Work

Belief in a Just World Decreases Blame for Celebrity Infidelity

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: Justice motivation has been considered one cause of celebrity infidelity scandals becoming flaming incidents. Nevertheless, few studies have examined how the belief in a just world (BJW), one motivation for justice, affects people's attitudes toward these incidents. This study was conducted to identify the relations among BJW, negative emotions toward infidelity (NE), and celebrity infidelity blaming (CIB). Data were collected from 1186 Japanese adults (mean age = 44.9 years, SD = 13.8; 49.4% male). The results of structural equation modeling revealed that NE positively relates to CIB and plays a mediating role between BJW and CIB. However, BJW neither facilitates NE nor positively predicts CIB; on the contrary, it suppresses both NE and CIB. The findings indicate that BJW decreases people's blame on celebrity infidelity and suggest future directions for mitigating the issues posed by casting blame on celebrities' cheating scandals.

Source: Behavioral Sciences

DOI: 10.3390/bs14100893

Authors: Ching-Yi Huang, Takashi Arai, Tsuneyuki Abe

Institution: Tohoku University

Language: English

Topic: Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment

Subfield: Cognitive Neuroscience

Field: Neuroscience

Domain: Life Sciences

SDG: Peace, justice, and strong institutions

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $2,501