Live Poster Session: Zoom Link
Nina Eyres
Nina is a senior at Wesleyan double-majoring in Psychology and Science in Society. She is involved in cognitive and social psychology research at Wes and is also part of a team down at the Middletown Community Health Center looking into institutional barriers in serving outstanding warrants. After graduating, Nina will be working as a paralegal in NYC contributing towards criminal justice initiatives, hence the interest in research topics involving the structural correlates of crime and interactions with law enforcement.
Abstract: One of the lasting features of the American ethos is the idea of meritocracy, the belief that individual life success is the product of hard work and personal merit, rather than one’s inherited economic or social standings. Under the logic of meritocracy, anyone, no matter how disadvantaged, can exercise autonomy, social control, and individual responsibility to pull themselves up by their bootstraps to achieve success. At the same time, levels of community crime and exposure to law enforcement are additional factors consistently linked with socioeconomic disadvantage, suggesting a flaw in the idea that anyone can be anything and get anywhere. While similar predictors have been associated with both presence of meritocratic beliefs and support for law enforcement (e.g., socioeconomic status, income level, neighborhood advantage), there is a substantial gap in the existing literature regarding how these two opinions might interact. This project attempts to attend to this knowledge gap by asking “Are strong meritocratic beliefs associated with support for law enforcement, controlling for socioeconomic status?”, while identifying an important subgroup to target with educational interventions regarding the societal limits on social control and individual autonomy in the United States.
Eyres_FinalQAC201Poster