Communicating justice restoration and its effect on the
attitude towards charities
Yorick van Schoonhoven 10193561 Universiteit van Amsterdam Afstudeerrichting: Bedrijfskunde
Begeleider: Mw. Dr. H.H. Lee
In this study we try to find a possible relationship between communicating justice restoration potential and a person's attitude towards the charity communicating. This was tested using a high- and low justice restoration potential condition and using and independent samples t-test to draw a comparison between the two. We proposed that the low justice restoration potential group would resort to rationalizing the situation and derogating the victim, resulting in a less favorable attitude towards the charity. In addition, we were interested in the possible effect of a person's implicit self theory on the effectiveness of communicating justice restoration potential. We hypothesized that those who viewed the world as changeable rather than fixed, would be more receptive of the idea of restoring justice. However, our results did not support this last hypothesis. We did find a significant difference (p=0.01) between the low and high justice restoration groups with regards to their
attitude towards the charity, conforming our first hypothesis.
Table of Contents
Abstract
2
Introduction
4
Literature Review
7
Just-world theory
7
Implicit self theories
9
Methodology
14
Research design
14
Procedure and sample
14
Measurements
15
Data analysis
16
Strengths and weaknesses
18
Results
20
Reliabilities
20
Results
21
Discussion
23
Summary of results
23
Merits and critiques
23
Future researched
26
Conclusion
27
Bibliography
28
Appendix
30
Introduction
For charities, recent economic down times have been harsh. Most charities receive the large majority of their contributions from a small group of extreme wealthy patrons and a group of regular donors (Breeze, Morgan, 2009), and both have been shown to decrease their contributions during economic hard times (Katz, 2005). All the while charities struggle to attract new donors due to the use of ineffective traditional marketing methods (Pope, Isely and Asamoa-Tutu, 2009). Traditional marketing consists of identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer needs profitably. This is somewhat problematic for charitable organizations, since charities do not have a product or service to sell for profit, but a societal goal to promote (Clarke and Mount, 2000; Pope, Isely, and Asamoa-Tutu, 2009). For charities, marketing often comes down to communicating the importance of a certain issue to the public, communicating a high need for help. However, this can be very ineffective or even damaging if it's not done correctly (White, MacDonnell and Ellard, 2012).
This study will investigate the possibility of improving marketing communications for charities, by using the findings of the just world theory. The basic idea of the just world theory is that people need to believe that the world is a just place in which good things happen to good people, so that good actions have good predictable outcomes (Lerner, 1980). When people are confronted with injustice, their believe in a just world is challenged and they respond by either helping solve the injustice, or by rationalizing the situation (e.g. making the victim deserving of his unjust fate or constructing a false perception in which the situation is less of an injustice) to defend their belief in a just world (Lerner, 1980).
Whether someone decides to help or rationalize is dependent on the perception of being able to make a difference (Lerner, 1980). White, MacDonnel and Ellard (2012) showed with the use of fair-trade products how communicating a high chance of restoring justice resulted in a greater purchase deciscion; an increase in people wanting to help. However, this potential to help does not completely explain why some people do choose to help and others do not (White, MacDonnel and Ellard, 2012). Personality traits such as altruism and moral sense are likely to influence people's behavior in this type of situation as well (Batson and Powell, 2003).
In this study we expand on this field of research by looking at how communicating a high justice restoration potential influences someone's attitude towards a charity. As well as try to expand on possible factors that influence whether a person is affected by the communicated high
justice restoration potential. We propose that a person's implicit self theory, as established by Dweck (2000), influences how receptive people are of high justice restoration potential
communications. According to Dweck's implicit self theories, people are either entity theorists, incremental theorists or undecided between the two. An entity theorist believes that their personal traits and the world around them is fixed, while incremental theorists believe that their personal traits and the world around them are malleable (Dweck, 2000). We propose that incremental theorists will respond better to high justice restoration potential, because incremental theorists believe that the world is changeable. Thus incremental theorists will have a more positive attitude towards a charity after receiving a high justice restoration potential message than entity theorists would.
The goal of this study is to improve marketing communications for charitable organizations by communicating justice restoration potential. White, MacDonnel and Ellard (2012) showed how communicating justice restoration potential resulted in an increased willingness to buy the fair trade product. We are interested if justice restoration potential influences people's attitude towards a charity as well. When people are confronted with injustice and are unable to help, they often resort to rationalizing the situation or derogating the character of the victim (Lerner, 1980). We
hypothesize that this derogating of the victims or rationalizing to make the situation less of an injustice reflects on how people perceive the charity trying to make the situation right as well. While when justice restoration potential is communicated, people will have the believe that they can make a difference and that the charity is making a positive difference in the world, which might lead to a more favorable outlook on the charity.
In addition to this first hypothesis, we would like to expand the existing knowledge on deciding factors that influence if a person chooses to help the victim or resorts to victim blaming and rationalizing. Communicating justice restoration potential leads to more willingness to help, however this factor alone does not fully explain when a person decides to help or not (White, MacDonnel and Ellard, 2012). Personality traits and situational factors are likely to influence the decision to help as well (Batson and Powel, 2003). We propose that Dweck's implicit self theories play a role as well. It has already been shown how being an entity theorist or incremental theorist influences a lot of behaviors, they respond differently to challenges, failure, and even hold different moral belief systems. We hypothesize that because incremental theorists believe that the world is malleable, they will me more receptive of the idea of making a change in the world. Thus making
incremental theorists more likely to respond to high justice restoration potential.
We will test for these hypotheses in two parts. First we will test the effect of communicating a high versus a low justice restoration potential. This will be done by letting participants read one of two articles, both about the same injustice but with different predicted outcomes should they support the charity. The participants will be questioned about their attitude towards the charities in general before reading the article, and their attitude towards the charity mentioned in the article afterwards. By comparing these two scores we will be able to see the change in attitude that a high or low justice restoration potential might cause.
