The impact of the perpetrator’s and the victim’s characteristics on moral responsibility attributions
Keywords:
responsibility attribution; guilt attribution; stereotype; relating an event to Self; victim; annihilation effect
Abstract
In accordance with the model based on defensive responsibility attribution and stereotyping, as well as the findings from previous studies (Styśko, 2006; 2007), in certain circumstances, unbiased or favourably biased judgements about the perpetrator from a negatively stereotyped group (the annihilation effect) can be explained by using a cognitive strategy which serves reducing a high sense of threat and regaining a lost sense of control. This article presents study based on the assumptions of this model. One hundred and seven high school students took part in the experiment using a computer procedure. When the victim was similar to the observer, the participants attributed a similar degree of responsibility to the perpetrators both not belonging and belonging to the negatively stereotyped group (jock hooligans). When the victim was presented as not similar but equally emotionally engaging (a child), the jock hooligan perpetrator was attributed even less responsibility than the non – jock hooligan perpetrator.
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Walster, E. (1966). Assignment of responsibility for an accident. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 3, 73-79.
Weinstein, N. D. (1980). Unrealistic optimism about future life events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39, 806-820.
Bodenhausen, G. V. (1988). Stereotypic biases in social decision making and memory: Testing process models of stereotype use. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 55, 726-737.
Bodenhausen, G. V., Lichtenstein, M. (1987). Social stereotypes and information-processing strategies: The impact of task complexity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 871-880.
Dobrzańska-Socha, B. (2001). Trudne rozmowy – wyobrażenie własnej śmierci. W: K. Popiołek (red.), Człowiek w sytuacji zagrożenia. Kryzysy, katastrofy, kataklizmy (s. 204-222). Poznań: SPA.
Doliński, D. (1992). Przypisywanie moralnej odpowiedzialności. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Instytutu Psychologii PAN.
Duncan, B. L. (1976). Differential social perception and attribution of intergroup violence: Testing the lower limits of stereotyping of blacks. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 34, 590-598.
George, W. H., Martinez, L. J. (2002). Victim blaming in rape: Effects of victim and perpetrator race, type of rape, and participant racism. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 26, 110-119.
Gump, B. B., Kulik, J. A., Henderson, G. R. (1998). Blaming the same-sex victim in IV-prevention messages: Further Examination of the self-protective similarity bias. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 20, 123-132.
Hafer, C. L. (2000). Do innocent victims threaten the belief in a just world? Evidence from a modified Stroop task. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79, 165-173.
Hodson, G., Hooper, H., Dovidio, J. F., Gaertner, S. L. (2005). Aversive racism in Britain: The use of inadmissible evidence in legal decisions. European Journal of Social Psychology, 35, 437-448.
Lerner, M. J., Goldberg, J. H. (1999). When do decent people blame victims? The differing effects of the explicit/rational and implicit/experiential cognitive systems. W: S. Chaiken, Y. Trope (red.), Dual-process theories in social psychology (s. 627-640). New York: The Guilford Press.
McKenna, F. P. (1993). It won’t happen to me: Unrealistic optimism or illusion of control? British Journal of Psychology, 84, 39-50.
Pittman, T. S. (1993). Control motivation and attitude change. W: G. Weary, F. Gleicher, K. L. Marsh (red.), Control motivation and social cognition (s. 157-175). New York: Springer--Verlag.
Pyszczynski, T., Greenberg, J., Solomon, S. (1999). A dual-process model of defense against conscious and unconscious death-related thoughts: An extension of terror management theory. Psychological Review, 106, 835-845.
Shaver, K. G. (1970). Defensive attribution: Effects of severity and relevance on the responsibility assigned for an accident. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 14, 101-113.
Sommers, S. R., Ellsworth, P. C. (2003). How much do we really know about race and juries? A review of social science theory and research. Chicago-Kent Law Review, 78, 997-1031.
Steel, C. M., Liu, T. J. (1983). Dissonance processes as self-affirmation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 45, 5-19.
Styśko, M. (2000). Wpływ negatywnego stereotypu i przerwy w komunikacie na obwinianie sprawcy negatywnych zdarzeń. Studia Psychologiczne, 38, 119-138.
Styśko, M. (2004). Wpływ prawdopodobieństwa osobistej konfrontacji z członkiem negatywnej grupy stereotypowej na proces atrybucji winy (niepublikowany raport z badań BW 1616 /8/03, Uniwersytet Warszawski, Wydział Psychologii).
Styśko, M. (2006). O nietendencyjnym i tendencyjnie przychylnym osądzaniu winowajcy z negatywnie stereotypizowanej kategorii. Psychologia Społeczna, 2, 141-150.
Styśko, M. (2007). Atrybucja winy: o roli stereotypów i odniesienia zdarzenia do Ja. Warszawa: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego.
Taylor, S. E. (1984). Przystosowanie do zagrażających wydarzeń. Nowiny Psychologiczne, 6-7, 15-38.
Tesser, A. (2000). On the cofluence of self-esteem maintenance mechanisms. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 4, 290-299.
Tesser, A., Martin, L. L., Cornell, D. P. (1996). On the substitutability of self-protective mechanisms. W: P. Gollwitzer, J. Bargh (red.), The psychology of action (s. 48-68). New York: The Guilford Press.
Thornton, B. (1984). Defensive attribution of responsibility: Evidence for an arousal-based motivational bias. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 46, 721-734.
Van Knippenberg, A., Dijksterhuis, A., Vermeulen, D. (1999). Judgement and memory of a criminal act: The effects of stereotypes and cognitive load. European Journal of Social Psychology, 29, 191-201.
Walster, E. (1966). Assignment of responsibility for an accident. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 3, 73-79.
Weinstein, N. D. (1980). Unrealistic optimism about future life events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39, 806-820.
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