Search

False accusations of wrongdoing are common and can have grave consequences. In six studies, we document a worrisome paradox in perceivers' subjective judgments of a suspect's guilt. Specifically, we found that people (including online panelists, n = 4,983, and working professionals such as fraud investigators and auditors, n = 136) use suspects' angry responses to accusations as cues of guilt. However, we found that such anger is an invalid cue of guilt and is instead a valid cue of innocence; accused individuals (university students, n = 230) and online panelists (n = 401) were angrier when they are falsely relative to accurately accused. Moreover, we found that individuals who remain silent are perceived to be at least as guilty as those who angrily deny an accusation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We posit that the modern airplane is a social microcosm of classbased society, and that the increasing incidence of "air rage" can be understood through the lens of inequality. Research on inequality typically examines the effects of relatively fixed, macrostructural forms of inequality, such as socioeconomic status; we examine how temporary exposure to both physical and situational inequality, induced by the design of environments, can foster antisocial behavior. We use a complete set of all onboard air rage incidents over several years from a large, international airline to test our predictions. Physical inequality on airplanes-that is, the presence of a first class cabin-is associated with more frequent air rage incidents in economy class. Situational inequality-boarding from the front (requiring walking through the first class cabin) versus the middle of the plane-also significantly increases the odds of air rage in both economy and first class. We show that physical design that highlights inequality can trigger antisocial behavior on airplanes. More broadly, these results point to the importance of considering the design of environments-from airplanes to office layouts to stadium seating-in understanding both the form and emergence of antisocial behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does emotional intelligence promote behavior that strictly benefits the greater good, or can it also advance interpersonal deviance? In the investigation reported here, we tested the possibility that a core facet of emotional intelligence--emotion-regulation knowledge--can promote both prosocial and interpersonally deviant behavior. Drawing from research on how the effective regulation of emotion promotes goal achievement, we predicted that emotion-regulation knowledge would strengthen the effects of other-oriented and self-oriented personality traits on prosocial behavior and interpersonal deviance, respectively. Two studies supported our predictions. Among individuals with higher emotion-regulation knowledge, moral identity exhibited a stronger positive association with prosocial behavior in a social dilemma (Study 1), and Machiavellianism exhibited a stronger positive association with interpersonal deviance in the workplace (Study 2). Thus, emotion-regulation knowledge has a positive side and a dark side. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing work on attribution theory distinguishes between external and internal attributions (i.e., "I overcame adversity due to luck" vs. "my own effort"). We introduce the construct of relational resilience attributions (i.e., "due to help from other people") as a critical, but overlooked form of external attribution that predicts compassion toward others. We first document the presence of internal, relational (social external), and situational (nonsocial external) resilience attributions among people who have overcome unemployment, showing the predominance of internal attributions (Study 1). Next, we show that relational attributions uniquely predict compassion toward people struggling to overcome a range of challenges, including losing a loved one (Study 2), quitting smoking (Study 3a), workplace bullying (Study 3b), divorce (Study 4a), and pandemic survival (Study 4b). To examine causality and the malleability of relational attributions, we experimentally induce relational attributions among ex-smokers (Study 5), advanced degree holders (Study 6), and those who completed a fatiguing task (Study 7). We further find that gratitude is one critical link between one's own relational attributions and compassion toward others. Despite the prevailing tendency for people to make internal attributions for their resilience, forming relational attributions is positively associated with greater compassion for others struggling to endure adversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A response from the authors of the article "Physical and situational inequality on airplanes predicts air rage" is presented regarding the association between front boarding of airplane passengers and air rage.

We document a unique driver of consumer behavior: the public disclosure of a firm's gender pay gap. Four experiments provide causal evidence that when firms are revealed to have gender pay gaps, consumers are less willing to pay for their goods, a reaction driven by consumer perceptions of unfairness. Unlike reactions to CEO‐to‐worker wage gaps, this effect varies by consumers' gender: Compared to men, women show larger decreases in purchase intentions toward firms with gender pay gaps. Social media data, from before and after the United Kingdom legally mandated many firms to disclose their gender pay gaps, further demonstrate that gender pay gaps correlate with negative consumer reactions; once again, women are more likely than men to express negative sentiments online in response to pay gap‐related topics. Although we show that firms consumers will punish firms with their wallets, we also observe boundary conditions: When decisions incur a sufficient cost to the self—such as when needing a ride‐share when rain is very likely—the negative effects of gender gap disclosure are attenuated. This article is part of the issue "Consumer Psychology for the Greater Good" [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A response from the authors of the article "Physical and situational inequality on airplanes predicts air rage" that was published in a 2016 issue.