2010 ). Smith (2005) noted that over the past 40 years, there has been periodic dialogue and literature about psychotherapy and people living with poverty, yet the role of classism has been relatively unexamined. Criticism about the relevance of traditional therapy models for people living in poverty and the need to address structural barriers more directly has been raised by a number of counseling psychologists (e.g., Caldwell, 2009 ; Smith, Chambers, & Bratini, 2009 ). For example, Smith (2006) suggested that “what we do is not particularly accessible, relevant, or useful for poor clients,” (p. 338). In addition, more literature has addressed poverty and homelessness (e.g., Cosgrove, 2006 ; Liu & - Estrada-Hernández, 2010 ; Smith, 2009 ).

Career counseling and vocational psychology have had a varied past in terms of attention to social class. Often, Frank Parsons is credited with influencing the social justice aspect of counseling through his work to establish training and vocational counseling services for under- and unemployed individuals in the early 1900s. In school counseling there are a number of pioneers who sought to extend vocational education opportunities. George Merrill is recognized as a pioneer of vocational guidance, implementing programs at Cogswell High School in San Francisco in 1888 and as headmaster of the California School of Mechanical Arts in 1895. Merrill developed a system for teachers to observe and advise students in these public schools about occupational choice and training ( Savickas, 2009 , p. 194). He was later also brought in to develop a newly created Lux School for Industrial Training for Girls funded by the estate of Miranda Lux and first opened in 1912 ( Lick-Wilmerding School, n.d. ). Miranda Lux had been involved in the kindergarten movement and orphan asylum work. This led her to an interest in the need for industrial and vocational education, “newly recognized by educators across the land as a means of creating trained laborers for industry and agriculture” ( Lick-Wilmerding School, n.d. ). The Lux School curriculum included sewing and textiles, retailing and merchandising, food, health, and art. Although these efforts extended vocational training opportunities for a larger number of individuals of limited economic means, the extent to which these challenged social and economic stratification is unclear.

Despite these examples of vocational education and guidance provided for populations with few economic resources, counseling theory, including career counseling theory, have generally assumed free choice and access to economic resources. A number of counseling psychologists have recently criticized this and advocated for attention to developing theory and practice that recognizes the needs of low-income populations (e.g., Blustein, Coutinho, Murphy, Backus, & Catraio, 2011 ). Although some career development theories have acknowledged economic barriers (e.g., Gottfredson, 1996 ; Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994 ), very few career counseling theories offer guidance for addressing these barriers (for exceptions see Fouad & Bingham, 1995 ; Toporek & Chope, 2006 ). And, as noted earlier, access to economic resources is only one aspect of social class. Few theories address the psychological aspect of classism and its impact on social and economic equity.

The Role of Social Class in Access and Choice: Where Does Social Justice Fit In?

The process of choosing an occupation is unavoidably linked to social class, leading researchers to describe the significance of social class within career development by stating, “if one were permitted only a single variable with which to predict an individual’s occupational status, it would surely be the socioeconomic status of the individual’s family.” ( Schulenberg, Vondracek, & Crouter, 1984 , p. 130)

Primary social class determinants include access to resources throughout many aspects of life including health care, housing, safe environments, childcare, healthy food, employment, and education as well as the individual and group perception of social class meaning. Given the space available, this discussion will focus specifically on education and vocational choice and opportunity.

In the arena of primary and secondary education, a number of authors have acknowledged the influence of socioeconomic status on educational and career outcomes ( Blustein et al., 2002 ; Thompson & Subich, 2006 ; Trusty, Ng, & Plata, 2000 ). Finn (1999) described several types of educational approaches and the implications for maintaining a pipeline of workers by social class. Using Anyon’s observations of four different schools (identified as working class, middle class, affluent professional, and executive elite), Finn classified educational approaches on a continuum with “domesticating” on one end and “empowering” on the other based on the extent to which students and teachers negotiated the conditions of education. He framed Anyon’s observations in terms of the utility of each approach in preparing workers for each of these four social classes and highlighted how the teaching approaches used including control, discipline, content, and expectations of students were aligned with expectations of workers at each social class. This description is striking, and although Anyon’s observations are dated they provide support for continued educational reform and call to question the role of education in maintaining a specific social stratification.

As noted earlier in this chapter, career counseling has generally framed career development and occupational selection with assumptions of choice and access to resources. Although there has long been a recognition of social class and economic status as a determinant of occupational choice and opportunity in career development ( Schulenberg et al., 1984 ), in practice and theory, career counseling has been characterized by continued emphasis on choice as well as the individual and individual agency with inadequate attention to the social and institutional structures that are set up, and some may say invested in, maintaining social class stratification.

One of the positive developments in the field over the past decade has been increased attention to disparities in educational and employment opportunities based on identity and sociopolitical and historical status. For example, there has been considerable work done in the area of contextual influences including barriers and supports for individuals of a range of minority statuses in the career development process ( Cook, Heppner, & O’Brien, 2002 ; Fouad & Kantamneni, 2008 ; Gushue, Clarke, Pantzer, & Scanlan, 2006 ; Howard et al., 2010 ; Kenny et al., 2007 ; Leung, 1995 ). There has also been some limited research examining the influence of social class and vocational psychology ( Blustein et al., 2002 ; Diemer & Ali, 2009 ; Lapour & Heppner, 2009 ). Diemer and Ali suggested using the social class worldview model (SCWM; Liu et al., 2004 ) and Blustein’s “psychology of working” perspective to address the subjective nature of social class experience and work. For example, Blustein et al. (2002) found that lower social class youth tended to view work as a means of survival or “making ends meet,” whereas upper social class youth tended to view work as a means of identity, life satisfaction, or upward mobility. Diemer and Ali identified “work or economic subcultures” (p. 254) and described how classism operates to define perceived and real vocational options for individuals and/or groups.

For example, in rural areas such as rural Appalachia, coal mining and other physical labor occupations are the primary source of income ( Ali & McWhirter, 2006 ). In these areas, working with one’s hands is valued more than work that is perceived to simply “push paper around.” Classism may be exerted on young rural Appalachians to fulfill occupational expectations that meet with social class demands of their particular economic culture. As a result, these youth may only consider occupations that require physical labor. ( Diemer & Ali, p. 254 )

Because social class also engages a psychological identity, changes in economic and intellectual status do not automatically change one’s internalized sense of one’s social class. Some literature has explored the experience of individuals who have shifted their social status along with implications for their psychological experience of social class. For example, Nelson, Englar-Carlson, Tierney, and Hau (2006) presented an interesting exploration of the experience of counseling academicians who have transitioned from identification with lower socioeconomic class status in their youth to higher economic and intellectual status as academics with doctoral degrees. Although much of this work has contributed significantly to understanding the influence on social class and classism on access to education and employment choice, there is still the question of action and what role, if any, the field of counseling has in addressing or working to change systems that maintain this classist framework.

Counseling Action in the Interest of Social Justice in Education and Occupational Choice

Before continuing, one question must be made transparent. Is social class stratification necessary and desired for society to “work”? In other words, do you, the reader, believe that there is a hierarchy within society that is necessary to ensure that there are workers who will pick lettuce, workers who will wash dishes, workers who will cook and serve food, workers who will sell food, workers who will run restaurants, workers who will establish restaurant chains and supervise others, workers who will manage economies of corporations, and workers who will trade commodities and economies? Further, is social stratification necessary to maintain a pipeline of workers in each of these fields? Alternatively, do you believe that everyone should aspire to higher education, professional level occupations, increased material wealth, and higher social status than their current community?

