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Attributions of Responsibility and Reactions to Affirmative Action: Affirmative Action as Help

The University of Western Ontario, kquinn{at}northwestern.edu

Erin M. Ross

The University of Western Ontario

Victoria M. Esses

The University of Western Ontario

The authors investigated the relation between attributions of responsibility and reactions to affirmative action. Participants read one of four fictitious editorials about visible minority under-employment in which responsibility for causing the underemployment problem and responsibility for solving it were manipulated. Results indicated that ratings and endorsement of affirmative action programs, and perceptions that affirmative action promotes relevant values, were highest when visible minorities were depicted as responsible for either the cause of the problem or its solution, but not both. That is, reactions to affirmative action were influenced by the interplay of attributions of responsibility for causing the problem and attributions of responsibility for providing a solution. The results of this experiment suggest that the framing of beneficiaries of affirmative action in terms of responsibility for causing and solving the problem of their disadvantage is an important determinant of reactions to affirmative action programs.

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