Abstract
The school system is intended to offer all students the same opportunities, but most international surveys reveal an overall lower achievement for students from disadvantaged groups compared with more advantaged students. Recent experimental research in social psychology has demonstrated that schools as institutions contribute with their implicit cultural norms and structure to the production of inequalities. This chapter examines the role that a structural feature of school, namely meritocratic selection, plays in this reproduction of inequalities at school. First, we describe how meritocracy in the educational system can hold paradoxical effects by masking the virtuous/vicious cycles of opportunities created by educational institutions. Second, we present recent research suggesting that selection practices relying on a meritocratic principle—more than other practices—can lead to biased academic decisions hindering disadvantaged students. We propose that inequalities in school might not just result from isolated failures in an otherwise functional meritocratic system, but rather that merit-based selection itself contributes to the perpetuation of inequalities at school.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Adams, G., Biernat, M., Branscombe, N. R., Crandall, C. S., & Wrightsman, L. S. (2008). Beyond prejudice: Toward a sociocultural psychology of racism and oppression. In G. Adams, M. Biernat, N. R. Branscombe, C. S. Crandall, & L. S. Wrightsman (Eds.), Commemorating Brown: The social psychology of racism and discrimination (pp. 215–246). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/11681-012
Autin, F., Batruch, A., & Butera, F. (2015). Social justice in education: How the function of selection in educational institutions predicts support for (non)egalitarian assessment practices. Frontiers in Psychology, 6, 707. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00707
Autin, F., Batruch, A., & Butera, F. (2019). The function of selection of assessment leads evaluators to artificially create the social class achievement gap. Journal of Educational Psychology, 111, 717–735. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000307
Autin, F., & Croizet, J. C. (2012). Improving working memory efficiency by reframing metacognitive interpretation of task difficulty. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 141, 610–618. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0027478
Batruch, A., Autin, F., Bataillard, F., & Butera, F. (2019). School selection and the social class divide: How tracking contributes to the reproduction of inequalities. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 45, 477–490. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167218791804
Batruch, A., Autin, F., & Butera, F. (2017). Re-establishing the social-class order: Restorative reactions against high-achieving, low-SES pupils. Journal of Social Issues, 73, 42–60. https://doi.org/10.1111/josi.12203
Bourdieu, P., & Passeron, J.-C. (1977). Reproduction in education, culture and society. London: Sage.
Browman, A. S., & Destin, M. (2016). The effects of a warm or chilly climate toward socioeconomic diversity on academic motivation and self-concept. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 42, 172–187. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167215619379
Buchmann, C., & Park, H. (2009). Stratification and the formation of expectations in highly differentiated educational systems. Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, 27, 245–267. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rssm.2009.10.003
Castilla, E. J., & Benard, S. (2010). The paradox of meritocracy in organizations. Administrative Science Quarterly, 55, 543–576. https://doi.org/10.2189/asqu.2010.55.4.543
Croizet, J.-C. (2008). The pernicious relationship between merit assessment and discrimination in education. In G. Adams, M. Biernat, N. R. Branscombe, C. S. Crandall, & L. S. Wrightsman (Eds.), Commemorating Brown: The social psychology of racism and discrimination (pp. 153–172). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/11681-009
Croizet, J.-C., & Dutrévis, M. (2004). Socioeconomic status and intelligence: Why test scores do not equal merit. Journal of Poverty, 8, 91–107. https://doi.org/10.1300/J134v08n03_05
Croizet, J. C., Goudeau, S., Marot, M., & Millet, M. (2017). How do educational contexts contribute to the social class achievement gap: Documenting symbolic violence from a social psychological point of view. Current Opinion in Psychology, 18, 105–110. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2017.08.025
Croizet, J.-C., & Millet, M. (2012). Social class and test performance: From stereotype threat to symbolic violence and vice versa. In M. Inzlicht & T. Schmader (Eds.), Stereotype threat: Theory, process, and application (pp. 188–201). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Darnon, C., Dompnier, B., Delmas, F., Pulfrey, C., & Butera, F. (2009). Achievement goal promotion at university: Social desirability and social utility of mastery and performance goals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 96, 119–134. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0012824
Darnon, C., Smeding, A., & Redersdorff, S. (2017). Belief in school meritocracy as an ideological barrier to the promotion of equality. European Journal of Social Psychology, 48, 523–534. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2347
Darnon, C., Wiederkehr, V., Dompnier, B., & Martinot, D. (2018). ‘Where there is a will, there is a way’: Belief in school meritocracy and the social-class achievement gap. British Journal of Social Psychology., 57, 250–262. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjso.12214
