What stops revenge taking? Effects of observed emotional reactions on revenge seeking

Abstract

What reaction stops revenge taking ? Four experiments (total N = 191) examined this question where the victim of an interpersonal transgression could observe the offender's reaction (anger, sadness, pain, or calm) to a retributive noise punishment.We compared the punishment intensity selected by the participant before and after seeing the offender's reaction. Seeing the opponent in pain reduced subsequent punishment most strongly, while displays of sadness and verbal indications of suffering had no appeasing effect. Expression of anger about a retributive punishment did not increase revenge seeking relative to a calm reaction, even when the anger response was disambiguated as being angry with the punisher. It is concluded that the expression of pain is the most effective emotional display for the reduction of retaliatory aggression. The findings are discussed in light of recent research on reactive aggression and retributive justice. K E Y W O R D S aggression, emotion display, retaliation

Downstream Consequences of Post-Transgression Responses: A Motive-Attribution Framework

“…Second, punishment may reflect a competitive orientation (in SVO terms): By punishing the transgressor, victims may simply aim at making the transgressor suffer (e.g., Baumeister et al, 1995;Fitness, 2001;Yoshimura, 2007), in line with the idea that people are intuitive retributivists who punish in accordance with the "eye for an eye" principle (Aharoni & Fridlund, 2012;Carlsmith & Darley, 2008; see also Eder et al, 2020;Gollwitzer et al, 2016). Likewise, punishment may aim at denigrating the transgressor, reducing their status/power, or demonstrating self-righteousness (i.e., "moralistic punishment"; Jordan & Rand, 2020;Kurzban et al, 2007;Nelissen, 2008).…”

Facing the enemy: Spontaneous facial reactions towards suffering opponents

“…We selected 12 pain videos from Study 1 and added 12 sadness videos taken from Eder et al (2020). Emotional ratings of the video materials are provided in the Supporting Information (Table S5).…”

“…The present studies were designed to measure affective reactions towards revenge punishment outcomes in a structured competitive game. Participant and (fictitious) opponents interacted with each other via a competitive RT game similar to that used by Eder et al (2020). During each game round, the participant was asked to press the mouse button as quickly as possible after the appearance of a visual cue.…”

Revenge as social interaction: Merging social psychological and interpersonal communication approaches to the study of vengeful behavior

“…Moreover, the psychological experience around a revenge episode is a function of the actors' messages, and vice-versa. These initial steps toward synthesizing social psychological and communication approaches to revenge suggest room for a more complete integration, as exemplified by recent studies by Gollwitzer and Denzler (2009), Funk et al (2014), and Eder et al (2020).…”

“…Further building on the above assumption, Eder et al (2020) examined the effects of observing an avengee's response to an initial act of revenge on an avenging party's ongoing pursuit of revenge. In three studies, participants viewed a video of their ostensible opponent's face as they meted out a sound‐blast in return for an earlier provocation.…”