These are critical questions and are not presented lightly. Fundamental political and philosophical beliefs and systems undergird social structures and influence social action. If one is to take action, it is important to understand one’s own basic assumptions and beliefs about the functioning of economic and political systems. These questions influence the values, assumptions, limitations, and framework with which the actor approaches the work. Without an understanding of the fundamental paradigm from which I view the world and the way it should work, with all the implications of that, then the dialogue and action risks inefficacy, inauthenticity, and unproductive conflict. Assuming that the reader is interested and believes that counselors and psychologists have a role in changing the systems of social class inequity, the possibilities for action are many. I will focus my discussion on social justice action oriented toward increasing equity in education and occupational choice.

There has been significant literature on equity in schools and the role that counselors can play in addressing inequity (e.g., Bemak & Chung, 2005 ; Cox & Lee, 2007 ; Schultheiss, 2005 ). Similarly, there has been increasing attention to increasing social justice through career counseling ( Bhat, 2010 ; Chope, 2010 ; Chronister, 2006 ; Pope & Pangelinan, 2010 ; Toporek & Chope, 2006 ). One approach to social justice that has slowly gained momentum over the past 10 years is the role of advocate ( Collison et al., 1998 ; Lewis, Lewis, Daniels, & D’Andrea, 1998 ; Fassinger & O’Brien, 2000 ; Toporek, & Liu, 2001 ). A practical model that can be applied to a range of situations that counselors and helping professionals encounter is the advocacy competencies model (Lewis, Arnold, House, & Toporek, as cited in Toporek et al., 2009 ). This model is based in community counseling models as well as multicultural competence literature. The advocacy competency model identifies specific competencies and skills counselors need when acting as advocates in six different domains of advocacy. These domains provide a structure for helping professionals to use in identifying the types of advocacy actions that may be appropriate given the situation. The domains are organized along two dimensions, the extent of client involvement (advocacy with the client or community and advocacy on behalf of the client or community) and the level of intervention ranging from micro- to macrolevels (individual, school/community, societal). Advocacy that is enacted in partnership with the client/community are empowerment, community collaboration, and public information. Advocacy that is enacted on behalf of the client/community includes client advocacy, systems advocacy, and social/political advocacy.

This model has been applied to a number of settings and has promise for addressing social class issues. For example, Crethar (2010) applied the model to a case of a Latino student who was identified as a problem student and struggling academically. Chope (2010) described the use of the model to working with transgender clients in career counseling. Liu and Estrada-Hernández (2010) applied the advocacy competencies model to counseling with individuals living with poverty. Throughout the discussion, Liu and Estrada-Hernandez reminded counselors to understand the client’s conceptualization of the current situation and his or her needs reinforcing the framework of social class as a psychological construct. The awareness of the counselor of his or her own social class worldview is critical in this process. I am reminded of a recent conversation with a group of graduate students regarding a needs assessment they had conducted with the client population who accessed their community clinic ( Niegocki et al., in press ). The students reported that counselor trainees had ranked resource referrals with housing, financial assistance, and other sustenance needs as highest priority whereas the clients ranked volunteer opportunities, recreation, and other resources highest. It is interesting to consider this discrepancy and wonder what assumptions we make as counselors and helping professionals and the extent to which our social class beliefs influence these assumptions.

Because inequity is usually larger than the individual, addressing the community, school, or even larger systems is also an important aspect of attending to social justice. Another example from the advocacy competencies model is that of community collaboration. In many social systems, determining the individuals or communities who have voice and power to shape the system is often based on social class. For example, the structure and distribution of resources within state allocations for education is determined to some extent by voters but to a larger extent by legislative representatives and state government. The allocations are then provided to local school districts and state education offices. How these resources are to be spent is determined by legislation, school district policy, school boards, and state and federal mandates. A great potential for community collaboration is involvement of communities, students, parents, and school staff in identifying local needs and resources and shaping public policy. Counselors can support and facilitate community collaboration by listening carefully to populations who are affected most by these decisions but who have the least opportunity to voice and shape the dialogue and policy. Further, counselors can engage these stakeholders as partners to create forums in which communities create and assert their needs and perspectives. Traditional skills in group facilitation, listening, organizing, problem solving, sharing resources, and other basic counseling proficiencies can be employed in this social justice process. Other disciplines such as community organizing, public health, and more can help enhance this knowledge and skill and also serve as allies in the process. Prevention and community counseling lend expertise as well as research approaches such as participatory action research.

Some criticism of social justice approaches have centered on what some view as the scope of counseling and might question the above paragraph, insisting that counseling is about individual well-being and that working with communities is beyond our scope. However, I will argue that attending to the individual without acknowledging and participating in addressing inequity is a disservice to the health and well-being of the individual. Toporek and Liu (2001) identified some additional criticism leveled at social justice oriented counselors and psychologists and identified recommendations for addressing these concerns in practice and training. Some of these issues included conflicting values between practitioner and the community served, disempowering clients, and other aspects that could become problematic. A number of authors have provided useful guidelines for facilitating ethical and effective training for social justice work within counseling and counseling psychology (e.g., Ali, Liu, Mahmood, & Arguello, 2008 ; Baggerly, 2006 ; Goodman et al., 2004 ). This will be discussed in more detail later in this chapter.

Addressing Classism in Counseling

Classism is a relevant consideration when looking at social justice and social class. Classism can be subtle and even born from good intentions. Although there are many different aspects of classism, in the interest of space I will focus on the influence and consideration of classism in counselor and institutional values, attributions of poverty and wealth, and privilege.

Counselor and Institutional Values

Classism is demonstrated through a system of beliefs that values some occupations over others, some behaviors over others, and some ways of thinking about the world over others. In fact, the reality of career and college counseling often involves serving as a “culture broker” ( Jinnah & Muñoz, 2007 ), whereby the counselor assists the client in learning the expected behaviors and norms of the world of employment or higher education and helps the client adapt to those expectations. When working with clients from communities that are underrepresented in those environments, for example, first-generation college students, the environment represents a more privileged social class than the client. In order to access the resources of this environment, the client must come to adapt to and generally value that system. This is a reality. So how does a counselor honor and help preserve the client’s cultural and social class identity while at the same time suggesting that the client change their behavior to accommodate the more privileged environment? Consciousness regarding this sociopolitical framework is one step. Honoring the value of the clients’ communities, their beliefs and their priorities is an additional step. It is often a challenge to tease out what clients present as a result of their cultural social class values and what clients present due to internalized oppression or intergenerational trauma. These are all important considerations with unclear resolutions.

Attributions in Counseling

A small amount of literature has focused on attributions of poverty and wealth that influence the relationship of social class and counseling and social work ( Bullock, 2004 ; Toporek & Pope-Davis, 2005 ; Weiss-Gal, Benyamini, Ginzburg, Savaya, & Peled, 2009 ). In an effort to determine if there was a relationship between attitudes about race and poverty, Toporek and Pope-Davis surveyed counseling trainees regarding their explanations of poverty and their affective and cognitive racial attitudes. They found that trainees who endorsed structural explanations of poverty or systemic causes were more likely to endorse more racially sensitive statements. Conversely, trainees who endorsed individual explanations for poverty, for example that poverty is caused by individual characteristics or behavior, were more likely to endorse racially insensitive statements. Further, trainees who had completed more multicultural training were more likely to endorse structural explanations of poverty even though the majority of trainees indicated that attention to social class and poverty was very minimal in their training. The authors hypothesized that the emphasis on structural oppression regarding other aspects of culture (e.g., racism) may also facilitate trainees’ understanding of other areas of structural oppression. Because social class and classism have been shown to be very misunderstood, and because they are so intertwined with other aspects of cultural attitudes and identity, it is important that multicultural training increase attention to these issues more directly.

