Self-Reported Voluntary Blame-Taking: Kinship Before Friendship and No Effect of Incentives.

Teresa Schneider,Harald Merckelbach,Melanie Sauerland,Jens Puschke,J Christopher Cohrs

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.621960

Teresa Schneider, Harald Merckelbach + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.621960

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Abstract

Inspired by theories of prosocial behavior, we tested the effect of relationship status and incentives on intended voluntary blame-taking in two experiments (Experiment 2 was pre-registered). Participants (NE1 = 211 and NE2 = 232) imagined a close family member, a close friend, or an acquaintance and read a scenario that described this person committing a minor traffic offense. The person offered either a monetary, social, or no incentive for taking the blame. Participants indicated their willingness to take the blame and reasons for and against blame-taking. Overall, a sizable proportion of participants indicated to be willing to take the blame (E1: 57.8%; E2: 34.9%). Blame-taking rates were higher for family members than close friends or acquaintances in both experiments, as expected. Unexpectedly, there was no difference between a close friend and an acquaintance in Experiment 2. Social incentives did not have an effect on voluntary blame-taking in either experiment. Neither did we find an interaction between relationship status and incentives. The results highlight the importance of kin relationships in the context of voluntary blame-taking.

Highlights

In 2002, Günther Kaufmann, a well-known German actor, was sentenced to 15 years in prison
Small monetary incentives can negatively affect prosocial behavior, but social incentives can be close substitutes for money without negatively affecting prosocial behavior. These findings suggest that people display more effort for a good cause when they are able to signal the effort to others and that a monetary award in public can crowd out prosocial behavior due to image motivation (Gneezy et al, 2011)
We found a small effect for the comparison between the close family member and close friend conditions, χ2(1, N = 144) = 7.99, p = 0.005, φ = 0.24

Summary

Introduction

In 2002, Günther Kaufmann, a well-known German actor, was sentenced to 15 years in prison. He had confessed to murdering his friend and tax accountant. It became clear that Kaufmann confessed to the murder to protect his terminally ill wife who died in the course of the trial (Otto, 2006). This case is not an exception and individual cases show that voluntary blame-taking can occur for serious crimes. Only four experimental studies have been published in this

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