Abstract
Research has suggested a fundamental connection between fairness and well-being at the individual, relational, and societal levels. Mattering is a multidimensional construct consisting of feeling valued by, and adding value to, self and others. Prior studies have attempted to connect mattering to both fairness and a variety of well-being outcomes. Based on these findings, we hypothesize that mattering acts as a mediator between fairness and well-being. This hypothesis was tested through Covariance-Based Structural Equation Modeling (CB-SEM) using multidimensional measures of fairness, mattering, and well-being. Results from a Latent Path Analysis conducted on a representative sample of 1,051U.S. adults provide support to our hypothesis by revealing a strong direct predictive effect of mattering onto well-being and a strong indirect effect of fairness onto well-being through mattering. Results also show that mattering is likely to fully mediate the relationship between fairness and multiple domains of well-being, except in one case, namely, economic well-being. These findings illustrate the value of a focus on mattering to understand the relationship between fairness and well-being and to provide future directions for theory, research, and practice. Theoretical implications for the experience of citizenship and participation, along with cross-cultural considerations, are also discussed.
Highlights
Despite decades of surging interest in well-being, there is still a need to understand the role that fairness and justice play in human flourishing (e.g., Greenberg and Colquitt, 2013; Prilleltensky, 2014; Yean, 2016; Di Martino and Prilleltensky, 2020)
The general mattering factor was regressed onto the general fairness factor
Given the presence of two bi-factor structures, we set to zero all correlations between the specific domains of both Mattering in Domains of Life Scale (MIDLS) and Multidimensional Fairness Scale (MFS) and their respective general domains
Summary
Despite decades of surging interest in well-being, there is still a need to understand the role that fairness and justice play in human flourishing (e.g., Greenberg and Colquitt, 2013; Prilleltensky, 2014; Yean, 2016; Di Martino and Prilleltensky, 2020). There is a robust literature on the psychology of social justice (Lind, 2020), especially in the context of work (Ybema and van den Bos, 2010), we still lack a full picture of how fairness impacts wellness. Mattering has potential as a bridging concept that helps explain how fairness produces wellness at the individual, community, and societal levels. We develop in this paper the argument that mattering plays a mediating role between fairness and well-being.
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