In the second part of our analysis we will test if a person's implicit self theory influences the effectiveness communicating high justice restoration potential. Participants will be asked about their view on the malleability of the world, and incremental and entity theorists will be identified. By comparing the attitude changes (as mentioned above) of the incremental theorists and entity
theorists in the high justice restoration potential group we will be able to see if incremental theorists are indeed more receptive of a high justice restoration potential as we suspect.
But first the relevant theories underlying these hypotheses will be discussed. Starting with a look into the Just world theory and how it can help charities communicate better. Followed by an explanation of the implicit self theories and what consequences these self theories hold.
Literature Review
Just world theory
Current marketing for charities generally consists of communicating the need for help for a particular group of people, area or species, to as many people as possible. Charities often try to make people actively support them by confronting them with shocking images and facts about how terrible the conditions are for the people they are trying to help (Helmig, Jegers, and Lapsley, 2004). Problematically, it's not uncommon for people to respond with indifference or a crooked
rationalization when confronted with innocent suffering. Think for instance how often rape victims are told that they are partly to blame for their fate, or how careless people can react when
confronted with terrible living conditions in third world countries (Hafer and Bégue, 2005). This blaming of innocents or rationalizing a bad situation is detrimental to the support for charitable organizations. Luckily, this phenomenon, sometimes called victim blaming, is well known and well researched. In particular the Just world theory by Lerner has made great progress in explaining the reasoning behind rationalizing injustice and can teach charitable organizations how to make their communications more effective (Lerner, 1980; Hafer, 2000; White, Mac Donnell and Ellard, 2012; etc.).
The first fundamentals of the Just world theory were laid in 1965 by Lerner. He led an experiment in which a participant observed two people working together at an anagrams task. Chance would decide which of the workers would receive a considerable amount of money as a reward, while the other received nothing. After payment was received, the observers tended to persuade themselves that the person receiving the payment had really earned it, even though the observer was aware that it was decided by chance.
This experiment is a good illustration of one of two defensive strategies people might utilize when confronted with unjust treatment or innocent suffering of others. In the example above the participant that does not receive a reward is obviously treated unjustly, both worked equally hard and are equally deserving of a reward. However the observers perceived that the person receiving the reward had worked harder and thus did in fact deserve the reward. The observer rationalizes the situation into a fair and just reward (Lerner, 1965). The other common defensive strategy is
derogating the victims character and blaming the victim for his misfortune. Common examples of this behavior are blaming rape victims for their misfortune, blaming victims of bullying for
should just move” (Hafer and Bégeu, 2005). Now that we have established what problematic reactions charities might face when communicating the suffering innocents, we can look into what causes these kind of reactions.
In their groundbreaking study, Lerner and Simmons (1966) came with an explanation for this behaviour towards innocent victims. Lerner explained this with the concept of the belief in a just world. According to this theory, people need to believe that the world is a stable and orderly place in which individuals get what they deserve. A belief that good things happen to good people and bad things to bad people (Lerner, 1980). This belief is necessary because in order to plan our lives and strive toward our goals, we need to assume that our actions will have the predictable outcome we want to achieve (Lerner, 1980). When people are confronted with injustice, bad things happening to good people, they are confronted with evidence that the world is not a just place. This implies that no one is safe, no matter how good of a person you are, bad things might happen to you (Lerner, 1980). In an attempt to maintain their just world views, people will engage in behaviors that help them to defend their view of a just world. This can be choosing to help the victim, but it can also mean that one might try to rationalize the situation or blame the victim and derogate the character of the victim (Hafer and Bégue, 2005). Both strategies help in restoring the injustice by either assisting the victim and restoring justice, or by rationalizing the situation and partly blaming the victim for the situation, making it less of an injustice (Lerner, 1980). The higher the degree suffering and the injustice of the situation the victim is in, also called the victim need, the more the just world view is threatened (Hafer, 2000). Thus a higher degree of injustice and suffering leads to a bigger reaction amongst people and a higher desire to either help or blame the victim (Hafer, 2000).
But what determines whether people help or blame a victim? Lerner and Simmons (1966) found that when people are presented with a victim who is suffering through little fault of their own, people showed compassion and compensated the victim if they believed they could effectively do so. However, when participants were presented with the same victim, but told that the victim may continue to suffer, participants described the victim in a lot more negative terms. Participants were likely to employ defensive strategies such as blaming the victim or rationalizing, when participants perceived the chances of restoring justice as low or uncertain (Lerner and Simmons, 1966). Later, White, MacDonnel and Ellard's study (2012) of the Just world theory and fair-trade products proved just how essential the potential for justice restoration is in determining people's behaviour towards injustice. Through as series of experiments White, MacDonnel and Ellard (2012) showed that communicating a high victim need results in stronger reactions, but if participants lack the believe that they have an impact on restoring justice the communication will have an adverse effect,
invoking a strong defensive reaction instead of strong support.
Thus, when marketers are promoting a charity, they should only communicate high victim need, if justice restoration potential is also communicated (White, MacDonnel and Ellard, 2012). Especially when factors implying low justice restoration potential, such as ineffective justice restoration system or a long standing injustice, are communicated. For this will result in a person with a shocked just-world believe without the conviction that they are able to make things right again, resulting in blaming and rationalizing the situation which leads to less support for the charity (White, MacDonnel and Ellard, 2012). Instead, a high degree of justice restoration potential should be communicated, which motivates people positively regardless of how high the victim need is. Because people need to feel the need that they can have an impact on the injustice through their support (White, MacDonnel and Ellard, 2012). Thus we arrive at our first hypothesis:
H1: Communicating a high degree of justice restoration potential will result in a stronger0 support for the charity.
In this study a short experiment will be conducted in which participants read an article about a fictional charity that is either high or low on justice restoration potential. Because our literature research has shown how people resort to rationalizing and victim blaming when they feel that they cannot help, we hypothesize that the participants in the high justice restoration potential group will have a more positive attitude towards the charity than the participants in the low justice restoration potential group.