Issues of Privilege and “Good Intentions”

The issue of privilege is important for us to address in this discussion, because it is often the case that human service practitioners, counselors, and psychologists working toward social justice have greater power than those they are working with. One of the most documented ways that psychology and counseling has addressed social class is through increased attention to marginalized populations. This is a welcome move given the history of neglect of these communities by the profession. It is also very likely that the social justice oriented counselor or psychologist reflects a position of greater social class privilege than the community being served. Understanding one’s assumptions, paradigm, and intentions is critical ( Roysircar, 2008 ; Toporek & Liu, 2001 ). The quote at the beginning of this chapter addresses this point eloquently. A paradigm of “helping those less fortunate” often carries a condescending and patronizing nuance that ultimately may contribute to reinforcing differences in institutional power.

One of the questions regarding help-givers’ motivations when working with communities with less socioeconomic privilege is, What is the help-provider getting from this interaction? Again, I am not suggesting that there are easy answers, but important reflection questions. In developing a community partnership between a university and nonprofit agency, my community partner and I ( Toporek et al., 2009 ) recounted the development of the relationship and likened it to a dating relationship. One of the questions repeated by the director of the community agency to me, the university representative was, “What are you getting out of this?” At the time, I felt that it was my responsibility to serve community and it was an opportunity to learn. I did not have a clear and concrete response to her question. Although this did not prevent us from working together, there was an uncertainty about the long-term sustainability of my involvement given that there was no concrete outcome that I could identify. In addition, it seemed that many people involved with the agency, students and staff alike, conveyed puzzlement about my role and my motivations for involvement. I gradually became able to articulate the benefits to my professional role and my students. This allowed me to function more genuinely in the partnership and when the demands of my teaching position limited the time I could spend, my transition away from weekly involvement was more easily explained.

Critical reflection of the practitioner’s cultural positionality in relation to the community being served can provide insight and opportunities for more ethical and effective intervention. In other words, who we are and what sociopolitical position we hold in relation to people and communities we work with is meaningful and may influence the way we approach our work and the way we are viewed by others. Chronister’s (2006) discussion of social class and racial dynamics that arose in the context of a career counseling group for women facing domestic violence provides a thoughtful examination of intentions and decision making regarding ways to address within-group tensions. Further, Chronister provided an excellent discussion of the various ways that social class and racial differences intersect and surface as well as alternative ways to process and structure the group in response to these dynamics.

Training, Educational, and Research Considerations

There are a plethora of implications for training, research, and practice of social justice work within counseling and counseling psychology (e.g., Ali et al., 2008 ; Baggerly, 2006 ; Goodman et al., 2004 ; Lewis, 2010 ; Murray, Pope, & Rowell, 2010 ; Toporek & Vaughn, 2010 ). Some of the advances and recommendations for multicultural counseling are relevant for training regarding social class in counseling. Namely, facilitating trainee self-awareness, increasing their understanding of their clients’ worldviews regarding social class, and developing skills specific to addressing social class in counseling are relevant. On top of this, consideration of the counselor’s role in the larger community and societal arenas is also important. The SCWM ( Liu et al., 2004 ) provides a useful model for self-understanding as well as conceptualization of clients. Understanding a client’s worldview may not automatically provide clear guidance regarding the most appropriate approach. For example, in their exploration of social justice training, Goodman and her colleagues (2004) expose the difficult dilemmas that may arise when trying to maintain a respect for client worldviews and self-determination when it is contrary to what the counselor believes to be in the best interest of the client. In training, and in practice, exploration of our own values and how those reflect our social class worldviews is essential. Further, facilitating skills for experiencing ambiguity and conflict can help when there are not easy answers.

In terms of addressing skills and intervention with regard to social class, training is needed that provides opportunities to develop the capacity to conceptualize and design interventions that address inequity at community and societal levels, as well as individual levels. The advocacy competencies model is a useful tool for identifying various types of advocacy in partnership with and on behalf of clients and communities as well as competencies that facilitate intervention at individual, community, and societal levels ( Toporek et al., 2009 ). Once classism within counseling and service organizations is identified, advocacy can help facilitate action to address institutional inequities.

One of the issues in research regarding social justice practice is the extent to which counselors should focus on internal or external etiology and treatment. In social justice and advocacy, recognition of external barriers and forces is accompanied by a move to action. Yet, this is not typically the entire picture. Internal forces and dynamics are also significant and should not be ignored. Thus, research that helps illuminate the balance of internal and external focus and provides models for assessing, collaborating and structuring counseling in a way that facilitates a recognition of both these realms would help address some of the criticisms that have been raised regarding social justice in counseling. In addition, research is needed that facilitates better understanding of barriers related to social class issues from clients’ and communities’ perspectives.

Finally, as I write the conclusion to this chapter, Occupy Wall Street enters its third month in New York City and there are similar Occupy movements across the United States. These movements are calling attention to social class divisions and inequality. There is tremendous opportunity for discussion, dialogue, and change through alternative models of discourse and challenges to corporate control of the world economy. The call of “We are the 99 percent” rings through the movement and is quickly becoming a well-recognized phrase. This movement has exceptional momentum and crosses a broad spectrum of social class groups. It is clear that this movement has strength because a wide range of people is harshly affected by home foreclosures, accelerating college tuitions, joblessness, and general frustration with the economy. Throughout all the potential, there coexists tension regarding the extent to which the movement is able to, or attempts to, truly include voices of marginalized individuals including those facing poverty, racism, and other structural oppressions. In other words, within the “99 percent”, there is tremendous potential for a new system of economies, yet in what ways are all social classes outside the top 1 percent represented? Fortunately, there is some recognition and struggle to reconcile the perpetuation of lateral oppression and exclusion. The extent to which the movement is able to find ways of truly incorporating voices from all social class levels within the “99 percent” is yet to be seen.

There is the potential for great strides to be made in addressing long-standing inequities and injustice in society and counselors, psychologists, and helping professionals stand poised to make important contributions. These contributions can only have large-scale impact when disciplines combine forces. Practitioners, educators, and researchers need to frame their passion and energy within a conscious awareness of their privilege and motivations and how that shapes the work.

This quote is “often attributed to Lila Watson, who has said she was ‘not comfortable being credited for something that had been born of a collective process’—the attribution here is the one she accepts.” ( http://wisdomquotes.org/freedom.php )

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Social Classes and Class Structure Essay

Introduction, relevance of marx ideas, bourgeoisie, the proletariat, alienation of proletariat, social stratification: marxist perspective.

According to Karl Marx, analyzing social classes and structures as well as variations in the structures are critical in understanding modern capitalism other social systems or even modes of production.

Marx and Engels argue that the communist in the manifesto ‘…the history of all hitherto existing in the society is the class struggles” (Marx and Engels 35).

Analyzing class distribution and struggles is relevant in establishing knowledge about capitalism. Social classes are divided into two main classes with distinct features one comprises the owners or possessors of property as well as the means of production.

This group performs the role of production. The other factor is concerned producers and controllers of the surpluses in relation to human social labor.

The economic factors in the modern world govern social relationships in capitalism than it did in ancient times. This paper therefore discusses stratification and conflicts that exist in society. It bases on the statements made by Marx in scholarly works.

Divisions in Capitalism

Earlier societies consisted of several sections or clusters that can be perceived to be classes. They were not classes parse but elites not specifically based on economic factors but also incorporated other things such as priesthood, knights or military elite.

