The Hindsight Effect:
Making Sense of the Phenomenon of "Blaming the Victim"

Abstract

In this study the effects on judgment of the Hindsight bias are considered. The subjects in the study were psychology graduate students who were given a scenario and asked to choose from provided responses. The subjects were a sample of convenience from a graduate psychology class and were divided into two groups with one group receiving a scenario with a positive outcome and the second group receiving the same scenario with a negative outcome. The hypothesis was that knowing the outcome would influence the judgments made concerning the scenario. The results of the study supported the hypothesis. There was a substantial difference in response to the scenario from both groups in the direction predicted by the hypothesis. The positive outcome tended to elicit positive responses and the negative outcome produced responses that fit with the concept of "blaming the victim."

Introduction

The hindsight effect can be defined as a natural consequence of people's attempt to make sense of an event based on knowing the outcome (Janoff-Bulman & Timko, 1985). It is a major factor in a phenomenon of judgment called "blaming the victim." Blaming the victim occurs when someone knows the outcome of a situation and expects the person in question to have given primary consideration to this as the probable outcome. If this was not done, then they are to some degree culpable of the results of their decisions. Of course, people who make decisions in their lives are infrequently certain of the outcomes of their choice. There are blatant examples of exceptions to this: jumping from a building tends to produce negative outcomes in nearly all cases, or driving a car when intoxicated substantially increases your odds of injury to yourself and others. However, most decisions that people make do not have outcomes that are so easy to predict. The hindsight effect tends to expect people to see into the future and therefore is a cognitive bias that must be understood and guarded against.

The hindsight effect has received considerable investigation. Studies have shown that victims to unfortunate events not only suffer the event but further suffer the judgments of others who believe they could have prevented the negative outcome (Coates, Wortman, & Abbey, 1979; Janoff-Bulman & Frieze, 1983). The principle dynamic in hindsight effect is that once the perceiver has information as to the outcome of an event, they are unable to separate this knowledge from their judgment of the situation (Fischhoff & Beyth, 1975; Slovic & Fischhoff, 1977). This tendency is one way people attempt to have more control of a confusing world by forming an overall perspective or Gestalt through which their impressions are formed. This attempt makes sense in itself, but can potentially have a serious impact on people in situations when we are sitting in judgment of them.

This current mini-study is a replication of the many previous demonstrations of the hindsight effect. The principal hypothesis was that knowing the outcome, the subject's judgments would be influenced concerning the scenario. A secondary hypothesis was the hindsight effect would be displayed even among a population sample quite sophisticated in the application of psychological principles.

Method

Subjects

For this small quasi-experimental study, a graduate psychology class was chosen. This population was both a sample of convenience and met the criteria of a group sophisticated in psychology. It was predicted that graduate psychology students are not easy to fool. Therefore, if this population was to show a significant effect, the strength of the hypothesis was assumed to be stronger than if freshmen psychology students were used as the subjects. Subjects were both male and female, predominant, Anglo with some diversity in age. The total number of subjects was thirteen, with six in Group 1 and seven in Group 2.

Procedure

A straightforward between subjects design was used. A graduate psychology class was randomly assigned to two groups. The groups were placed in two different rooms and were asked to read the following scenario:

"Jennifer has enjoyed taking risks since she was a young child. Every time she has had an opportunity she enjoyed the thrill and exhilaration of being on the edge. On a white water rafting trip, she chose to ride the 4.5 rated Hades rapid rather than portage. Going into the roughest section, her raft flipped over and she went through the rapids in the frigid water. When other rafters were able to reach her and pull her out Group 1--she yelled it was the ride of her life, Group 2--she had injured her spine and has paralysis from the waist down. Which of the following statements do you agree with:

a. Take it easy in life, discretion is always the better part of valor.
b. She had bad luck.
c. A life with no risks isn't worth living.
d. Risky behavior will catch up with you sooner or later."

The only difference in both scenarios was the wording underlined above. Group 1 had a positive outcome to the experience and Group 2 had an injury and negative outcome. The hypothesis was that based solely on knowledge of the outcome, the subjects would respond quite differently concerning Jennifer's behavior.

Results

With the caution that this was a very small sample size, both hypotheses were supported by the study results. The responses for both groups are reported in

Table 1. Scenario responses by item and group

	Item	Group 1		Group 2

	a.	     1		     1

	b.	     2		     1

	c.	     0		     4

	d.	     3		     1

As the choices of the subjects demonstrate, there was a substantial overall difference in Group 1 and Group 2. Item a. and b. were not significantly different for both groups. Item a., "Take it easy in life," received one response in both groups. Item b. had two voted for the negative scenario and in fact Jennifer did have worse luck in this scenario. The principal difference is revealed in items c. and d.

Item c. had the highest discrepancy with four choices in the positive scenario and none in the negative scenario. It may be that the subjects in Group 1 believe that "a life with no risks isn't worth living," but they were clearly unwilling to make this comment in the face of a young active woman who was just paralyzed. At the same time, Group 2 clearly had a easier time circling this choice and saying that taking on risks is a part of what life is all about. Since Jennifer risked, faltered, and eventually prevailed, Group 2 were generally supportive of Jennifer's risky choice.

Item d. is the "blaming the victim" choice for Group 1. Knowing that Jennifer risked and lost badly, Group 1 tended to admonish her choice by indicating "risky behavior will catch up with you sooner or later." This statement makes some logical sense, but should not be more true with a negative outcome than a positive one.

Discussion

Logically, both groups would have equally checked choice d. if they believed "Risky behavior will catch up with you sooner or later." However, only one member of Group 2 chose this response compared to three members of Group 1. Again, because of the small sample size the results cannot be generalized. However, it can be said that when these psychology graduate students were aware of a positive outcome of risky behavior they tended to support the risky decision, and with a negative outcome they tended to admonish the risky decision.

The results of this study are consistent with many studies over the years in the hindsight effect. This effect is a cognitive bias that has been a major issue in social issues such as domestic violence (why did she stay with an abuser in the first place), AIDS (they knew it was risky, they gambled and lost), and rape (she should have known better than to walk alone in the park). With the apparent potency of this cognitive bias, further study is recommended to determine how it can be overcome. Particularly in circumstances where there is a legitimate victim, fixing the blame on the victim is not only ironic but it is also cruel.

References

Coates, D., Wortmen, C.B., & Abbey, A. (1979). Reactions to victims. In I. H. Frieze, D. Bar-Tal, & J. S. Carroll (Eds.), New approaches to social problems. San Francisco; Jossey-Bass.

Fischhoff, B., & Beyth, R. (1975). "I knew it would happen"--Remembered probabilities of once-future things. Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, 13, 1-16.

Janoff-Bulman, R., & Frieze, I.H. (1983). A theoretical perspective for understanding reactions to victimization. Journal of Social Issues, 39, 1-17.

Janoff-Bulman R., & Timko, C. (1985). Cognitive biases in blaming the victim. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 21, 161-177.

Slovic, P., & Fischhoff, B. (1977). On the psychology of experimental surprises. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 3, 544-551.