Relative Deprivation: Specification, Development, and Integration

The relative deprivation construct has been widely used in the social sciences to explain phenomena from experiencing psychosomatic stress to participating in urban riots. It is currently a hot topic for research, being used especially to understand processes of social identity and responses to disadvantage by both disadvantaged minorities and privileged majorities. This book assembles chapters by the world’s leading relative deprivation researchers in order to present a synthesis of current knowledge. Featuring cutting-edge integrative theoretical and empirical work from social psychology, sociology, and psychology, the book will be a standard reference work for relative deprivation researchers for years to come. It is relevant to researchers in intergroup relations, prejudice, racism, social identity, group processes, social comparison, collective behavior, and social movements. The book is suited for use as a text in graduate-level and advanced undergraduate-level courses.