Study: Income inequality may boost your ego

(PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE) A new study finds that countries with more income inequality tend to have more people who believe that they are better than average — a psychological phenomenon known as “self-enhancement.” The study, published in Psychological Science, hypothesizes that societies with high levels of inequality are more likely to encourage competition over scarce rewards, and outsized perceptions of the self is simply an outgrowth of that environment.

Income inequality may foster greater self-enhancement through increased competition. Takata (2003) found that when Japanese participants were asked to compete over a limited resource under zero-sum conditions (i.e., the winner receives everything, the loser nothing), they displayed levels of self-enhancement similar to the levels displayed by Americans. That is, when people compete over concentrated rewards, they have a tendency to self-enhance ...

In societies with more income equality, people may not only have more equal incomes, but they may also feel a pressure to seem more similar to others. This may manifest as a modesty norm, whereby people are discouraged from voicing both real and perceived superiority

Despite stereotypes, America is actually in the middle of pack when it comes to self-enhancement. But it’s ahead of most industrialized nations, which could still make it the land of Garrison Keillor’s Lake Wobegon — “where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all the children are above average.”