Social Comparisons

Social Comparison and Motivation

In our research, we integrate social comparison theory with motivational principles from self-regulation frameworks to examine how people's assessments of discrepancies between themselves and comparison standards impact motivation and goal pursuit. Upward comparisons, which emphasize a negative discrepancy between the self and the standard, are linked to heightened self-improvement motivation ("pushing"). However, when the perceived gap becomes too large, people are more likely to disengage from their goal. Conversely, positive discrepancies associated with downward comparisons, where the self has surpassed the standard, generally lead to reduced effort ("coasting"). These findings are supported by recent studies (Diel, Grelle, & Hofmann, 2021; Diel, Broeker, Raab, & Hofmann, 2021). Additionally, we explore how social comparisons can be leveraged as an intervention tool to enhance goal pursuit in everyday life (Diel, Hofmann, Grelle, Boecker & Friese, in press).

Social Comparison and Environmental Behavior 

In our research, we explore the dynamics of social comparison in the context of environmental behavior. We find that people are more likely to engage in downward comparisons when evaluating their environmental actions, compared to other common social comparison domains (Diel & Friese, 2024). Our studies suggest that this tendency can be partly explained by the morally charged nature of environmental behavior. To protect their moral self-image, people often favor downward comparisons, as they help reinforce a positive sense of self (Fleischmann, Lammers, Diel, Hofmann, & Galinsky, 2021). We also investigate how this inclination towards downward comparison influences people's motivation to engage in pro-environmental behaviors in the future.

Social Comparison and Emotions

Social comparisons are rarely neutral events; they are often accompanied by strong emotional responses. Downward comparisons tend to boost well-being and self-esteem, while upward comparisons can undermine confidence and evoke feelings of inadequacy. We also study specific emotions that arise uniquely from social comparisons. For example, upward comparisons can elicit admiration, benign envy, or malicious envy, while downward comparisons may evoke pity, sympathy, or schadenfreude. In our work, we investigate how the intensity and occurrence of these emotions depend on factors such as the direction of the comparison (upward or downward) and the extremity of the comparison, which reflects how far an individual perceives themselves to deviate from the standard. Additionally, we examine the motivational and behavioral functions of these emotions, exploring how they can drive or inhibit action (Diel, Boecker, Lange, Hofmann & Crusius, in preparation).