Do innocent victims threaten the belief in a just world? Evidence from a modified stroop task

被引:177
作者
Hafer, CL [1 ]
机构
[1] Brock Univ, Dept Psychol, St Catharines, ON L2S 3A1, Canada
关键词
D O I
10.1037//0022-3514.79.2.165
中图分类号
B84 [心理学];
学科分类号
04 ; 0402 ;
摘要
Two experiments tested whether innocent victims threaten observers' belief in a just world. In both experiments, participants viewed an innocent victim then performed a modified Stroop task in which they identified the color of several words presented for brief exposures (followed by a mask) on a computer screen. When the threat to justice beliefs was presumably highest, color-identification latencies were greater for justice-related words than for neutral words. In Experiment 2, under conditions of high threat, justice-related interference predicted participants' tendency to disassociate themselves from and derogate the victim. These findings suggest that innocent victims do threaten justice beliefs and responses to these victims may, at times, be attempts to reduce this threat. The methodology presented here may be applied to future investigations of defensive, counternormative processes reflecting people's concern with justice.
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页码:165 / 173
页数:9
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