What is the Matthew effect?

Matthew Effect, where more is more and less is less, and both success and recognition are always relegated to the same privileged minority.

The Matthew effect is the sociological name for a phenomenon of accumulation of goods, wealth or fame. Although the use of this term is attributed for the first time to sociologist Robert K. Merton in an article published in 1968, its use has spread to other disciplines such as economics, psychology and education, in which it refers to both goods materials, such as money, as well as immaterial values, such as trust or social prestige.

It is originally called the Matthew effect after the biblical quote from chapter 13, verse 12 of the Gospel of Saint Matthew, (which is repeated in Matthew 25, 29 and in other evangelists up to five times) which says verbatim: “For to him who has will be given and he will have abundance; But from him who does not have, even what he has will be taken away.” In the field of education, the one who analyzed the event and gave it the name of the Matthew effect was the Canadian psychologist Keith Stanovich.

“Do you want to be rich? So do not worry about increasing your wealth, but rather about decreasing your greed.”

-Epicurus-

Examples of the Matthew effect

There are abundant observations of the Matthew effect, let’s look at some depending on the area where it appears.

in science

In the scientific field, There is a sensational experiment done a dozen years ago. A team of scientists selected fifty articles by reputed researchers working at leading North American universities published a couple of years earlier. The scientists changed the titles of the articles, invented fictitious authors employed at inferior universities, and sent them to the same journals where they had been published. Almost all articles were rejected.

Read Also: How to acquire emotional strength

Interpreting it in the opposite sense, what is known as Stigler’s Law is produced because in many cases scientific findings are not named after the person who discovered them in the first place.

In education

In education, It would be something similar to Pygmalion effectwhich draws attention to the improvement of students who receive more attention and they are the object of the teacher’s most optimistic expectations, to the detriment of the good evolution of others; he Mateo effect has a lot to do with the call self-fulfilling prophecy also formulated by Merton.

The Canadian psychologist Keith Stanovich was the one who observed that Those who acquired “richness” in written and oral expression at an early age increasingly reinforced these skillswhile those who took a long time to achieve them felt their failure, resisted going through the bad experience again and therefore read and wrote less.

This made them susceptible to being at a greater and greater disadvantage compared to those who already mastered reading and writing who, being happy with their results, practiced more and more. This gave advantage to the latter regarding success in schooling and future studies.

“In science, recognition is given to the man who convinces the world, not to the one who comes up with the idea.”

-William Osler-

in sociology

In Sociology we could give the following example: The Bank will give a loan more easily to those who can prove that they have greater guarantees (that is, to the one who has the most) and not to the poor who is the one who surely needs that money the most, so the rich will become richer and the poor will become poorer.

Consequences of the Matthew effect

It has two large facets, usually antagonistic, in the words of Jiménez (2009):

Read Also: Four signs that we are being used by a friend

The contribution of a greater amount of benefitsboth material (financial and other resources, rewards) and non-material (privileges, considerations, trust, power, fame) due to the fact of having the maximum value in a certain parameter that is considered relevant.

It is placed in the first position of a certain classification or category at a local, regional, national or global level. As a consequence of being rated as the best, he is the most benefited, overvalued and often overshadows the rest.

Besides, benefits of any kind are reduced or canceled for people or entities that have the least value of a certain parameter that is considered relevant. In many cases, marginalization processes are generated because the consideration towards these people or entities changes when they are perceived as being at the bottom of the classification.

It is frequently observed that are far below expectations if we take into account the resources they had at the beginning. In the extreme case, the one who has less is stripped of what is his, which is paradoxically given to the one who has more.

“Wealth is like salt water; “The more you drink, the thirstier you get.”

-Arthur Schopenhauer-

One way to correct the harmful effects of the Matthew effect is prioritizing participation to the detriment of competitiveness. Another is to establish mechanisms that protect the most disadvantaged. The most radical way to carry it out would be to grant aid in an inverted manner. That is, help more those who have proven to be worse off, know less or have less. In short, correct inequalities.

Read Also: 3 types of emotional dependence