Hidden Brain

When Bad Things Happen to Good People

We tend to think of justice as something that exists in the world — that good things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people. When we see someone suffering, it's natural to assume they must have done something to deserve it. But this belief, psychologists have found, can cause us to blame the victims of misfortune rather than help them.

Hidden Brain

When Bad Things Happen to Good People

When bad things happen to good people, we tend to assume that victims must have done something to deserve their fate. This belief in a just world—the idea that people get what they deserve and deserve what they get—can be deeply comforting. But it comes at a cost: it leads us to blame the innocent and ignore the role of chance in human life.

Hidden Brain

When Bad Things Happen to Good People

Most of us believe that we would recognize injustice when we see it, and that we would speak up or take action. But research by social psychologist Melvin Lerner suggests we often do something quite different — we blame the victim. Lerner found that when people observed an innocent person suffering, they didn't always feel empathy. Instead, they often convinced themselves that the victim must have done something to deserve their fate.

Hidden Brain

When Bad Things Happen to Good People

We have a deep commitment to the idea that good things happen to good people, and bad things happen to bad people. So when tragedy strikes someone who doesn't deserve it, it's a challenge to our sense of a just and orderly world. And that's deeply uncomfortable.

Hidden Brain

When Bad Things Happen to Good People

We often think of justice as something that should be distributed according to merit — good things should happen to good people, and bad things should happen to bad people. But the world doesn't work this way, and when we refuse to accept this, we can end up blaming the victims of misfortune for their own suffering.

EconTalk

Incentives Are for Losers (with Adam Mastroianni)

obeying bad incentives--shading a headline for clicks, keeping the found wallet because no one's watching--is "loser behavior," a surrender of the hardest and most human task: figuring out right from wrong for yourself.