MacArthur Scale of Subjective Social Status – Adult Version

Factor: Being Valued in Community

Age: Adult

Duration: Less than 3 minutes

Reading Level: 6th-8th grade

What

Created by health psychologist Nancy Adler and team (2000), the MacArthur Scale of Subjective Social Status (MacArthur SSS Scale) is a single-item measure that assesses a person’s perceived rank relative to others in their group.

Who

Researchers have used the MacArthur SSS Scale with African-American, Asian-American, Chinese-American, European-American, Latinx-American, Native-American, Mexican-American, and Pacific Islander adults living on a low income (Bullock & Limbert, 2003; Franzini & Fernandez-Esquer, 2006; Ostrove, et al., 2000). They have also used it with recent immigrants to the U.S. from Asia (Leu, et al., 2008) and Latin America (Garza, et al., 2017). In addition, many researchers outside the U.S. use the scale (e.g. Curhan, et al., 2014).

How

INSTRUCTIONS

Respondents view a drawing of a ladder with 10 rungs, and either read or hear that the ladder represents where people stand in society. Respondents further read or hear: “At the top of the ladder are the people who are the best off, those who have the most money, most education, and best jobs. At the bottom are the people who are the worst off, those who have the least money, least education, worst jobs, or no job. Please place an ‘X’ on the rung that best represents where you think you stand on the ladder.”

Some researchers also include a second item that asks respondents to rank themselves on the ladder relative to other people in their community.

To score this measure, researchers simply note the number of the rung (1-10) on which the respondent placed their “X.”

In addition to English, this measure has been translated into Spanish, Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese, and other languages (Curhan, et al., 2014; Ostrove, et al., 2000). Researchers have also developed a version of this scale for youth ages 12 to 18 (Goodman, et al., 2001).

RESPONSE FORMAT

The Socioeconomic Status Ladder subscale item is Q1. The Community Ladder subscale item is Q2.

Each rung of the ladder corresponds with numbers from 1 through 10. If a participant marks an “X” on the bottom rung, their response is scored as 1. If they mark an “X” on the middle rung, their response is scored as 5. If they mark an “X” on the top rung, their response is scored as 10.

Why It Matters

A person’s objective socioeconomic status (SES) — their education, job prestige, and income — is both a cause and a consequence of their mental and physical health (Adler, et al., 1994). A person’s subjective social status (SSS) has similar associations, with higher levels of SSS predicting better health (Ostrove, et al., 2000). Yet the MacArthur SSS Scale is easier to use than objective measures of SSS because many people do not know or want to report their income and education level. What’s more, the MacArthur SSS Scale sometimes predicts health and wellbeing better than do objective SES measures (Singh-Manoux, Marmot, & Adler, 2005).

For example, a study of Latinx-American immigrants showed that the MacArthur SSS Scale better predicted a range of health outcomes than did a standard income measure (Garza, et al., 2017). The study authors suggest the MacArthur SSS scale “may tap into stressful immigrant experiences … left out by conventional socioeconomic measures.” Other studies show that the MacArthur SSS scale predicts health outcomes even after controlling for objective SES among Mexican immigrants living on a low income (Franzini & Fernandez, 2006), European-Americans, and Chinese-Americans, (Ostrove, et al., 2000), and large, multiethnic and multi-SES samples of American (Operario, et al., 2004) and British respondents (Demakakos, et al., 2008).

HEADS UP

Relationships between the MacArthur SSS Scale and health outcomes are different for different cultural groups (e.g., Curhan, et al., 2014). Researchers have not yet established for which cultural groups this measure is most effective. In addition, which comparison group researchers use affects respondents’ answers (Wolff, et al., 2010). Most studies use U.S. society or society as the comparison group, though.

SEE ALSO

Macarthur Scale of Subjective Social Status – Youth Version

References

Adler, N. E., Boyce, T., Chesney, M. A., Cohen, S., Folkman, S., Kahn, R. L., & Syme, S. L. (1994). Socioeconomic status and health: The challenge of the gradient. American psychologist, 49(1), 15-24.

Adler, N. E., Epel, E. S., Castellazzo, G., & Ickovics, J. R. (2000). Relationship of subjective and objective social status with psychological and physiological functioning: Preliminary data in healthy, White women. Health Psychology, 19(6), 586-592.

Bullock, H. E., & Limbert, W. M. (2003). Scaling the socioeconomic ladder: Low‐income women’s perceptions of class status and opportunity. Journal of Social Issues, 59(4), 693-709.

Curhan, K. B., Levine, C. S., Markus, H. R., Kitayama, S., Park, J., Karasawa, M., … & Ryff, C. D. (2014). Subjective and objective hierarchies and their relations to psychological well-being: A US/Japan comparison. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 5(8), 855-864.

Demakakos, P., Nazroo, J., Breeze, E., & Marmot, M. (2008). Socioeconomic status and health: The role of subjective social status. Social Science & Medicine, 67(2), 330-340.

Franzini, L., & Fernandez-Esquer, M. E. (2006). The association of subjective social status and health in low-income Mexican-origin individuals in Texas. Social Science & Medicine, 63(3), 788-804.

Garza, J. R., Glenn, B. A., Mistry, R. S., Ponce, N. A., & Zimmerman, F. J. (2017). Subjective social status and self-reported health among US-born and immigrant Latinos. Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health, 19(1), 108-119.

Goodman, E., Adler, N. E., Kawachi, I., Frazier, A. L., Huang, B., & Colditz, G. A. (2001). Adolescents’ perceptions of social status: Development and evaluation of a new indicator. Pediatrics, 108(2), e31-e31.

Leu, J., Yen, I. H., Gansky, S. A., Walton, E., Adler, N. E., & Takeuchi, D. T. (2008). The association between subjective social status and mental health among Asian immigrants: Investigating the influence of age at immigration. Social Science & Medicine, 66(5), 1152-1164.

Operario, D., Adler, N. E., & Williams, D. R. (2004). Subjective social status: Reliability and predictive utility for global health. Psychology & Health, 19(2), 237-246.

Ostrove, J. M., Adler, N. E., Kuppermann, M., & Washington, A. E. (2000). Objective and subjective assessments of socioeconomic status and their relationship to self-rated health in an ethnically diverse sample of pregnant women. Health Psychology, 19(6), 613-618.

Singh-Manoux, A., Marmot, M. G., & Adler, N. E. (2005). Does subjective social status predict health and change in health status better than objective status? Psychosomatic Medicine, 67(6), 855-861.

Wolff, L. S., Acevedo-Garcia, D., Subramanian, S. V., Weber, D., & Kawachi, I. (2010). Subjective social status, a new measure in health disparities research: Do race/ethnicity and choice of referent group matter?. Journal of Health psychology, 15(4), 560-574.