Understanding the Better Than Average Effect

People evaluate themselves more positively than they evaluate most other people. Although this better than average (BTA) effect was originally thought to represent a motivated bias, several cognitively oriented theorists have questioned whether this is the case. In support of a motivational model, the author reports five studies showing that the BTA effect is stronger for important attributes than unimportant ones (all five studies) and that once attribute importance is taken into account, the effect occurs when self-evaluations are compared with a single peer (Study 2) and when self is specified as the referent rather than the target (Study 4). Finally, Study 5 shows that the BTA effect increases in magnitude after participants experience a threat to their feelings of self-worth. Collectively, these findings establish that motivational processes underlie the BTA effect.