Research That Matters (January 17 - 20, 2008)

Background: Stigma is “an attribute that is deeply discrediting” and “a personal characteristic that negatively differentiates deviants from non-deviants” (Goffman, 1963, p.3). Although stigma theory suggests its applicability to various labeled characteristics (Link & Phelan, 2001), stigma research is restrained to a few topical areas including mental illness and HIV/AIDS. The lack of the stigma perspective in research of social class and poverty is a salient gap in accumulated stigma study since the epidemic lay theory on poverty or lower socio-economic status (Bullock, 1999; Cozzarelli et al., 2001) evidences the existence of stigma related to socio-economic status. This empirical study tests the hypothesis predicated upon the modified labeling theory (Link et al., 1989). The hypothesis is that the stigma attached to lower socio-economic status or social class has adverse effects on the general psychological well-being including life satisfaction and psychological distress.

Methods: The 1995 Detroit Area Study (DAS) with 1,139 respondents was used. Individuals who self-identified as white consists of 45.7% (n=520) of the sample, those who self-identified as black 51.4% (n=586), and others 2.9% (n=33). Due to the limited number of those in ‘other' category, this study is focused on blacks and whites. Perceived stigma of socio-economic status was measured by respondents' attribution of their experienced unfair treatment or discrimination to their income level or social class. Among other included variables are unfair treatment or discrimination experiences in the past and day-to-day lives, financial stress, income level, age, and perceived race stigma. Perceived race stigma was created in the same procedure as perceived stigma of socio-economic status.

Results: Higher percentage of blacks (13.5%; n=79) perceived the stigma of socio-economic status than whites (3.5%; n=18). Overall, perceived stigma of socio-economic status was associated negatively with life satisfaction (beta = -.224; p<.05) and positively with psychological distress (beta = .305; p<.01) after controlling for other predictors. Among blacks, race stigma was not associated with life satisfaction and psychological distress as opposed to stigma of socio-economic status. Among whites, perceived stigma of socio-economic status was not related to life satisfaction and psychological distress. The mechanisms through which income, financial stress, and other variables operate to predict the outcomes appeared to be different across blacks and whites and require further investigation in relation to stigma of socio-economic status.

Implications: Despite using a strict measure, the perceived stigma of socio-economic status was shown to exist and function adversely in predicting psychological outcomes of the stigmatized. Stigma of socio-economic status may operate to a stronger extent for blacks than for whites, and is differentiated from race stigma even though perceiving both categories of stigma is likely to be the case for many blacks. Further studies may examine the mechanism of why race stigma was not shown to be related to negative psychological outcomes while stigma of socio-economic status was.