Making the Bad Seem Worse

It has often been speculated that disasters caused by intentional human actions are perceived as more harmful than natural disasters of the same magnitude. A new series of studies by social psychologists Daniel Ames and Susan Fiske confirms this expectation and suggests that the reason for this effect is our wish to blame the harm-doer. Specifically, they propose that when the harmful event is intentional, we build our case for punishing the perpetrator in part by exaggerating the seriousness of the outcome. (See this article for a general discussion of compensatory and retributive justice.)

For example, in one of the seven studies they report, participants read about a drought caused by a river that dried up. In the intentional harm condition, they were told that a man deliberately diverted the river, while in the unintentional condition, the problem was said to be due to lack of rain. The participants were then given a brief opportunity to look at a list of monetary damages caused by the disaster, i.e., value of crops lost, etc., and asked to estimate the total damages.

	Estimated Total Harm
Actual Damage	$2,862.00
Unintentional Harm	$2,753.00
Intentional Harm	$5,120.00

As you can see, those in the unintentional harm condition estimated the damages fairly accurately. However, participants in the intentional harm condition gave a mean estimate of harm that was almost twice the real damage. This difference persisted even when participants were given a monetary incentive for being accurate, and even when they were asked to give separate estimates of total harm and any punitive damages they might want to impose.

In some of their studies comparing accidental vs. intentional harms caused by the same perpetrator, Ames and Fiske measured blame motivation, a combination of desire to blame, morally condemn and punish the perpetrator. They found that the effect of intentionality on harm estimates was mediated by—that is, largely accounted for by—the motivation to blame the harm-doer. (See this previous post for an explanation of how researchers infer mediation.) Of course, it was not possible to do this analysis with the drought scenario, since no person was responsible for the lack of rain.

As with all good studies, this one raises more questions than it answers. The authors tentatively suggest that we may be overreacting to intentional acts such as the threat of terrorism, but neglecting other impersonal threats. I'm intrigued by the fact that the participants exaggerated the costs of intentional harms rather than underestimating the costs of unintentional ones. This suggests that we are more inclined to punish people who harm us deliberately than to forgive those who harm us unintentionally. (Actually, I'm combining the results of two separate studies to draw this conclusion, but it doesn't seem far-fetched.) If so, is this more characteristic of Americans than of other cultures? Of conservatives than of liberals?

In the real world, important events have multiple causes whose exact contributions are not clear. Most of us believe that Hurricane Katrina was not simply a natural disaster, but was caused in part by failure to adequately build and maintain the levees, by failure of FEMA to respond efficiently, etc. Presumably, those who believe that human negligence played a significant role will see Katrina as having been more harmful. How will society assign blame for current and future disasters attributable by climate change?

In disasters where human agency is clearly involved, i.e., the BP oil spill, there will almost certainly be conflicting accounts of who was responsible and whether the harm was deliberate or accidental. How does the public respond to these controversies and why? When safety precautions are disregarded, do they think the primary fault lies with the corporations who disregard the rules or the government regulators who fail to enforce them? What if these corporations contribute to politicians who in turn weaken the rules or ensure that regulatory agencies are understaffed?

There are enough questions here to keep social psychologists occupied for quite a while.

You may also be interested in reading:

Blaming the Victim

The Ultimate Attribution Error