Finally, an important factor that one must consider when trying to utilize justice restoration potential, is how strong a person beliefs in a just world (Hafer, 2000). The reactions people show when confronted with injustice is influenced by the strength of the belief in a just world. People who highly belief in a just world are particularly sensitive to injustice, and are more motivated to take action to preserve their beliefs. Thus people with a strong belief in a just world are more likely to assist innocent victims or to utilize a defensive strategy to maintain their just world belief (Hafer, 2000; Hafer & Bégue, 2005). To account for this participants in our study will be asked about their belief in a just world to keep this variable from distorting our data.
Implicit Self theories
The just world theory gives us an underlying motive for the behavior people show when confronted with injustice. However, the factors given by the just world theory (e.g. justice restoration potential, victim need, belief in a just world) alone do not completely explain when people engage in
prosocial behavior, helping, or instead blame and derogate the innocent victim (White, MacDonnel and Ellard, 2012). Personality traits such as altruism, egoism and moral sense influence a person's willingness to help as well(Batson and Powell, 2003). In this study we will investigate if Dweck's self theories (2000) can help further our understanding of people's behavior when confronted with injustice.
Dweck (2000) investigated how people develop beliefs about themselves, also called self-theories, and how these beliefs shape people's thoughts, behavior, feelings and world perspective. Dweck's self-theories focused on how people perceive intelligence as a trait, and how this
influences learning behavior (Dweck and Leggett, 1988). But they have also successfully been applied in a moral and world view dimension (Dweck, Chiu and Hong, 1995; Chiu, Dweck, Tong and Fu, 1997). Research identified two implicit self-theories: entity theory and incremental theory. Individuals who endorse the incremental theory (incremental theorists) view their personal qualities as malleable, which they can improve through their own efforts. While persons who endorse the entity theory (entity theorists) believe that their personal qualities are fixed, and cannot be improved through their own direct efforts (Dweck, 2000; Dweck and Legget, 1988). This principle, malleable versus fixed, can be applied across three dimensions: intelligence, morality, and world (also called social) dimension. When someone is an entity theorist in all three dimension, he would belief that your intelligence, a person's moral character, or the fundamental nature of the world cannot be changed much. However there is no link between what implicit self theory you hold in one dimension, and what self theory you hold in a different one. (Chiu, Dweck, Tong and Fu, 1997).
What implicit self theory a person holds can influence a lot of their actions. Studies showed that children who endorsed an entity theorist view on intelligence, strove towards gaining favorable judgments of that trait. While children with an incremental view tended to try and develop the trait, resulting in a better performance for the incremental theorists (Hong, Chiu, Dweck, Lin and Wan, 1999). The differences between entity theorists and incremental theorists become especially noticeable when people are confronted with the threat of poor performance. People who view intelligence as a fixed trait are more likely to respond helplessly to setbacks or poor performance, by making negative judgments about their capabilities or intelligence (e.g. “I'm just not smart enough for... I'm just not good at....”), instead of increasing their effort (Hong, Chiu, Dweck, Lin and Wan, 1999). The reasoning for this behavior is that entity theorists see poor performance as a
lack of ability, which in their theory cannot be changed. Rather than increasing the effort, entity theorists are likely to engage in defensive strategies. To make the failure less meaningful they engage in self-handicapping behavior, such as procrastinating and decreasing effort, in order to give them a face-saving excuse (Rhodewalt 1994). While incremental theorists faced with failure
typically focus on looking for ways to increase their ability by increasing effort and engaging in corrective actions (Hong et. al., 1999). The influence of a person's implicit self theory are not confined to the intelligence dimension but play a big factor in the moral and world view dimensions as well.
In the moral dimension, people who view a person's moral character as fixed, an entity theorists' view, understands a person behavior in a different way than an incremental theorist would. An entity theorists perceives a person's moral traits (such as conscientiousness, uprightness and honesty) as something fixed, something deeply ingrained in their personality. While an incremental theorists would view these traits as malleable and changeable over time (Dweck, Chiu and Hong, 1995). Studies showed these different assumptions play a big part in how someone understands a person's behaviors. An entity theorists tend to understand a person's behavior in terms of the person's fixed traits, and will see a person's misconduct as a show of that person's moral traits. While incremental theorists assign less importance to fixed traits and emphasize more specific factors (e.g., emotional state, needs, intentions) that influence behavior (Dweck, Chiu and Hong, 1995). Thus when an incremental person sees someone misbehave, they are inclined to emphasize the need, emotional state or intention that drove the person (Dweck, Chiu and Hong, 1995).
In the social or world view dimension the differences between entity and incremental theorists are apparent as well. For an entity theorists, the major sources of moral actions in the world: the world and its institutions and other people, are believed to be unchangeable and fixed (Chiu, Dweck, Tong and Fu, 1997). Thus entity theorists believe that there's a stable social-moral order in the world, which they are to abide to. Incremental theorists on the other hand considers both people's moral character and the world and its institutions to be malleable, and pay more attention to situational factors influencing moral behavior (Chiu, Dweck, Tong and Fu, 1997).
These different views on the malleability of other people's character and the world and its systems have important implications for what a person sees as morally acceptable. When you view both other people and the world around you as fixed, you view both channels of moral action as fixed. As a result, the implicit self theory a person holds in the moral and world dimension is linked to what moral belief system a person lives by (Chiu et al., 1997).
rights-based moral beliefs. In the duty-based moral beliefs system is preforming ones duty the fundamental justification for the moral rightness of one's actions. People with duty-based moral beliefs think it's important that people act according to the laws, norms and role expectations that are expected of them (Dworkin, 1978). While people with a rights-based moral belief system see human rights as the base of moral judgment (e.g. the right to liberty, to express ideas or opinions with freedom as an individual, to be treated as equal to other etc.) (Dworkin, 1978).
