Visualization of Cognitive Process about Income Gap in Japan : Model Constructions Using SEM and Mutual Relations among Respondents' Attributes

Based on a questionnaire-based survey in Japan, we created a model to visualize the cognitive process regarding the income gap using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). According to our results, in a four-factor structural model, the exogenous valuable "Social unfairness in economic attributes" significantly influences the latent valuable "Cognition of income gap." The path coefficient for married respondents was significantly smaller than that for unmarried. In our analysis of each attribute of respondents, marital status was the attribute with the most distinct effect on the model. We constructed models that showed the mutual relations between the respondents' attributes of (1) age and marital status and (2) personal income and marital status. According to the results for (1), the path coefficients of "Social unfairness in economic attributes" to "Cognition of income gap" for married respondents were smaller than those for unmarried at all years of age. For (2), the path coefficients of "Social unfairness in economic attributes" to "Cognition of income gap" for married respondents were smaller than those for unmarried except when personal income was 10 million yen or more. Thus, the significance of spouses as advisors was negligible in the case of respondents whose personal income was 10 million or more.