Deutsch, M. (1979). Education and distributive justice: Some reflections on grading systems. American Psychologist, 34, 301–401. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.34.5.391
Dompnier, B., Pansu, P., & Bressoux, P. (2006). An integrative model of scholastic judgments: Pupils’ characteristics, class context, halo effect and internal attributions. European Journal of Psychology of Education, 21, 119–133. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03173572
Dornbusch, S. M., Glasgow, K. L., & Lin, I. C. (1996). The social structure of schooling. Annual Review of Psychology, 47, 401–429. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.47.1.401
Duru-Bellat, M., & Tenret, E. (2009). L’emprise de la méritocratie scolaire: Quelle légitimité? Revue Française de Sociologie, 50, 229–258. https://doi.org/10.3917/rfs.502.0229
Duru-Bellat, M., & Tenret, E. (2012). Who is for meritocracy? Individual and contextual variations in the faith. Comparative Education Review, 56, 223–247. https://doi.org/10.1086/661290
Easterbrook, M. J., Kuppens, T., & Manstead, A. S. (2016). The education effect: Higher educational qualifications are robustly associated with beneficial personal and socio-political outcomes. Social Indicators Research, 126, 1261–1298. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-015-0946-1
Falcon, J. (2013). Social mobility in 20th Century Switzerland (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Lausanne, Switzerland: Université de Lausanne.
Faniko, K., Lorenzi-Cioldi, F., Buschini, F., & Chatard, A. (2012). The influence of education on attitudes toward affirmative action: The role of the policy’s strength. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 42, 387–413. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1559-1816.2011.00892.x
Goudeau, S., Autin, F., & Croizet, J. C. (2017). Etudier, mesurer et manipuler la classe sociale en psychologie sociale: Approches économiques, symboliques et culturelles. International Review of Social Psychology, 30, 1–19. https://doi.org/10.5334/irsp.52
Goudeau, S., & Croizet, J. C. (2017). Hidden advantages and disadvantages of social class: How classroom settings reproduce social inequality by staging unfair comparison. Psychological Science, 28, 162–170. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797616676600
Jetten, J., Iyer, A., Tsivrikos, D., & Young, B. M. (2008). When is individual mobility costly? The role of economic and social identity factors. European Journal of Social Psychology, 38, 866–879. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp
Jetten, J., Iyer, A., & Zhang, A. (2017). The educational experience of students from low socioeconomic status background. In K. I. Mavor, M. J. Platow, & B. Bizumic (Eds.), Self and social identity in educational contexts (pp. 112–125). Abingdon, UK: Routledge.
Johnson, S. E., Richeson, J. A., & Finkel, E. J. (2011). Middle class and marginal? Socioeconomic status, stigma, and self-regulation at an elite university. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 100, 838–852. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0021956
Jost, J. T., & Hunyady, O. (2005). Antecedents and consequences of system-justifying ideologies. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 14, 260–265. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0963-7214.2005.00377.x
Jury, M., Smeding, A., & Darnon, C. (2015). First-generation students’ underperformance at university: The impact of the function of selection. Frontiers in Psychology, 6, 710. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00710
Jury, M., Smeding, A., Stephens, N. M., Nelson, J. E., Aelenei, C., & Darnon, C. (2017). The experience of low-SES students in higher education: Psychological barriers to success and interventions to reduce social-class inequality. Journal of Social Issues, 73, 23–41. https://doi.org/10.1111/josi.12202
Knowles, E. D., & Lowery, B. S. (2012). Meritocracy, self-concerns, and Whites’ denial of racial inequity. Self and Identity, 11, 202–222. https://doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2010.542015
Lareau, A. (2003). Unequal childhoods: Race, class and family life. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Lehmann, W. (2013). Habitus transformation and hidden injuries: Successful working-class university students. Sociology of Education, 87, 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038040713498777
Madero Cabib, I., & Madero Cabib, C. (2013). Between equity and differentiation: An analytical schema of the social function of education. International Journal of Sociology of Education, 2, 193–214. https://doi.org/10.4471/rise.2013.29
Manstead, A. S. R. (2018). The psychology of social class: How socioeconomic status impacts thought, feelings, and behaviour. British Journal of Social Psychology, 57, 267–291. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjso.12251
McCoy, S. K., & Major, B. (2007). Priming meritocracy and the psychological justification of inequality. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 43, 341–351. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2006.04.009
Mijs, J. J. (2016a). The unfulfillable promise of meritocracy: Three lessons and their implications for justice in education. Social Justice Research, 29, 14–34. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038040716636434
Mijs, J. J. (2016b). Stratified failure: Educational stratification and students’ attributions of their mathematics performance in 24 countries. Sociology of Education, 89, 137–153. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038040716636434
OECD. (2013a). PISA 2012 results: Excellence through equity: Giving every student the chance to succeed (Volume II). Paris: OECD Publishing.