There are several reasons why entity and incremental theorists would hold different moral belief systems. When one believes in a fixed social world, one might be more inclined to value fixed rules and laws that sustain this fixed reality. While an incremental theorists would logically be more inclined towards a moral belief system that is less rigid and allows for changes and a dynamic context (Chiu et al., 1997). Another strong factor is that when one believes in a malleable world, the duties prescribed by the current moral order would be of less value. For if the world is malleable and changing, the world's laws, norms and role expectations are malleable and changing as well. Thus the duties prescribed by the current moral order would no longer be an absolute code to follow. Instead incremental are likely to want to seek general principles which can guide them in their changing reality, general principles that will guide society as a whole (Chiu et al., 1997). So, entity theorists are more likely to have a duty-based moral belief system, while incremental theorists favor a rights-based moral belief system. What are the implications of these different moral systems?
Due to the different beliefs in the malleability of the world and the different moral belief systems, entity and incremental theorists consider different things to be morally good behavior, and react differently to it. Because entity theorists believe in a stable world order, they judge moral actions by the existing codes of conduct. According to an entity theorist, an action is immoral when it does not conform to the current laws, norms and role expectations. (Chiu et al., 1997). Entity theorists value the existing codes of conduct highly, and are thus less accepting of violations of these codes than incremental theorists are. Moral conformity and societal stability are valued highly by entity theorists, more so than individual rights and liberty. In trying to protect that status quo, entity theorists are more willing to penalize undesirable behavior and using punishments to enforce moral behavior (Chiu et al., 1997).
Incremental theorists on the other hand, have a more dynamic view of their social-moral surrounding. They believe in a changeable world in which everyone is capable of developing his individual morality. As a result, the existing social order does not have an absolute moral authority over incremental theorists. Rather, the existing codes of conduct should be subject to change if these come in conflict with greater principles such as individual rights and liberty (Chiu, et al., 1997). While incremental theorists have less of a problem with breaking the existing codes of
conduct, the infringement of human rights is more problematic. Also, because incremental theorists see moral character as something that can be developed, incremental theorists believe in education rather than punishment as a response to undesirable behavior (Chiu, et al., 1997). Due to these different views on the malleability of the social-moral world, and these different moral belief systems we come with the following hypothesis:
H2: Incremental theorists are more responsive to high justice restoration communications than entity theorists.
Incremental theorists' belief that the world is malleable may make them susceptible to the notion that things would change and justice will be restored. Compared to entity theorists who are more likely to be skeptical of changing an unjustified situation. However, because the victim need in this experiment, factory workers in China being treated in an inhumane way, is human rights violation, incremental theorist are likely to be more affected by this injustice than an entity theorist would be. This would inflate the effect observed and is something we must consider when interpreting the results. Because our reasoning for an increased effectiveness of high justice restoration is dependent on the belief in a malleable world, we will test for this effect with the participant's implicit self theory in the world dimension only. To sum up, we hypothesize that incremental theorists in the world dimension, will be more supportive of the cause of the charity and more willing to donate after reading the high justice restoration article than the entity theorists in same group.
Methodology
Research Design
This thesis tries to find a causal relationship between support for a societal cause and
communicating justice restoration potential, and investigate if the implicit self theory a person holds influences the effectiveness of the communication. Since the goal is to find possible causal links between variables, this research is of an explanatory nature. Because this study has two conditions to test for: communication high on justice restoration potential, and communication that is low on justice restoration potential, the most suited research form is an experiment (Saunders et al., 2009). In alignment with the experimental design, participants have been assigned to two groups randomly. Both groups were asked about their attitude towards charitable organizations, to establish a baseline before the manipulation takes place. Then, both groups read a news article about the mistreatment of employees in a consumer electronics factory in China. The ending paragraph of the article differed between groups, one communicating high chances of success, while the other communicated a low chance of justice being restored. After reading the message participants were questioned on their attitude towards the charity, which we compared to the attitudes they had prior.
Besides testing the effect of communicating justice restoration potential, we are also interested in how the implicit self theories that participants hold influence the effectiveness of communicating justice restoration potential. All participants took a short questionnaire, established by Chiu et al. (1997), to determine what implicit self theory the participant holds. Because 20% of the population is neither incremental nor entity theorist, with the remaining of the population divided equally between the two theorists, a significant part of our sample will be exempt from the last part of our analysis.
Finally, we checked the participants belief in a just world. If a participant has a low belief in a just world, his belief wont be shocked by the confrontation with injustice, and restoring justice wont be as important to him. While a participant with an extraordinarily high belief in a just world might respond more heavily to the restoration of justice. Thus participants were asked to take a short 4 item survey developed by Lipkus (1991) to measure their general belief in a just world.
Procedure and Sample
participate regardless of age, sex, or occupation. Only condition participants have to meet to be of use for both hypothesises is that they are either entity or incremental theorists. However there is no way of knowing this before the questionnaire is taken, so everyone was illegible. Participants were contacted through existing contacts. Friends, relatives and colleagues were asked to participate and encourage others to participate as well. This gave us a convenient way of accessing our data, which was also time and cost efficient. The implications of this method of data collection will be discussed later.
In total 145 people responded and started the questionnaire, 46 participants did not finish the questionnaire, leaving us with a total sample size of 99 and a response rate of 68,3%. From this group, 15 responses did not pass our control variables. These participants were filtered by the item: “I believe that by supporting Asia Labor Watch justice will be restored”, on a scale from 1 to 6. When a participant who read the low justice restoration article responded with a 5 or higher they were removed from the sample. The same goes for the high justice restoration group and response of 2 or lower. This left us with a usable sample of 84 participants. In this sample, 38.1% (32) were male, while 61,9% (52) were female. The age ranged from 18 to 62, with an average of 28.57 (SD:13.136) and a median of 23.
