What is relative deprivation?
Relative deprivation is the sense of grievance people feel when they compare what they have with a reference group and conclude that they are getting less than they deserve. The key question is not "How much do I have?" but "Compared with whom?" Unlike absolute deprivation, which means lacking basic necessities, relative deprivation can intensify even as conditions improve, if the people you compare yourself with pull ahead faster.
- Meaning
- Feeling unfairly worse off than a comparison standard
- Coined in
- The American Soldier, Stouffer et al. (1949)
- Types
- Egoistic (individual) and fraternal (group) deprivation (Runciman, 1966)
- Related ideas
- Social comparison, reference groups, distributive justice
Stouffer’s soldiers
During World War II, sociologist Samuel Stouffer and colleagues surveyed hundreds of thousands of U.S. soldiers and published the results in *The American Soldier* (1949).
Would you expect soldiers in units with fast promotions to be the most satisfied? Military police, who were rarely promoted, were relatively content with their chances of advancement. Soldiers in the Air Corps, where promotions were frequent, were more critical of the promotion system. Seeing peers move up all around them made Air Corps soldiers who were passed over feel left behind.
The researchers used the term "relative deprivation" to explain such puzzles, and Robert K. Merton later built on it in his reference group theory.
Egoistic vs. fraternal deprivation
British sociologist W. G. Runciman (1966) distinguished two forms:
| Aspect | Egoistic (individual) | Fraternal (group) |
|---|---|---|
| Comparison | Me vs. other individuals | My group vs. other groups |
| Typical feeling | "I’m the one losing out." | "People like us are treated unfairly." |
| Likely outcomes | Stress, depression, deviance | Collective action, social movements, political attitudes |
What the research shows
A meta-analysis by Smith and colleagues (2012) pooled 210 studies with more than 186,000 respondents. Simply judging that you have less than others had weak effects; relative deprivation predicted attitudes and behavior much better when it included feelings of anger and injustice. Individual-level deprivation was more closely tied to individual outcomes such as health and deviance, while group-level deprivation was more closely linked to collective action.
Relative deprivation in everyday life
- Social media: feeds full of other people’s highlights encourage upward comparison. See social comparison theory.
- Wealth gaps: even with the same income, soaring housing prices or investment gains around you can heighten the feeling.
- Coping: compare yourself with your own past and goals, limit exposure where it helps, and treat structural unfairness as a policy issue rather than purely a personal failing.
Frequently asked questions
- What is relative deprivation?
- It is the resentment people feel when they believe they have less than they deserve compared with a reference person or group.
- What is the difference between relative and absolute deprivation?
- Absolute deprivation means lacking basic necessities; relative deprivation is a subjective sense of being worse off than others.
- What is an example of relative deprivation?
- In The American Soldier, Air Corps soldiers with frequent promotions were more dissatisfied with promotion than military police who were rarely promoted.
References
- Stouffer, S. A., Suchman, E. A., DeVinney, L. C., Star, S. A., & Williams, R. M., Jr. (1949). The American soldier: Adjustment during army life (Vol. 1). Princeton University Press.
- Smith, H. J., Pettigrew, T. F., Pippin, G. M., & Bialosiewicz, S. (2012). Relative deprivation: A theoretical and meta-analytic review. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 16(3), 203–232. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868311430825