Attributions for Cross-Country Inequality Scale (ACIS)

Description

The Attributions for Cross-Country Inequality Scale (ACIS) (Vezzoli et al., 2024) was developed to explore how people explain the disparity in income and wealth between rich and poor countries. This scale was created based on the tripartite model of causal attributions for domestic poverty, wealth, and Third-World poverty (e.g., Zucker & Weiner, 1993). It includes 18 items designed to assess beliefs about the reasons behind economic inequality across nations. The scale was evaluated in three countries—Italy, South Africa, and the UK—using adult participants recruited online. Factor analysis, reliability, and validity results support the scale’s effectiveness in capturing perceptions of economic inequality. Three key causal attributions were identified: blaming rich countries, blaming poor countries, and attributing the inequality to fate. This tool provides insights into how people rationalize global disparities and their implications for cross-country inequality.

Authors

• Michela Vezzoli: Department of Psychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy. ORCID
• Roberta Rosa Valtorta: Department of Psychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy. ORCID
• Attila Gáspár: Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialisation, University of Padua, Italy. ORCID
• Carmen Cervone: Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialisation, University of Padua, Italy. ORCID
• Federica Durante: Department of Psychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy.
• Anne Maass: Psychology Program, Division of Science, NYU Abu Dhabi, UAE.
• Caterina Suitner: Department of Developmental Psychology and Socialisation, University of Padua, Italy.

Purpose

The scale aims to deepen understanding of lay theories regarding the causes of economic inequality, particularly regarding why people tolerate, justify, or oppose inequality between countries.

Construct

• Economic Inequality Attributions
  • Rich Countries: Attributing economic inequality to the systematic advantages and exploitation of wealthier countries.
  • Poor Countries: Attributing inequality to the perceived faults and inadequacies of poorer countries.
  • Fate: Attributing inequality to destiny or luck.

Instrument Type

Inventory/Questionnaire

Items of “ACIS”

• 18 items
• 5-point scale for responses, where 1 = totally disagree/not at all and 5 = totally agree/very much.

Reliability

• Internal Consistency:
  • Rich countries factor: Cronbach’s α = .88 (Italy), .93 (UK), .92 (South Africa)
  • Poor countries factor: Cronbach’s α = .83 (Italy), .84 (UK), .79 (South Africa)
  • Fate factor: Cronbach’s α = .69 (Italy), .67 (UK), .69 (South Africa)

Validity

• Criterion Validity: The correlations between the “rich countries” and “poor countries” factors were complementary and medium-to-strong in size. The “rich countries” factor correlated negatively with ideological measures and positively with attitudes toward cross-country inequality and its remedies, while the “poor countries” factor showed the opposite pattern. The “fate” factor showed weaker correlations and a less consistent pattern across the countries.

Factor Analysis

• Exploratory Factor Analysis: Three causal dimensions emerged explaining over 50% of the variance in the data. These dimensions were related to the attribution of inequality to rich countries, poor countries, and fate.
• Confirmatory Factor Analysis: After excluding Item 17, the measurement model was confirmed across the three countries.
• Measurement Invariance: Support was found for configural and metric invariance, but not for scalar invariance, indicating caution when comparing means across countries.

Administration Method

• Electronic

Population

• Age Group: Adults (18 years and older)
• Location: Italy, South Africa, United Kingdom

Items of “ACIS”

Attributions for Cross-Country Inequality Scale (ACIS)

The following items constitute the Attributions for Cross-Country Inequality Scale (ACIS). Participants rate each item on a scale from 1 (totally disagree/not at all) to 5 (totally agree/very much).

Items

• Economic systems that create advantages for rich countries

• Political systems that give special treatment to rich countries

• Rich countries deciding the rules of the game

• Decades or even centuries of exploitation by rich countries

• Rich countries snatch the resources of poor countries

• Greediness of rich countries

• Rich countries taking advantage of poor countries

• The dishonesty of rich countries

• The political influences of rich countries

• The lack of talent and ability to succeed of poor countries

• The loose morals of poor countries

• The laziness of poor countries

• The lack of effort at self-improvement of poor countries

• The lack of thrift and proper money management of poor countries

• The lack of personal drive and willingness to take risks of poor countries

• Some countries are just lucky and others are not

• That is what fate/destiny has in store for each of us

• The good or bad luck the country has compared to other countries

Scale Summary

References

Vezzoli, M., Valtorta, R. R., Gáspár, A., Cervone, C., Durante, F., Maass, A., & Suitner, C. (2024). Why are some countries rich and others poor? Development and validation of the Attributions for Cross-Country Inequality Scale (ACIS). PLoS ONE, 19(2), Article e0298222. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0298222