Measurements
Dependent Variable NPO Support
Support for the NPO was measured with a 5 item Likert scale, developed by Webb, Green and Brashear (2000). The scale ranged from (1) strongly disagree to (6) strongly agree. The variable was first measured before the experiment took place, to measure the attitude towards NPOs in general. After the experiment the same scale with slightly altered wording was used to measure attitude towards the NPO the participants just read about. An example item is: 'Charity
organizations perform a useful function to society'. A high score means the participants has a favourable attitude towards NPOs. One item was counterbalanced and will be recoded for analysis.
Independent Variable Justice restoration potential
The effect of communicating justice restoration potential was tested by letting participants read one of two fake news article about an imaginary NPO. Both articles went into detail about the appalling
working conditions in a factory producing smartphone components. An imaginary NPO, named Asia Labor Watch, uncovered this during an undercover investigation and was now preparing a class action lawsuit hoping to get compensation for the workers and improved working conditions for all employees in service of the company. In the article communicating low justice restoration potential, the NPO would take the manufacturing company to court in China Participants were told that the court in China usually sides with the big organizations, and that the case did not have a high chance of success. In the article communicating high justice potential, the NPO was able to take the case to court in the USA, and the case was likely to be successful if the NPO received enough financial support (for the full text, see appendix 1). Participants were later asked if they believed that Justice would be restored if they supported the NPO, to check if the correct degree justice restoration potential was indeed communicated. At the end of the survey, participants were
informed that the news article was fake (though based on true events) and asked if they thought the article was believable while they read it.
Independent Variable Implicit self theory
The implicit self theory participants endorse was measured using a 9 item Likert scale, developed by Chiu, Dweck, Tong and Fu (1997). The scale ranged from (1) strongly disagree to (6) strongly agree. The items test the implicit self theory a person holds across three dimension, intelligence, morality and world view, each dimension being measured by three items. Because implicit self theory is a unidimensional construct, meaning that you are either an incremental or an entity theorist, three items is sufficient and adding more items would not increase reliability (Chiu, Dweck, Tong & Fu, 1997). An example item is: 'You have a certain amount of intelligence and you really can't do much about it'. A high score means the participant is an incremental theorists.
Controle Variable Belief in a just world
The control variable was measured with a short 4 item Likert scale, developed by Lipkus (1991). The scale ranged from (1) strongly disagree to (6) strongly agree. The items test the participant's belief in a just world. An example item is: 'I feel that people's efforts are noticed and rewarded'. A high score indicates a strong belief in a just world.
The first step of our analysis was to compare the attitude towards charities before reading the article (the baseline) with the attitude after reading the article. This change in attitude was supposed to be our dependent variable. However, when we executed an independent samples t-test we found that there was no significant difference in the change in attitude between the two different justice restoration groups. When we looked at the data, we saw that the low justice restoration group often perceived Asia Labor Watch (the fictional charity) more favorable than their general outlook on charities, even though the Asia Labor Watch had very low chances of making a difference. After asking some of our participants for their feedback and the reasoning for their answers, we came with multiple possible explanations for this increased support.
The baseline was established by asking participants about their feelings towards charities in general. The items asked if people thought money was wasted by charities, their general image about charities but also if thought the money went to a good cause. Nowadays a lot of people are skeptical of charities, because they feel that not enough of their money is used to support the cause they want to support. In the news you increasingly hear stories about high salaries for the people in charge at charities and large organizational costs. So many participants mentioned that their attitude towards charities in general was quite low to begin with. Then people read a long article about the terrible working conditions these factory workers have to endure, and it's hard to deny that Asia Labor Watch is fighting for a good cause and trying to help innocent people. So because the attitude towards charitable organizations is also measured by the image and the nobility of the charity, the fact that Asia Labor Watch will be unsuccessful might not deter participants from rating them higher than charities in general. Also, it is likely that reading the news article made Asia Labor Watch and it's cause more tangible for the participants. The problem of suffering factory workers was extensively reported, and a story of a small charitable organization struggling to make a difference was told. It is likely that this leads to a feeling of sympathy for the charity and the innocent sufferers, resulting in a more favorable attitude.
Due to this unforeseen behavior we had to alter our method of analysis. Instead of a comparing the change in attitude after reading the high or low justice restoration potential article, we decided to compare the participants general attitude towards the charity. Thus, our method of analysis is an independent sample t-test. Before we could use this method, we had to test if the dependent variable is approximately normally distributed as this is one of the assumptions that the independent sample t-test makes. We tested for normality with the Shapiro-Wilk test for normality. Luckily our data was by approximation normally distributed, and we could perform the independent sample t-test to compare the attitude towards the charity, with high or low justice restoration
communication indeed leads to an increased support for the charity, Allowing us to answer our first hypothesis.
Initially, our goal was to test both the support for the charity and willingness to donate for an increase in the high justice restoration group. However, the willingness to donate was not normally distributed and there was no way to make it approximate normal distribution. A lot of participants were completely unwilling to donate, or gave a low score. Even though the participant might have a favorable attitude towards the attitude. This is probably because finding something a good cause and believing that supporting that cause is worth it, and actually taking action and donating money to the cause yourself are quite different things. Participants might not be able to donate any money, or have an aversion to donating to charities in general. Due to this difference in attitude and taking action, and for clarity reasons, we will limit our measure of support to for the charity to attitude only.
For our second hypothesis, linking implicit self theory with an increased effectiveness of justice restoration potential. Because we are looking for an effect of a person's implicit self theory and not an effect through the moral belief system and type of injustice, we will analyze the
effectiveness of high justice restoration communications dependent on the implicit self theory a person holds in the world dimension. To determine if a participant holds an entity or incremental theorists' view on the world around him we used a six-point scale, in alignment with the study by Hong, Chiu, dweck, Lin and Wan (1999), we regarded mixed answers as people who are undecided between the two views. Thus those with an average score between 3.0 and 4.0 will be exempt from the sample. Participants who's average score was equal to or higher than 4.0 agreed with the
statements and were grouped as entity theorists, while those with an average score of equal to 3.0 or lower were grouped as incremental theorists. Before we can compare b test attitude towards the charity for normality again. With an independent sample t-test we will be able to determine if incremental theorists indeed have a more favorable attitude towards the charity than the entity theorists who read the same article.
