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Gülay Karadere (Dipl.-Psych.)
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GWAL
Allgemeine Gerechte-Welt-Skala
Short abstract
The GWAL measures convictions of justice, willingness to prosocial action, disposition to devalue victims ("blaming the victim"-phenomenon), etc. It consists of six items. Reliability: The internal consistency according to Cronbach is Alpha = .82 and the split-half reliability according to Spearman-Brown is rtt = .77 and according to Guttman rtt = .77. Validity: In a cross-validation, five of the six GWAL items were again fed by their own factor. The GWAL as a measure of the willingness to maintain faith in the just world as fiction if necessary covariates positively with the tendency towards self-deception and foreign deception in the sense of social desirability. The more pronounced the belief in justice and the world is, the less a guilty conscience is experienced when comparing one's own situation with that of disadvantaged people. Rather the devaluation of such persons and the denial of the differences between their situation in life and one's own increases with increasing just world faith. Internal explanations both of one's own positive fate and of the worse life situation of others (and thus justifications of the given differences) become more probable with increasing just world faith (partial correlations: r = -.14 to .45). As expected, a factor analysis resulted in a one-factor solution.
Leibniz Institute for Psychology (ZPID). (2019). Open Test Archive: GWAL. Allgemeine Gerechte-Welt-Skala. Available at: https://www.testarchiv.eu/en/test/9001041
Citation
Dalbert, C., Montada, L. & Schmitt, M. (2002). GWAL. Allgemeine Gerechte-Welt-Skala [Verfahrensdokumentation, Autorenbeschreibung und Fragebogen]. In Leibniz-Institut für Psychologie (ZPID) (Hrsg.), Open Test Archive. Trier: ZPID.
https://doi.org/10.23668/psycharchives.6542
Short information
Short Name GWAL
English Name General Belief in a Just World Scale (GBJW)
Authors Dalbert, C., Montada, L., Schmitt, M.
Published in Test archive 2002
Copyright/Licence Copyright Autoren; CC-BY-NC-ND 3.0
Key words Prosocial Behavior, Cognitive Dissonance, Guilt, Defense Mechanisms, Cognitions, Justice, Morality, Social Equality
Language versions deu
Construct Belief in the just world (Lerner, 1980)
Application age 16 years and older
Item number 6 items
Subscales None; Just World Belief
Application Time approx. 10 min.
Interpretation time approx. 3 min.
Internal consistency: Cronbach Alpha = .82. split-half reliability: rtt = .77 (Spearman-Brown), rtt = .77. (Guttman)
Correlations with the bias towards self-deception and deception by others and conscience; one-factor solution.
None.
Applications Research
There is no abstract in English available. Short information about the measure can be found under Overview. More can be found on the German pages.
There is no review in English available. Short information about the measure can be found under Overview. More can be found on the German pages.
First published in
Dalbert, C., Montada, L. & Schmitt, M. (1987). Glaube an eine gerechte Welt als Motiv: Validierungskorrelate zweier Skalen. Psychologische Beiträge, 29 (4), 596-615. PSYNDEX Dok.-Nr. 0034626
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Contact information
Ministerin Prof. Dr. Claudia Dalbert, Landwirtschaft und Energie des Landes Sachsen-Anhalt, Universität Halle, Pädagogische Psychologie, Franckeplatz 1, Haus 5, D-06099 Halle (Saale)
Prof. Dr. Leo Montada, Emeritus, Universität Trier, Pädagogische und Angewandte Psychologie, Universitätsring 15, D-54286 Trier
Prof. Dr. Manfred Schmitt, Emeritus, Arbeitsgruppe Diagnostik, Differentielle- und Persönlichkeitspsychologie, Methodik und Evaluation, Universität Koblenz-Landau, Rhabanusstraße 3, D-55118 Mainz