In the modern society, other classes of people such as capital owners, petty bourgeoisie and peasants are incorporated in the production process.

In spite of Lumpen proletariat existing, they are not primarily in terms of the dynamics of capitalism or its expansion and development.

The bourgeoisie controls the means of production such as capital and labor. The capital exploit the workers by misusing their labor meaning that they produce much but are paid less.

They utilize the surplus value created from employment of labor to accumulate and expand their capital. Owning massive resources is not equivalent to possessing capital power and labor; it does not make an individual to be bourgeoisie.

To be a capitalist or member of bourgeoisie class entails the ownership of huge capital, active participation in capital accumulation, using capital to organize production, employ and exploit labor and finally make the capital self regulating by using the surplus value to continue the cycle of capital accumulation (Marx and Engels 48).

Bourgeoisies began in cities of medieval Europe. This was during the development of mercantilism, artisans and manufacturing. The main aim of economic survival for the people was increase wealth through trade and commerce.

The bourgeoisies needed much freedom in marketing activities and economic expansion activities. Capital ownership was achieved by labor employment (industrial capital) while for some it was acquired through trade (merchant capital).

Those who employed workers to create and expand capital succeeded in acquiring capital consequently leading the sector of bourgeoisie.

The workers only own their labor implying that they earn their living through their ability to work. They do not own any resources in form of capital meaning that they own nothing apart from their hands, bodies and minds/skills.

The Proletariat works hard to sustain their lives and provide basic needs to their relatives and other dependants. They have to seek employment if they are to continue coexisting in the society.

For an employee, working for a capitalist is not peaceful instead; the kind of relation that exists is exploitative in nature because the worker performs many activities with insufficient returns.

The exploitative relationship between the worker and the employer is cumulative meaning that it keeps on repeating itself. The capitalists accumulate wealth by underpaying the worker (Marx and Engels 50).

The workers produce goods and services that belong to the capitalist meaning that workers are also properties of capitalists. They produce goods that create surpluses to the bourgeoisie but they remain in poverty.

Exploitation occurs in every day’s production process, which ends up restricting workers from acquiring wealth and regenerates the best working environments for further exploitation (Marx and Engels 50).

The existing mode of production is arranged in such a way that the property owners continue enjoying better opportunities while workers continue occupying their current positions.

Capitalists accumulate the excesses obtained in the production process by workers. The intersection point between workers and capitalists is the production process. The capitalist who create struggles and intrigues hence causing tension in the society exploits the workers.

Although the workers are the direct producers of goods, they are slaves of the goods they produce. The produced good has more value than the worker does because they are offered maximum security and stored in safe places.

The workers produce goods that they do not consume, they produce for others. The increase in product value decreases the viability of the workers. The worker ends up being treated the same way goods are treated, treated as equals.

Workers are perpetually pushed to the periphery leading to alienation from the process of production. The way workers relate to the whole process of production leaves a lot to be desired because the relationship is unnatural and uncalled for.

The workers never find satisfaction because they satisfy the interests of other individuals (Capitalists). The worker views the whole process of production as forced labor because actually it is inhuman.

The worker ends up being alienated from the self because of the last two forms of alienation. The worker portrays two personalities; one is the feeling of belonging to capitalism because the worker is separated from real consciousness. In the other hand, workers perceive themselves as human beings ((Marx and Engels 54).

The last form of alienation that dissatisfied Marx is alienation from others implying that the worker is separated from other people. Workers cannot relate normally to others because individuals with separated self cannot interact in accordance to societal norms.

They view others as properties of capitalism. It is at this point that Marx noted with finally that only a revolution would salvage humankind from all these troubles.

Marx observed in his statements that capitalism brings about differentiations in society. The rich are at the top while the poor are at the bottom perishing in great poverty. In modern capitalistic societies, classes differentiate people.

According to Marx, the capitalistic culture is a divisive force not an integrating one. The existing social groups are differentiated in property meaning that some benefit more than others do.

The owners of the means of production who enjoy power, prestige and luxurious life occupy the higher positions. Social stratification basing on property is found in all human societies.

For societies to survive therefore role allocation is indispensable. Society attaches unequal rewards to social positions because people differ in ability and positions differ in terms of importance. Unfortunately, the important positions benefit the elite (Marx and Engels 56).

There is a heated debate on whether unequal rewards function to motivate talented individuals. Generally, social stratification basing on capital is a mechanism in which some exploit others.

The elite uses the institutions of the state to advance their interests, in fact Marx termed the state as the committee of dominant class. Those with highest rewards enjoy superior life chances such as access to high education, quality housing and special Medicare.

Those who occupy important positions erect barriers to recruitment of others into comfortable positions. They use capital power to restrict access to their positions by creating unnecessary demands to the position services.

The different rewards exist to propel hostility, suspicion and mistrust. It gives the low class the feeling of exclusion from larger society leading to formation of solidarity, which might cause tensions and more conflicts with threats of revolutions.

The statements made by Karl Marx serve to describe how people should liberate themselves. Liberation would be achieved through people’s consciousness.

People will arise up against the existing mode of production because of its social injustices. The mode hands a few the power of investment while the majority survive at the mercy of the owners of the means of production.

The state cannot liberate the masses because the capitalist to enhance self-interests uses it. Exploitation and alienation are the most pressing issues among the workers; they are the same things that disillusioned Marx to an extent of calling for a revolution to guarantee mass happiness.

Marx, Karl and Engels, Fredrick. The Communist Manifesto: introduction by Martin Malia , New York: Penguin group, 1998, pg. 35.

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• Social Class and Alienation
• Social Alienation
• Marx’s and Engels’s Communist Manifesto
• Karl Marx's Critique of Capitalism
• "The Communist Manifesto" by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels
• Marx, Wallerstein and Baudrillard
• The Peculiarity of Class Stratification
• Analysis of Marx's Alienation Theory
• World History in The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx
• Karl Marx’s and Max Weber's Ideas
• Theoretical Examination of Social Stratification
• Emile Durkheim and His Philosophy
• Civilization and Its Discontents
• The Concept of Otherness
• Social concepts

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5.1 Social Structure: The Building Blocks of Social Life

Learning objectives.

• Describe the difference between a status and a role.
• Understand the difference between an ascribed status, an achieved status, and a master status.
• List the major social institutions.

Social life is composed of many levels of building blocks, from the very micro to the very macro. These building blocks combine to form the social structure . As Chapter 1 “Sociology and the Sociological Perspective” explained, social structure refers to the social patterns through which a society is organized and can be horizontal or vertical. To recall, horizontal social structure refers to the social relationships and the social and physical characteristics of communities to which individuals belong, while vertical social structure , more commonly called social inequality , refers to ways in which a society or group ranks people in a hierarchy. This chapter’s discussion of social structure focuses primarily on horizontal social structure, while Chapter 8 “Social Stratification” through Chapter 12 “Aging and the Elderly” , as well as much material in other chapters, examine dimensions of social inequality. The (horizontal) social structure comprises several components, to which we now turn, starting with the most micro and ending with the most macro. Our discussion of social interaction in the second half of this chapter incorporates several of these components.

Status has many meanings in the dictionary and also within sociology, but for now we will define it as the position that someone occupies in society. This position is often a job title, but many other types of positions exist: student, parent, sibling, relative, friend, and so forth. It should be clear that status as used in this way conveys nothing about the prestige of the position, to use a common synonym for status. A physician’s job is a status with much prestige, but a shoeshiner’s job is a status with no prestige.