Strengths and Weaknesses
First of all, due to the nature of this topic, the type of data that we gather is limited in statistical possibilities. There is no way to give a numerical value to both justice restoration potential and implicit self theory, both are dichotomous data. A person is either an entity theorist or an
incremental theorists (or undecided between the two, a group in which we cannot make
generalizations), there is no numerical degree to which way one might lean. The same goes for justice restoration potential, given the available resources we cannot group justice restoration potential in more than either a low or high group. Our dependent variable is the attitude towards the charity. This data was gather with a Likert scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 6 (strongly agree), and can thus be classified as ranked (or ordinal data). This data can be analyzed as if it were numerical interval data (Saunders, 2009). We decided that our best method of analysis would be an independent sample t-test. Which allows us to both determine if there's a significant difference in attitude between the groups, and conclude if one group has a more favorable attitude than the other (Saunders, 2009).
Second, our method selecting our sample, gathering participants through existing contacts, is not ideal. Though this method of sampling is convenient and low cost, it is also prone to bias and other influences because the cases only appear in the sample because of the ease of obtaining them (Saunders et al, 2009). This means that the sample might not be very representative of the total population, it is likely to be significantly younger and compromised of a large number of students. A person's age, education and income are likely to influence what type of charity someone chooses to support. However, we assume that most people respond uniformly to the charities'
communications. So despite a possible bias in age, income or geographical location, we do not expect this to influence our results. Thus, due to little expected variance in the population, this method of sampling will still be adequate for this study.
Thirdly, our data is collected through means of an online survey. The contents of the survey and it's statistical limitations have been discussed above, however other limitations are present as well. An online survey, combined with the large part young students in our sample, limited how much we were able to ask of our participants. We could only ask a limited amount of questions and present only one article or a large part of the participants would have gotten bored. Even now when the survey is as short as it is, a large percentage of the responses were either incomplete or
inconsistent. As a result, our variables are measured by 3-5 items per variable only. Luckily for the implicit self theories this is sufficient (Chiu, Dweck, Tong and Fu, 1997). But one might ask if this is enough to properly measure a person's attitude towards a charitable organization.
Then, due to the nature of this topic, we were left with a quite small sample size. After eliminating all the incomplete and unreliable answers (conflicting answers, regarding the low justice article as “Very high chance to restore justice”, etc.) We were left with only 99 out of 145 participants for our first hypothesis. This problem probably could have been alleviated if we had written the survey in Dutch as well, making it easier for the mainly Dutch participants to complete
the survey. Then for our second hypothesis, only the participants in the high justice restoration group were eligible, decreasing our sample size to 40. Of this sample 11 participants were
undecided between the two implicit self theories in the world dimension, leaving us a usable sample size of 31. Smaller than ideal, though hopefully still large enough to find significant results.
Finally, because comparing our baseline with the attitude after reading the article showed no significant difference between the two conditions our results will be less reliable. We now only measure participant's attitude towards the charity, without having the control of their previous general attitude towards charities. Hopefully our samples will be large enough that we can assume that those with a negative outlook on charities are equally present in both conditions.
Results
Reliabilities
Before we can conduct our analysis, we must test the reliability of the variables. The variables that will be used in our analysis are the participant's implicit self theory in the world dimension, and the participant's attitude towards the charity dependent on the level of justice restoration potential communicated. Table 1 shows some basic descriptives of these variables as well as the Cronbach's alpha for each variable. The Cronbach's alpha for the participants implicit self theory in the world dimension was very high, 0.895, and could not be improved by removing an item. The Cronbach's alpha for attitude towards the charity in high justice restoration group on the other hand was a bit weaker, only 0.689. However this Cronbach's alpha could be improved to a more acceptable 0.753 if we removed the item “Asia Labor Watch has been quite successful in helping the needy”. We decided that this improvement of 0.064 was worth the loss of data and removed the item from our analysis. We had already received feedback that some participants were unsure how to answer this question, since the article only told about Asia Labor Watch's current struggle with a factory in China and the chance of success. Not about previous success of Asia Labor Watch. The reliability analysis for the low justice restoration potential group showed a strong Cronbach's Alpha of 0.801, which can be be improved to 0.840 by removing the recoded item “Much of the money donated to Asia Labor watch is wasted”. We decided against removing this item, because the Cronbach's Alpha was already quite high and we rather keep the data this recoded item gives us.
In addition, we tested if there was a correlation between the attitude towards the charity and the participant's believe in a just world. We found that there was no significant correlation between the believe in a just world and the attitude towards that charity in either the low restoration, high restoration or both combined. Thus, in this sample, the strength of a participant's believe in a just world does not influence participant's perception of the charity.
Results
Before we could test for significant differences in attitude towards the charity between the low justice restoration potential group and the high justice restoration potential group, we had to check if the dependent variable is normally distributed. Using Shapiro-Wilk's test for normality we found that the attitude for both the low justice restoration group (p= 0.103>0.05) and the high justice restoration group (p= 0.203>0.05) were normally distributed. Thus we could continue to test our first hypothesis.
An independent samples t-test was conducted to compare the attitude towards the charity in the high justice restoration potential and the low justice restoration potential conditions. There was a significant difference in the scores for the low justice restoration potential (M= 3.99, SD= 0.818) and the high justice restoration potential (M= 4.46, SD = 0.82), t(82)= -2.636, p= 0.010. For a quick overview of these results see Table 2.
