Abstract
BACKGROUND: The aggressiveness of college students has attracted widespread attention due to its significant negative impact. Studies had found that subjective socioeconomic status (SSS) can influence individual aggression. However, few studies have explored the essential mechanisms and influencing factors behind. Thus, this study explores the relationship between SSS and aggression, also the roles of attributions for wealth and poverty and social mobility beliefs within this context. METHODS: Study 1 manipulated the SSS of 270 participants (130 in the high SSS group, 140 in the low SSS group) experimentally to explore the mediating role of attributions for wealth and poverty on the impact of SSS on aggression. Study 2 manipulated the social mobility beliefs of another 270 participants (139 in high social mobility beliefs group, 131 in the low social mobility beliefs group) to examine the moderating effects of these beliefs. This study conducted descriptive statistical analysis, Pearson correlation analysis, mediation model test, and moderated mediation analysis on the obtained data using SPSS 20.0 and PROCESS v4.0. RESULTS: (1) SSS significantly negatively predicted aggression (β = -0.37, t(268) = -2.75, p < 0.01). Attributions for wealth and poverty plays a mediating role in it, with a mediating effect value of -0.10, and the mediating effect accounts for 27.03% of the total effect. (2) Social mobility beliefs in SSS and attributions for wealth and poverty (β = 0.30, t(268) = 2.72, p < 0.01) and between SSS and aggressive (β = -0.25, t(268) = -2.11, p < 0.05) were the significant adjustment. CONCLUSION: SSS can directly affect college students' aggression and can also indirectly affect aggression through the mediating effect of attributions for wealth and poverty. The improvement of social mobility beliefs promotes college students' attributions for wealth and poverty internally, thereby reducing their aggressiveness. These findings not only enrich the research on SSS and aggression, providing new insights for understanding the relationship between socioeconomic status differences and aggression, but also suggest that policymakers, school psychological service providers and school teachers need to pay attention to the social mobility beliefs of college students, create a fairer social environment and encourage them to view personal development with a more positive perspective.