OECD. (2013b). PISA 2012 results: What makes schools successful? Resources, policies and practices (Volume IV). Paris: OECD Publishing.
OECD. (2014). Education at a glance 2014. OECD indicators. Paris: OECD Publishing.
Ostrove, J. M., & Long, S. M. (2007). Social class and belonging: Implications for college adjustment. The Review of Higher Education, 30, 363–389. https://doi.org/10.1353/rhe.2007.0028
Oyserman, D., & Destin, M. (2010). Identity-based motivation: Implications for intervention. The Counseling Psychologist, 38, 1001–1043. https://doi.org/10.1177/0011000010374775
Pansu, P., Dubois, N., & Dompnier, B. (2008). Internality-norm theory in educational contexts. European Journal of Psychology of Education, 23, 385–397. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03172748
Plaut, V. C., & Markus, H. R. (2005). The « inside » story: A cultural-historical analysis of being smart and motivated, American style. In A. J. Elliot & C. S. Dweck (Eds.), Handbook of competence and motivation (pp. 457–488). New York, NY: Guilford Publications.
Reay, D., Crozier, G., & Clayton, J. (2010). ‘Fitting in’ or ‘standing out’: Working-class students in UK higher education. British Educational Research Journal, 36, 107–124. https://doi.org/10.1080/01411920902878925
Smeding, A., Darnon, C., Souchal, C., Toczek-Capelle, M.-C., & Butera, F. (2013). Reducing the socio-economic status achievement gap at university by promoting mastery-oriented assessment. PLoS One, 8, e71678. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0071678
Son Hing, L. S., Bobocel, D. R., & Zanna, M. P. (2002). Meritocracy and opposition to affirmative action: Making concessions in the face of discrimination. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83, 493–509. https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.83.3.493
Son Hing, L. S., Bobocel, D. R., Zanna, M. P., Garcia, D. M., Gee, S. S., & Orazietti, K. (2011). The merit of meritocracy. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 101, 433–450. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0024618
Stephens, N. M., Fryberg, S. A., Markus, H. R., Johnson, C. S., & Covarrubias, R. (2012). Unseen disadvantage: How American universities’ focus on independence undermines the academic performance of first-generation college students. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 102, 1178–1197. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0027143
Stephens, N. M., Hamedani, M. G., & Destin, M. (2014). Closing the social-class achievement gap: A difference-education intervention improves first-generation students’ academic performance and all students’ college transition. Psychological Science, 25, 943–953. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797613518349
Tyler, K. M., Boykin, A. W., & Walton, T. R. (2006). Cultural considerations in teachers’ perceptions of student classroom behavior and achievement. Teaching and Teacher Education, 22, 998–1005. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2006.04.017
UN General Assembly. (1948). Universal declaration of human rights. Retrieved from https://www.ohchr.org/EN/UDHR/Pages/Language.aspx?LangID=eng
Walton, G. M., & Cohen, G. L. (2007). A question of belonging: Race, social fit, and achievement. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92, 82–96. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.92.1.82
Walton, G. M., & Cohen, G. L. (2011). A brief social-belonging intervention improves academic and health outcomes of minority students. Science, 331, 1447–1451. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.92.1.82
Wiederkehr, V., Darnon, C., Chazal, S., Guimond, S., & Martinot, D. (2015). From social class to self-efficacy: Internalization of low social status pupils’ school performance. Social Psychology of Education, 18, 769–784. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11218-015-9308-8
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Batruch, A., Autin, F., Butera, F. (2019). The Paradoxical Role of Meritocratic Selection in the Perpetuation of Social Inequalities at School. In: Jetten, J., Peters, K. (eds) The Social Psychology of Inequality. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28856-3_8
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28856-3_8
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-28855-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-28856-3
eBook Packages: Behavioral Science and PsychologyBehavioral Science and Psychology (R0)