When contributions make a difference: explaining order effects in responsibility attribution.

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review
Tobias Gerstenberg, David A Lagnado

Abstract

In two experiments, we established an order effect in responsibility attributions. In line with Spellman (Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 126: 323-348, 1997), who proposed that a person's perceived causal contribution varies with the degree to which it changes the probability of the eventual outcome, Experiment 1 showed that in a team challenge in which the players contribute sequentially, the last player's blame or credit is attenuated if the team's result has already been determined prior to her acting. Experiment 2 illustrated that this attenuation effect does not overgeneralize to situations in which the experienced order of events does not map onto the objective order of events; the level of the last person's performance is only discounted if that person knew that the result was already determined. Furthermore, Experiment 1 demonstrated that responsibility attributions remain sensitive to differences in performance, even if the outcome is already determined. We suggest a theoretical extension of Spellman's model, according to which participants' responsibility attributions are determined not only by whether a contribution made a difference in the actual situation, but also by whether it would have made a differ...Continue Reading

References

Aug 19, 2008·Cognition·David A Lagnado, Shelley Channon
Jan 15, 2010·Cognition·Tobias Gerstenberg, David A Lagnado
Jun 11, 2010·European Journal of Clinical Investigation·Sanaa Youssef ShaabanRasha Adel Fathy
Oct 5, 2010·Journal of Vascular and Interventional Radiology : JVIR·Nishita KotharyLawrence V Hofmann
Dec 1, 2010·Journal of Personality and Social Psychology·John V PetrocelliZakary L Tormala
Sep 11, 2012·Cognition·Ro'i ZultanDavid A Lagnado
Jul 17, 2013·Cognitive Science·David A LagnadoRo'i Zultan

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Citations

Jul 17, 2013·Cognitive Science·David A LagnadoRo'i Zultan
Aug 21, 2012·American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology·Alan Leviton
Sep 11, 2012·Cognition·Ro'i ZultanDavid A Lagnado
Feb 24, 2015·Cognition·Jonathan F KominskyJoshua Knobe
Nov 20, 2015·Perspectives on Psychological Science : a Journal of the Association for Psychological Science·Mark D AlickeDavid A Lagnado
Apr 24, 2019·Nature Human Behaviour·Marwa El ZeinRalph Hertwig
Mar 24, 2020·Wellcome Open Research·Marwa El ZeinBahador Bahrami
Oct 30, 2019·Nature Human Behaviour·Edmond AwadIyad Rahwan
Apr 21, 2018·Cognition·Tobias GerstenbergJoshua B Tenenbaum
Apr 6, 2021·Cognition·Paul HenneAugustana Houcek
Jul 25, 2021·Cognitive Psychology·Antonia F LangenhoffTobias Gerstenberg

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