Why we sometimes punish the innocent: The role of group entitativity in collective punishment

Abstract

Because punishments are expected to give offenders what they deserve proportionally to the severity of their offenses, the punishment of an entire group because of the misdeed of a few of its members is generally considered as unfair. Group entitativity might increase support for such collective punishment, because members of highly entitative groups are perceived as more similar and interchangeable. We designed three experiments comparing support for third-party collective punishment of low versus high entitative groups. As comparison base-rate, we included conditions in which participants punish an individual wrongdoer (Experiments 1 & 2). Results show that although support for individual punishment is higher than support for collective punishment, this difference was reduced (Experiment 1) or absent (Experiment 2) when the group was highly entitative. Experiment 3 replicated the increasing effect of group entitativity on support for collective punishment. We conclude that group entitativity increases the likelihood of an entire group being treated as a single unit, facilitating collective punishment when a few group members commit an offense.

Strike one hundred to educate one: Measuring the efficacy of collective sanctions experimentally

“…the question of their legitimacy and fairness, depending on the context of the situation. Acceptance of and readiness to apply collective sanctions vary with group entitativity (degree of members’ similarity) [ 50 ], power structure within a group (democratic vs. non-democratic) [ 1 ] and intergroup competition [ 51 ]. However, unlike the current study, these studies focusing on stated preferences do not capture the effect the threat of collective sanctions may have on individual behavior.…”

Causality and Blame Judgments of Negative Side Effects of Actions May Differ for Different Institutional Domains

“…Although the notion of macrosocial objects (such as societies or institutions) as independent entities that may act like living organisms dates back at least to the works of H. Spencer, recent empirical studies stem from the seminal work of D. Campbell (1958), who coined the concept of "entitativity" to refer to "the degree of having the nature of an entity, of having real existence" (Campbell, 1958, p. 17). There is some empirical evidence that victims' "entitativity" influences moral judgments as well as the support for third-party collective punishment of group members (Bartels & Burnett, 2011;Pereira & van Prooijen, 2018) and that intuitive theory of groups plays an important role in shaping judgments of collective responsibility (Lickel et al, 2001;Sacchi et al, 2009). Therefore, we have some reasons to generalize the above-outlined elementary "theory of social action" to the cases of corporate actors and even decision-making institutions such as states, legislating bodies and educational institutions.…”

Concern for the Transgressor’s Consequences: An Explanation for Why Wrongdoing Remains Unreported

“…Beyond ingroup and outgroup distinctions, when a particular group is considered important to one's identity, then concern for the group could hinder reporting transgressors. A person may be concerned that the group's reputation will be tarnished by its association with the transgressor and therefore avoid reporting the crime (see Pereira & van Prooijen, 2018).…”

“…al, 2005). Research also suggests that people are more likely to attribute complex, secondary emotions (e.g., humiliation, guilt) to ingroup members than to outgroup members (e.g., Leyens et al, 2001), and the same may be true of members of higher vs. lower entitative groups (Newheiser et al, 2012;Pereira & van Prooijen, 2018). Thus, members of highly entitative groups may more easily imagine that a fellow group member felt anxiety or guilt about their actions, in turn heightening concern for them and their outcomes.…”