Beschreibung

Educational success remains strongly linked to social background. However, there is no growing concern about this, which could be explained by meritocratic beliefs that success primarily depends on individual effort and talent. The author examines how such beliefs are shaped by experiences and what consequences they have for the reproduction of educational inequality.

In her book, Rebecca Wetter explores a possible explanation for the presistence of meritocratic beliefs. She studies and discusses how these beliefs are shaped by parental education and educational experiences. Precisely, she examines how (differences in) inequality beliefs influence perception of justice, distributive preferences, and persistence in goal pursuit. To address these issues, the author combines sociological, socio-psychological and economic theories. She uses this theoretical framework and quantitative methods empirically by analyzing longitudinal data of applicants to medical school in Germany.
The results show that parental education and self-serving belief mechanisms shape applicants‘ inequality beliefs. Consequently, successful individuals and those from privileged backgrounds form stronger meritocratic and weaker nonmeritocratic beliefs, leading them to perceive inequality as more just and having inequality-reproducing distributive preferences. This could explain why people in positions of power may be less inclined to reduce structural barriers to educational success.
Overall, the results suggest that inequality beliefs and differences in these beliefs play a crucial role in the persistence of educational inequality. Promoting balanced inequality beliefs among adolescents and young adults could be a crucial step to increase support for measures to reduce inequality and pave the way for a more just education system with equal opportunities for all.

The author:
Dr. Rebecca Wetter is currently a Research Fellow at the University of Potsdam at the Chair of School Development. She wrote the doctoral dissertation, on which this book is based, at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center.

The subject:
Education, Sociology

Zusätzliche Informationen

Additional Material

Table of contents + reading sample

Autor*innen

Rebecca Wetter

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Keywords

ambition, distributive preferences, educational inequality, legitimation of inequality, meritocratic beliefs, November 2025, Social background, university admission