Any one individual often occupies several different statuses at the same time, and someone can simultaneously be a banker, Girl Scout troop leader, mother, school board member, volunteer at a homeless shelter, and spouse. This someone would be very busy! We call all the positions an individual occupies that person’s status set (see Figure 5.1 “Example of a Status Set” ).

Figure 5.1 Example of a Status Set

Sociologists usually speak of three types of statuses. The first type is ascribed status , which is the status that someone is born with and has no control over. There are relatively few ascribed statuses; the most common ones are our biological sex, race, parents’ social class and religious affiliation, and biological relationships (child, grandchild, sibling, and so forth).

Status refers to the position an individual occupies. Used in this way, a person’s status is not related to the prestige of that status. The jobs of physician and shoeshiner are both statuses, even though one of these jobs is much more prestigious than the other job.

Public Domain Images – CC0 public domain.

The second kind of status is called achieved status , which, as the name implies, is a status you achieve, at some point after birth, sometimes through your own efforts and sometimes because good or bad luck befalls you. The status of student is an achieved status, as is the status of restaurant server or romantic partner, to cite just two of the many achieved statuses that exist.

Two things about achieved statuses should be kept in mind. First, our ascribed statuses, and in particular our sex, race and ethnicity, and social class, often affect our ability to acquire and maintain many achieved statuses (such as college graduate). Second, achieved statuses can be viewed positively or negatively. Our society usually views achieved statuses such as physician, professor, or college student positively, but it certainly views achieved statuses such as burglar, prostitute, and pimp negatively.

The third type of status is called a master status . This is a status that is so important that it overrides other statuses you may hold. In terms of people’s reactions, master statuses can be either positive or negative for an individual depending on the particular master status they hold. Barack Obama now holds the positive master status of president of the United States: his status as president overrides all the other statuses he holds (husband, father, and so forth), and millions of Americans respect him, whether or not they voted for him or now favor his policies, because of this status. Many other positive master statuses exist in the political and entertainment worlds and in other spheres of life.

Some master statuses have negative consequences. To recall the medical student and nursing home news story that began this chapter, a physical disability often becomes such a master status. If you are bound to a wheelchair, for example, this fact becomes more important than the other statuses you have and may prompt people to perceive and interact with you negatively. In particular, they perceive you more in terms of your master status (someone bound to a wheelchair) than as the “person beneath” the master status, to cite Matt’s words. For similar reasons, gender, race, and sexual orientation may also be considered master statuses, as these statuses often subject women, people of color, and gays and lesbians, respectively, to discrimination and other problems, no matter what other statuses they may have.

Whatever status we occupy, certain objects signify any particular status. These objects are called status symbols . In popular terms, status symbol usually means something like a Rolls-Royce or BMW that shows off someone’s wealth or success, and many status symbols of this type exist. But sociologists use the term more generally than that. For example, the wheelchair that Matt the medical student rode for 12 days was a status symbol that signified his master status of someone with a (feigned) disability. If someone is pushing a stroller, the stroller is a status symbol that signifies that the person pushing it is a parent or caretaker of a young child.

Whatever its type, every status is accompanied by a role , which is the behavior expected of someone—and in fact everyone —with a certain status. You and most other people reading this book are students. Despite all the other differences among you, you have at least this one status in common. As such, there is a role expected of you as a student (at least by your professors); this role includes coming to class regularly, doing all the reading assigned from this textbook, and studying the best you can for exams. Roles for given statuses existed long before we were born, and they will continue long after we are no longer alive. A major dimension of socialization is learning the roles our society has and then behaving in the way a particular role demands.

Roles help us interact because we are familiar with the behavior associated with roles. Because shoppers and cashiers know what to expect of each other, their social interaction is possible.

David Tan – Cashier – CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Because roles are the behavior expected of people in various statuses, they help us interact because we are familiar with the roles in the first place, a point to which the second half of this chapter returns. Suppose you are shopping in a department store. Your status is a shopper, and the role expected of you as a shopper—and of all shoppers—involves looking quietly at various items in the store, taking the ones you want to purchase to a checkout line, and paying for them. The person who takes your money is occupying another status in the store that we often call a cashier. The role expected of that cashier—and of all cashiers not only in that store but in every other store—is to accept your payment in a businesslike way and put your items in a bag. Because shoppers and cashiers all have these mutual expectations, their social interaction is possible.

Social Networks

Modern life seems increasingly characterized by social networks. A social network is the totality of relationships that link us to other people and groups and through them to still other people and groups. As Facebook and other social media show so clearly, social networks can be incredibly extensive. Social networks can be so large, of course, that an individual in a network may know little or nothing of another individual in the network (e.g., a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend). But these “friends of friends” can sometimes be an important source of practical advice and other kinds of help. They can “open doors” in the job market, they can introduce you to a potential romantic partner, they can pass through some tickets to the next big basketball game. As a key building block of social structure, social networks receive a fuller discussion in Chapter 6 “Groups and Organizations” .

Groups and Organizations

Groups and organizations are the next component of social structure. Because Chapter 6 “Groups and Organizations” discusses groups and organizations extensively, here we will simply define them and say one or two things about them.

A social group (hereafter just group ) consists of two or more people who regularly interact on the basis of mutual expectations and who share a common identity. To paraphrase John Donne, the 17th-century English poet, no one is an island; almost all people are members of many groups, including families, groups of friends, and groups of coworkers in a workplace. Sociology is sometimes called the study of group life, and it is difficult to imagine a modern society without many types of groups and a small, traditional society without at least some groups.

In terms of size, emotional bonding, and other characteristics, many types of groups exist, as Chapter 6 “Groups and Organizations” explains. But one of the most important types is the formal organization (also just organization ), which is a large group that follows explicit rules and procedures to achieve specific goals and tasks. For better and for worse, organizations are an essential feature of modern societies. Our banks, our hospitals, our schools, and so many other examples are all organizations, even if they differ from one another in many respects. In terms of their goals and other characteristics, several types of organizations exist, as Chapter 6 “Groups and Organizations” will again discuss.

Social Institutions

Yet another component of social structure is the social institution , or patterns of beliefs and behavior that help a society meet its basic needs. Modern society is filled with many social institutions that all help society meet its needs and achieve other goals and thus have a profound impact not only on the society as a whole but also on virtually every individual in a society. Examples of social institutions include the family, the economy, the polity (government), education, religion, and medicine. Chapter 13 “Work and the Economy” through Chapter 18 “Health and Medicine” examine each of these social institutions separately.

As those chapters will show, these social institutions all help the United States meet its basic needs, but they also have failings that prevent the United States from meeting all its needs. A particular problem is social inequality, to recall the vertical dimension of social structure, as our social institutions often fail many people because of their social class, race, ethnicity, gender, or all four. These chapters will also indicate that American society could better fulfill its needs if it followed certain practices and policies of other democracies that often help their societies “work” better than our own.

The largest component of social structure is, of course, society itself. Chapter 1 “Sociology and the Sociological Perspective” defined society as a group of people who live within a defined territory and who share a culture. Societies certainly differ in many ways; some are larger in population and some are smaller, some are modern and some are less modern. Since the origins of sociology during the 19th century, sociologists have tried to understand how and why modern, industrial society developed. Part of this understanding involves determining the differences between industrial societies and traditional ones.

One of the key differences between traditional and industrial societies is the emphasis placed on the community versus the emphasis placed on the individual. In traditional societies, community feeling and group commitment are usually the cornerstones of social life. In contrast, industrial society is more individualistic and impersonal. Whereas the people in traditional societies have close daily ties, those in industrial societies have many relationships in which one person barely knows the other person. Commitment to the group and community become less important in industrial societies, and individualism becomes more important.

Sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies (1887/1963) long ago characterized these key characteristics of traditional and industrial societies with the German words Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft . Gemeinschaft means human community, and Tönnies said that a sense of community characterizes traditional societies, where family, kin, and community ties are quite strong. As societies grew and industrialized and as people moved to cities, Tönnies said, social ties weakened and became more impersonal. Tönnies called this situation Gesellschaft and found it dismaying. Chapter 5 “Social Structure and Social Interaction” , Section 5.2 “The Development of Modern Society” discusses the development of societies in more detail.

Key Takeaways

• The major components of social structure are statuses, roles, social networks, groups and organizations, social institutions, and society.
• Specific types of statuses include the ascribed status, achieved status, and master status. Depending on the type of master status, an individual may be viewed positively or negatively because of a master status.

For Your Review

• Take a moment and list every status that you now occupy. Next to each status, indicate whether it is an ascribed status, achieved status, or master status.
• Take a moment and list every group to which you belong. Write a brief essay in which you comment on which of the groups are more meaningful to you and which are less meaningful to you.

Tönnies, F. (1963). Community and society . New York, NY: Harper and Row. (Original work published 1887).

Sociology Copyright © 2016 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Essay on social class (918 words).

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One of the important elements of social stratification is the ‘Class’. A social class is ‘a category or group of persons having a definite status in society which permanently determines their relations to other groups’. Social classes have been defined by various thinkers “in different manner. The notion of objectivity of class existence is the main contribution of Karl Marx. His emphasis is on the economic factors. Power, style of life and property determine the class status of individuals in the society.

Karl Marx defined the social classes by their relation to the means of production (ownership or non-ownership). In modern capitalist society there are two principal classes the capitalist and the proletariat.

Image Courtesy : borderzine.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/philip-levine-utep-honors-class.jpg

Max Weber, like Marx, is another German thinker who has seen the importance of economic factor in the classification of a society. He has defined class as a group of persons having the same ‘life chances’ or social opportunities, as determined typically by economic conditions. He agreed with the fundamental tenet of Marx that control over property is a basic fact in the determination of the life chances of an individual or a class.

That is to say, the members of a particular class will have more or less chance of getting good things of life – things such as a high standard of living, leisure etc. Thus, Weber’s definition of class is broadly similar to that of Marx. To the economic dimension Weber added two other dimensions, prestige and power. He saw these factors as separate but interacting bases of social hierarchy.

His notions are that property creates classes, prestige creates status groups and power creates parties. Like Marx, Weber recognized the important role of property in giving rise to status group. However, he gave it less importance than Marx did. Weber had given emphasis on life-style in deciding status group. Weber says that status groups are formed on the basis of prestige and honour. He admits that difference in property can constitute the basis for differences in honour or prestige.

Many modern sociologists regard status as the basic criterion of social class. “A social class” as defined by Maclver and Page, “is any portion of a community marked off from the rest by social status”. According to this view, classes arise wherever social differentiations in terms of language, locality, faction or specialization are associated with a status hierarchy. These differentiations may give rise to significant class phenomena only when they develop common sentiments.

These sentiments imply feeling of equality among the members of one’s own class, a feeling of inferiority in relation to these above in the social hierarchy and a feeling of superiority to those below. What is most important in making class distinction is the sense of status which is sustained by economic, political or ecclestical power and by the distinctive modes of life and cultural expression corresponding to them. In this sense the status separates one class from the other. Thus, classes are status marked and group conscious strata.

It follows that the division of society into classes on the basis of status is unavoidable. But the primary determinant of status is unquestionably economic. In a class-ridden society, a man possessing wealth has resources through which he can exercise both economic and political power. Weber’s approach is, sociologically, more agreeable because he referred to the conditions which led to the different types of classes in a society. Social class are defacto groups and their basis is mainly economic. But they are more than economic groups.

Nature of Social Class :

1. the system is ubiquitous:.

Class system is a universal phenomenon. It is prevalent in all modern and complex social systems.

2. Class is an Economic Group:

Social classes are determined by their relation to means of production. A social class also includes wealth, property, income etc.

3. Class is also a Status Group:

Class is also related to status dimension. Status groups are composed of persons having the same life style and in joining similar social honour. Thus, status consciousness separates the individuals both physically and psychologically.

4. An Achieved Pattern:

In class system status is achieved, not ascribed. Class is open and elastic and mobility is possible. A man can, by his effort and initiative, change his class and thereby rise in social status.

5. Feeling of Class-consciousness:

Feeling of class consciousness is experienced among the members of a particular class. The members feel a sense of equality within their own class and a sense of superiority or inferiority in relation to the members of lower or higher classes.

6. Prestige Dimension:

The persons of a particular class develop status consciousness and this is reflected through the status symbols of different class groups. The status symbols of the upper classes are considered prestigious, whereas the status symbols of the middle classes are considered less prestigious.

7. Relatively Stable Group:

A class is a stable group. It is not temporary like a crowd or mob. Although social mobility in the class system is possible, class cannot be interpreted as transitory. Under certain extraordinary situations such as revolutions, movements etc. the class is subject to rapid transformation.

8. Varieties of Life-styles:

A particular social class is marked off from the other classes by its life-styles. Life-style include the mode of living such as, the dress pattern, the type of house, the leisure time activities, the mode of consumption, the exposure to media and the mode of communication etc.

Related Articles:

• The Nature of Social Class
• Social Class in India: Class Typology and Class Consciousness

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Home — Essay Samples — Literature — Hamlet — The Theme Of Social Class And Power In Shakespeare’s Hamlet

The Theme of Social Class and Power in Shakespeare’s Hamlet

• Categories: Hamlet William Shakespeare

About this sample

Words: 1209 |

Published: Feb 8, 2022

Words: 1209 | Pages: 2 | 7 min read

• Skinfill, M. (1996). Reconstructing Class in Faulkner's Late Novels: The Hamlet and the Discovery of Capital. Studies in American Fiction, 24(2), 151-169. (https://muse.jhu.edu/article/440423)
• Prior, L. T. (1969). Theme, Imagery, and Structure In" The Hamlet". The Mississippi Quarterly, 22(3), 237-256. (https://www.jstor.org/stable/26473806)
• Brotton, J. (2013). Ways of Seeing Hamlet. In Hamlet (pp. 161-176). Routledge. (https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9780203060520-10/ways-seeing-hamlet-jerry-brotton)
• Guagliardo, E. J. (2021). The Experience of Authority: Hamlet and the Political Aesthetics of Majesty. English Literary Renaissance, 51(3), 476-502. (https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/715427)
• Haque, F. (2016). Revenge and Vengeance in Shakespeare’s Hamlet: A Study of Hamlet’s Pursuit and Procrastination Regarding Revenge. Journal Of Humanities And Social Science, 21(9), 55-59. (http://un.uobasrah.edu.iq/lectures/3541.pdf)

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William Shakespeare's play Hamlet is a timeless classic that has captured the hearts of audiences around the world for centuries. The play's protagonist, Hamlet, is a complex and multi-dimensional character, whose significance [...]

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Ed. Ann Thompson and Neil Taylor. London: Arden Shakespeare, 2006. Print.Frye, Northrop. "The Mythos of Autumn." Shakespearean Criticism, edited by Laurie Lanzen Harris, vol. 4, Gale, 1986, pp. [...]

"This above all, to thine own self be true" (1.3.88). As Polonius offers this advice to his departing son Laertes, he also states one of the defining principles of the philosophical branch known collectively as existentialism. A [...]