These results suggest that the communicating of high justice restoration potential leads to a more favorable attitude towards the charity. It can also be read as an example of how a low chance of justice restoration, results in derogating the victim. Participants might have responded to the inability to make this right by derogating the victims and with them the charity that stands for them.
For our second analysis, we excluded the entirety of the low justice restoration group. As well as the 11 participants in the high justice restoration group who were neither an entity or an incremental theorists, leaving us with a sample size of 31. Then we tested the attitude towards the charity for normal distribution. Using Shapiro-Wilk's test for normality we found that the attitude of both the entity theorists (p= 0.803>0.05) and the incremental theorists (p= 0.395>0.05) was normally distributed. Allowing us to perform the t-test.
An independent samples t-test was conducted to compare the attitude towards the charity in the high justice restoration potential group between entity theorists and incremental theorists. There was no significant difference in the scores for entity theorists (M=4.66, SD= 0.725) and the
incremental theorists (M= 4.47, SD = 0.749), t(29)= 0.713, p= 0.481. For a simple overview of the results of this t-test see Table 3.
This suggests that there is no difference in the effectiveness of communicating high justice restoration to either entity or incremental theorists. Meaning that despite their different views on the malleability of the world, entity theorists and incremental theorists respond the same to high justice restoration potential. However, because we had to exempt both the low justice restoration group and the participants undecided between the two implicit self theories, we were left with a sample size of only 14 entity theorists and 17 incremental theorists. Which is likely to be a too small sample to find significant results in.
Discussion
Summary of results
The aim of this study was to increase our knowledge of effective communications for charities. We were interested in seeing the possible effect of communicating a high degree of justice restoration potential on the attitude that people hold towards a charity. We proposed that when a charity communicates a high chance of justice restoration, people would have the feeling that they can make an impact and help restore justice. Rather than rationalize the situation or derogate the
innocent suffers. Thus, our first hypothesis was: Communicating a high degree in justice restoration potential will result in a stronger support for the charity. The results of our first independent sample t-test showed that the high justice restoration potential group had a more favorable attitude towards the charity than the low justice restoration group, p=0.010, confirming our first hypothesis.
In addition to investigating the effect of justice restoration potential on people's perceptive of a charity. We were also interested in finding other factors that might influence the effectiveness of communicating justice restoration potential and people's willingness to help. We proposed that the believe someone holds over the malleability of the world would affect how receptive they are of the idea of causing a change and restoring justice. We hypothesized that incremental theorists, those who believe that the world is malleable, would be more receptive of the idea of restoring justice, and thus communicating justice restoration potential would be more effective amongst incremental theorists. However, the results of our second independent samples t-test showed that there was no difference between the attitude of the incremental theorists and their counterpart, entity theorists. Meaning that we found no support for our second hypothesis.
Merits and critiques
First of all, in our sample we found no evidence supporting our second hypothesis. This can be caused by either a fault in our research method, or because the effect we tried to find simply does not exist. However, we did find support for our first hypothesis, the consequences of these results and possible weak points will be examined.
There are several possible reasons that could explain why we did not find support for our second hypothesis while it does exist. For starters, our sample size for our second analysis was very
small, with only 31 participants. This is because the low justice restoration group was exempt from the second analysis and our questionnaire divided participants between the high and low justice restoration group evenly. Add to this that 22,5% of the remaining participants was undecided between the two implicit self theories and we were left with a sample size in which it's difficult to find significant results. We should have anticipated this need for participants for our second
analysis and assignment more participants to the high justice restoration group. The low sample size was especially problematic since attitude toward charities can be influenced by multiple factors. It could be influenced by how much a person believes in the use of charities in general, or how strongly he feels about the unjust situation that the charity is trying to right. After our original plan of utilizing a baseline did not work out we had fall back on just comparing attitude. This allowed a lot more room for other factors to distort our data.
Also, because our participants would mostly consists of young students and we could give no real compensation for completing the survey, we had to keep the survey quite short (and even then we were left with only 84 usable responses out of 140 started). If we could have asked more intensively about participant's attitude towards charities in general, if they believe that their money will end up in the right hands, how they feel about the injustice they just read about and other possible factors we might have come up with more interesting results. Because now our measure for attitude towards the charity consisted of a mere 5 general items.
Then, it's also possible that the relation we expected; believing that the world is changeable makes one more receptive of the idea of justice restoration leading to a more positive attitude towards the charity, simply does not exist. It might well be the case that even though a participant beliefs that the world is unchangeable, he would still take the justice restoration as a given and act accordingly. The justice restoration would be seen as an exception in an otherwise unchangeable world.
Another possible explanation is that though entity theorists see the world as unchangeable, they do not see the injustice as an unchangeable aspect of the world. If our participants do not feel that the injustice presented in our article is a part of the unchangeable world the idea that the
injustice situation will change will not conflict with their beliefs about the fixed nature of the world. We are fortunate enough to live in a wealthy country with a good social security system and strong unions, which we often take as a given. Therefore it might be unlikely that entity theorists would believe that an equally fair situation can not exist in other countries as well.
did indeed have a more favorable attitude towards the charity. Previous research by White, MacDonnel and Ellard on fair trade products had already shown how a high justice restoration potential resulted in a higher purchase decision. Our results differ in that they show a more positive attitude rather than action. The higher justice restoration potential lead to a more favorable outlook on the charity as a whole.
We decided to redo our first independent sample t-test, this time leaving out the item
recoded item “Much of the money donated to Asia Labor Watch is wasted” in both conditions. This left us with items that only measured the general image of the charity, unrelated to it's current struggle. The results showed that the high justice restoration group still had a more favorable perception on the charity (p=0.03, for an overview see table 4). While both conditions read about the same charity fighting the same injustice, the higher chance of success in the high justice restoration potential group lead to participants seeing the charity in a more positive light.