William Shakespeare's Hamlet (1600-01), regarded by many scholars and critics as his finest play, is based on the story of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, which first appeared in the Historia Danica, a Latin text by the [...]

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6 Common Leadership Styles — and How to Decide Which to Use When

• Rebecca Knight

Being a great leader means recognizing that different circumstances call for different approaches.

Research suggests that the most effective leaders adapt their style to different circumstances — be it a change in setting, a shift in organizational dynamics, or a turn in the business cycle. But what if you feel like you’re not equipped to take on a new and different leadership style — let alone more than one? In this article, the author outlines the six leadership styles Daniel Goleman first introduced in his 2000 HBR article, “Leadership That Gets Results,” and explains when to use each one. The good news is that personality is not destiny. Even if you’re naturally introverted or you tend to be driven by data and analysis rather than emotion, you can still learn how to adapt different leadership styles to organize, motivate, and direct your team.

Much has been written about common leadership styles and how to identify the right style for you, whether it’s transactional or transformational, bureaucratic or laissez-faire. But according to Daniel Goleman, a psychologist best known for his work on emotional intelligence, “Being a great leader means recognizing that different circumstances may call for different approaches.”

• RK Rebecca Knight is a journalist who writes about all things related to the changing nature of careers and the workplace. Her essays and reported stories have been featured in The Boston Globe, Business Insider, The New York Times, BBC, and The Christian Science Monitor. She was shortlisted as a Reuters Institute Fellow at Oxford University in 2023. Earlier in her career, she spent a decade as an editor and reporter at the Financial Times in New York, London, and Boston.

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RECOMMENDED READS

• 5 Steps to Getting Started with Llama 2
• The Llama Ecosystem: Past, Present, and Future
• Introducing Code Llama, a state-of-the-art large language model for coding
• Meta and Microsoft Introduce the Next Generation of Llama
• Today, we’re introducing Meta Llama 3, the next generation of our state-of-the-art open source large language model.
• Llama 3 models will soon be available on AWS, Databricks, Google Cloud, Hugging Face, Kaggle, IBM WatsonX, Microsoft Azure, NVIDIA NIM, and Snowflake, and with support from hardware platforms offered by AMD, AWS, Dell, Intel, NVIDIA, and Qualcomm.
• We’re dedicated to developing Llama 3 in a responsible way, and we’re offering various resources to help others use it responsibly as well. This includes introducing new trust and safety tools with Llama Guard 2, Code Shield, and CyberSec Eval 2.
• In the coming months, we expect to introduce new capabilities, longer context windows, additional model sizes, and enhanced performance, and we’ll share the Llama 3 research paper.
• Meta AI, built with Llama 3 technology, is now one of the world’s leading AI assistants that can boost your intelligence and lighten your load—helping you learn, get things done, create content, and connect to make the most out of every moment. You can try Meta AI here .

Today, we’re excited to share the first two models of the next generation of Llama, Meta Llama 3, available for broad use. This release features pretrained and instruction-fine-tuned language models with 8B and 70B parameters that can support a broad range of use cases. This next generation of Llama demonstrates state-of-the-art performance on a wide range of industry benchmarks and offers new capabilities, including improved reasoning. We believe these are the best open source models of their class, period. In support of our longstanding open approach, we’re putting Llama 3 in the hands of the community. We want to kickstart the next wave of innovation in AI across the stack—from applications to developer tools to evals to inference optimizations and more. We can’t wait to see what you build and look forward to your feedback.

Our goals for Llama 3

With Llama 3, we set out to build the best open models that are on par with the best proprietary models available today. We wanted to address developer feedback to increase the overall helpfulness of Llama 3 and are doing so while continuing to play a leading role on responsible use and deployment of LLMs. We are embracing the open source ethos of releasing early and often to enable the community to get access to these models while they are still in development. The text-based models we are releasing today are the first in the Llama 3 collection of models. Our goal in the near future is to make Llama 3 multilingual and multimodal, have longer context, and continue to improve overall performance across core LLM capabilities such as reasoning and coding.

State-of-the-art performance

Our new 8B and 70B parameter Llama 3 models are a major leap over Llama 2 and establish a new state-of-the-art for LLM models at those scales. Thanks to improvements in pretraining and post-training, our pretrained and instruction-fine-tuned models are the best models existing today at the 8B and 70B parameter scale. Improvements in our post-training procedures substantially reduced false refusal rates, improved alignment, and increased diversity in model responses. We also saw greatly improved capabilities like reasoning, code generation, and instruction following making Llama 3 more steerable.

*Please see evaluation details for setting and parameters with which these evaluations are calculated.

In the development of Llama 3, we looked at model performance on standard benchmarks and also sought to optimize for performance for real-world scenarios. To this end, we developed a new high-quality human evaluation set. This evaluation set contains 1,800 prompts that cover 12 key use cases: asking for advice, brainstorming, classification, closed question answering, coding, creative writing, extraction, inhabiting a character/persona, open question answering, reasoning, rewriting, and summarization. To prevent accidental overfitting of our models on this evaluation set, even our own modeling teams do not have access to it. The chart below shows aggregated results of our human evaluations across of these categories and prompts against Claude Sonnet, Mistral Medium, and GPT-3.5.

Preference rankings by human annotators based on this evaluation set highlight the strong performance of our 70B instruction-following model compared to competing models of comparable size in real-world scenarios.

Our pretrained model also establishes a new state-of-the-art for LLM models at those scales.

To develop a great language model, we believe it’s important to innovate, scale, and optimize for simplicity. We adopted this design philosophy throughout the Llama 3 project with a focus on four key ingredients: the model architecture, the pretraining data, scaling up pretraining, and instruction fine-tuning.

Model architecture

In line with our design philosophy, we opted for a relatively standard decoder-only transformer architecture in Llama 3. Compared to Llama 2, we made several key improvements. Llama 3 uses a tokenizer with a vocabulary of 128K tokens that encodes language much more efficiently, which leads to substantially improved model performance. To improve the inference efficiency of Llama 3 models, we’ve adopted grouped query attention (GQA) across both the 8B and 70B sizes. We trained the models on sequences of 8,192 tokens, using a mask to ensure self-attention does not cross document boundaries.

Training data

To train the best language model, the curation of a large, high-quality training dataset is paramount. In line with our design principles, we invested heavily in pretraining data. Llama 3 is pretrained on over 15T tokens that were all collected from publicly available sources. Our training dataset is seven times larger than that used for Llama 2, and it includes four times more code. To prepare for upcoming multilingual use cases, over 5% of the Llama 3 pretraining dataset consists of high-quality non-English data that covers over 30 languages. However, we do not expect the same level of performance in these languages as in English.

To ensure Llama 3 is trained on data of the highest quality, we developed a series of data-filtering pipelines. These pipelines include using heuristic filters, NSFW filters, semantic deduplication approaches, and text classifiers to predict data quality. We found that previous generations of Llama are surprisingly good at identifying high-quality data, hence we used Llama 2 to generate the training data for the text-quality classifiers that are powering Llama 3.

We also performed extensive experiments to evaluate the best ways of mixing data from different sources in our final pretraining dataset. These experiments enabled us to select a data mix that ensures that Llama 3 performs well across use cases including trivia questions, STEM, coding, historical knowledge, etc.

Scaling up pretraining

To effectively leverage our pretraining data in Llama 3 models, we put substantial effort into scaling up pretraining. Specifically, we have developed a series of detailed scaling laws for downstream benchmark evaluations. These scaling laws enable us to select an optimal data mix and to make informed decisions on how to best use our training compute. Importantly, scaling laws allow us to predict the performance of our largest models on key tasks (for example, code generation as evaluated on the HumanEval benchmark—see above) before we actually train the models. This helps us ensure strong performance of our final models across a variety of use cases and capabilities.

We made several new observations on scaling behavior during the development of Llama 3. For example, while the Chinchilla-optimal amount of training compute for an 8B parameter model corresponds to ~200B tokens, we found that model performance continues to improve even after the model is trained on two orders of magnitude more data. Both our 8B and 70B parameter models continued to improve log-linearly after we trained them on up to 15T tokens. Larger models can match the performance of these smaller models with less training compute, but smaller models are generally preferred because they are much more efficient during inference.

To train our largest Llama 3 models, we combined three types of parallelization: data parallelization, model parallelization, and pipeline parallelization. Our most efficient implementation achieves a compute utilization of over 400 TFLOPS per GPU when trained on 16K GPUs simultaneously. We performed training runs on two custom-built 24K GPU clusters . To maximize GPU uptime, we developed an advanced new training stack that automates error detection, handling, and maintenance. We also greatly improved our hardware reliability and detection mechanisms for silent data corruption, and we developed new scalable storage systems that reduce overheads of checkpointing and rollback. Those improvements resulted in an overall effective training time of more than 95%. Combined, these improvements increased the efficiency of Llama 3 training by ~three times compared to Llama 2.

Instruction fine-tuning

To fully unlock the potential of our pretrained models in chat use cases, we innovated on our approach to instruction-tuning as well. Our approach to post-training is a combination of supervised fine-tuning (SFT), rejection sampling, proximal policy optimization (PPO), and direct preference optimization (DPO). The quality of the prompts that are used in SFT and the preference rankings that are used in PPO and DPO has an outsized influence on the performance of aligned models. Some of our biggest improvements in model quality came from carefully curating this data and performing multiple rounds of quality assurance on annotations provided by human annotators.

Learning from preference rankings via PPO and DPO also greatly improved the performance of Llama 3 on reasoning and coding tasks. We found that if you ask a model a reasoning question that it struggles to answer, the model will sometimes produce the right reasoning trace: The model knows how to produce the right answer, but it does not know how to select it. Training on preference rankings enables the model to learn how to select it.

Building with Llama 3

Our vision is to enable developers to customize Llama 3 to support relevant use cases and to make it easier to adopt best practices and improve the open ecosystem. With this release, we’re providing new trust and safety tools including updated components with both Llama Guard 2 and Cybersec Eval 2, and the introduction of Code Shield—an inference time guardrail for filtering insecure code produced by LLMs.

We’ve also co-developed Llama 3 with torchtune , the new PyTorch-native library for easily authoring, fine-tuning, and experimenting with LLMs. torchtune provides memory efficient and hackable training recipes written entirely in PyTorch. The library is integrated with popular platforms such as Hugging Face, Weights & Biases, and EleutherAI and even supports Executorch for enabling efficient inference to be run on a wide variety of mobile and edge devices. For everything from prompt engineering to using Llama 3 with LangChain we have a comprehensive getting started guide and takes you from downloading Llama 3 all the way to deployment at scale within your generative AI application.

A system-level approach to responsibility

We have designed Llama 3 models to be maximally helpful while ensuring an industry leading approach to responsibly deploying them. To achieve this, we have adopted a new, system-level approach to the responsible development and deployment of Llama. We envision Llama models as part of a broader system that puts the developer in the driver’s seat. Llama models will serve as a foundational piece of a system that developers design with their unique end goals in mind.

Instruction fine-tuning also plays a major role in ensuring the safety of our models. Our instruction-fine-tuned models have been red-teamed (tested) for safety through internal and external efforts. ​​Our red teaming approach leverages human experts and automation methods to generate adversarial prompts that try to elicit problematic responses. For instance, we apply comprehensive testing to assess risks of misuse related to Chemical, Biological, Cyber Security, and other risk areas. All of these efforts are iterative and used to inform safety fine-tuning of the models being released. You can read more about our efforts in the model card .

Llama Guard models are meant to be a foundation for prompt and response safety and can easily be fine-tuned to create a new taxonomy depending on application needs. As a starting point, the new Llama Guard 2 uses the recently announced MLCommons taxonomy, in an effort to support the emergence of industry standards in this important area. Additionally, CyberSecEval 2 expands on its predecessor by adding measures of an LLM’s propensity to allow for abuse of its code interpreter, offensive cybersecurity capabilities, and susceptibility to prompt injection attacks (learn more in our technical paper ). Finally, we’re introducing Code Shield which adds support for inference-time filtering of insecure code produced by LLMs. This offers mitigation of risks around insecure code suggestions, code interpreter abuse prevention, and secure command execution.

With the speed at which the generative AI space is moving, we believe an open approach is an important way to bring the ecosystem together and mitigate these potential harms. As part of that, we’re updating our Responsible Use Guide (RUG) that provides a comprehensive guide to responsible development with LLMs. As we outlined in the RUG, we recommend that all inputs and outputs be checked and filtered in accordance with content guidelines appropriate to the application. Additionally, many cloud service providers offer content moderation APIs and other tools for responsible deployment, and we encourage developers to also consider using these options.

Deploying Llama 3 at scale

Llama 3 will soon be available on all major platforms including cloud providers, model API providers, and much more. Llama 3 will be everywhere .

Our benchmarks show the tokenizer offers improved token efficiency, yielding up to 15% fewer tokens compared to Llama 2. Also, Group Query Attention (GQA) now has been added to Llama 3 8B as well. As a result, we observed that despite the model having 1B more parameters compared to Llama 2 7B, the improved tokenizer efficiency and GQA contribute to maintaining the inference efficiency on par with Llama 2 7B.

For examples of how to leverage all of these capabilities, check out Llama Recipes which contains all of our open source code that can be leveraged for everything from fine-tuning to deployment to model evaluation.

What’s next for Llama 3?

The Llama 3 8B and 70B models mark the beginning of what we plan to release for Llama 3. And there’s a lot more to come.

Our largest models are over 400B parameters and, while these models are still training, our team is excited about how they’re trending. Over the coming months, we’ll release multiple models with new capabilities including multimodality, the ability to converse in multiple languages, a much longer context window, and stronger overall capabilities. We will also publish a detailed research paper once we are done training Llama 3.

To give you a sneak preview for where these models are today as they continue training, we thought we could share some snapshots of how our largest LLM model is trending. Please note that this data is based on an early checkpoint of Llama 3 that is still training and these capabilities are not supported as part of the models released today.

We’re committed to the continued growth and development of an open AI ecosystem for releasing our models responsibly. We have long believed that openness leads to better, safer products, faster innovation, and a healthier overall market. This is good for Meta, and it is good for society. We’re taking a community-first approach with Llama 3, and starting today, these models are available on the leading cloud, hosting, and hardware platforms with many more to come.

Try Meta Llama 3 today

We’ve integrated our latest models into Meta AI, which we believe is the world’s leading AI assistant. It’s now built with Llama 3 technology and it’s available in more countries across our apps.

You can use Meta AI on Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger, and the web to get things done, learn, create, and connect with the things that matter to you. You can read more about the Meta AI experience here .

Visit the Llama 3 website to download the models and reference the Getting Started Guide for the latest list of all available platforms.

You’ll also soon be able to test multimodal Meta AI on our Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.

As always, we look forward to seeing all the amazing products and experiences you will build with Meta Llama 3.

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