These results show that the lower chance of success communicated to the participants lead to them feeling like they were unable to help and thus making them resort to rationalizing the situation or derogating the suffers and the charity that stands for them. This further proves the workings of the just world theory; if people perceive that they cannot help make a situation right they are more likely to resort to rationalizing and victim blaming. In addition it shows how the victim blaming and rationalizing might have a greater reach than previously thought, with it affecting the attitude
However, it is possible that participants perceived the charity to be fighting a battle that is impossible to win, and that it would be better for the charity to direct its efforts where it might have a higher chance of success, leading to a more negative image of the charity. While this might cause some of the difference between the two conditions, participants were also asked how they felt about the cause the charity stood for and we believe that though this alternative explanation might have an influence as well, it's impact is likely not big enough to disregard the result.
To conclude, the findings of our first hypothesis showed how higher justice restoration potential communicated resulted in a more favorable attitude towards the charity. When we removed the item linked to the justice restoration, much of the money donated is wasted, we still found a significant difference between the two conditions. Our interpretation of these results are that the low justice restoration group felt like they could not help the victims, and thus resorted to rationalizing and victim blaming leaving them with a less positive attitude towards the charity. The significance of these results is that we found a new relationship between justice restoration potential and a more positive attitude. As well as preliminary evidence that shows that rationalizing injustice and victim derogating extends to the charity trying to help the victims.
Unfortunately, we did not find a difference in the effectiveness of communicating a high justice restoration potential between entity theorists and incremental theorists. This might be due to our small sample size and limited amount of items to measure the attitude towards charities. Or it might be that entity theorists do not see the unjust situation as part of the unchangeable nature of the world. Making entity theorists just as receptive of high justice restoration potential as incremental theorists.
Future research
The findings of our first hypothesis show how communicating justice restoration potential leads to a more favorable perception of not only the victims but the charity as well. A follow-up study could investigate how giving people the feeling that they are able to make a difference influences their perception of a charity with more extensive items measuring the general attitude towards a charity. This study should include more control variables such as general outlook on the function of
charities and attitude towards the injustice presented to increase the reliability of the results. More importantly, this study should investigate to what extent a more positive perception of the charity could lead to more donors, better brand recognition and a higher general support for the charity.
Secondly, a follow-up study could be performed to investigate if entity theorists view a certain amount of injustice and suffering as something that will always be a part of the world. Or if, with a larger sample size and a reliable baseline, a difference can be found in the effectiveness of communicating justice restoration potential to entity theorists or incremental theorists. If there were to be a difference in effective marketing communications dependent on a person's implicit self theory, this would open up a lot of interesting opportunities for charitable organizations. Since it has been shown that people can temporarily be primed to agree with one of the two self theories this could lead to more effective marketing communications for charities. And, because entity theorists and incremental theorists have such fundamentally different views on the world around them and different moral beliefs, it is not unlikely that there yet is a difference in how entity theorists and incremental theorists respond to injustice and justice restoration potential.
Conclusion
In this study we investigated a possible relationship between communicating justice restoration potential and a person's attitude towards the charity communicating. Our results show that communicating justice restoration potential leads to a more positive attitude towards the charity. Further reinforcing the importance of communicating justice restoration potential. This also
suggests that when someone resorts to rationalizing a situation or derogating the victim, this reflects on their perception of the charity as well. We also attempted to find a relationship between a
person's implicit self theory and the effectiveness of communicating a high justice restoration potential. However we found no difference between the entity theorists and incremental theorists. This might be due to flaws in our research method, or because entity theorists do not view the injustice as an unchangeable part of their world.
There are still plenty of areas for future studies left in this field of research. Particularly of interest are the consequences that this more positive attitude has on a charities' donations and general
support. As well as an more extensive examination of the significance of implicit self theories when people are confronted with injustice.
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Appendix
Article used in questionnaire, only the last paragraph differed between conditions. High justice restoration potential in italics.
DONGGUAN, CHINA – As a result of an undercover investigation, Asia Labor Watch (ALW) has uncovered appalling labor conditions at a factory producing smartphone components for a major consumer electronics corporation. The Mingqua plant, employing over 5,000 local workers, produces cell phone covers, phone screens and electronic components for various lines of
smartphones. In January of this year, ALW sent an investigator into the Mingqua plant to work on the production line for a month, he uncovered shocking ethical and legal violations.
Workers at the Mingqua Plant are asked to stand 12-hour shifts, with just two 30-minute breaks, six days a week. In certain departments workers are forced to work barefooted, despite the cold, hard factory ground and filthy restroom floor. Staff are working without adequate protective equipment, at risk from chemicals, noise and lasers. During their 12-hour shifts, workers cannot take their eyes or hands off of the products as they constantly hear the sounds of line leaders shouting at workers. The treatment of workers is so poor, that production lines will arrange 4 to 10 extra workers on the line in order to fill in when others get fed up with the abuse and leave in the middle of the day. What is the reward for putting up with the abuse and dangerous working conditions? A lousy 1,500 RMB a month, not even half the average monthly wage in the nearby city of Dongguan.
Asia Labor Watch is preparing a class action law suit against the manufacturing company owning the Mingqua factory. Hoping to achieve compensation for the workers at the Mingqua plant and improved pay and working conditions at not only the Mingqua plant but at every factory owned by the manufacturing company. To top it all off, a decisive win in court might convince other
manufacturing companies to change their ways as well.
However, the Mingqua factory is backed by the financial and legal power of the electronics corporation they are producing for. Also, because the manufacturing company is located in China,
the lawsuit will go to Chinese court which has rarely spoken out against large corporations in similar cases. In addition, it's likely that (ex-)employees will be coerced by the manufacturing company to not take part in the class action lawsuit. Asia Labor Watch is just a small non-profit organizational with limit resources, they will need your help to be able to convince workers to step forward, and battle against the legal and financial power of the electronics corporation. With your help they will try to to make sure that the working conditions will drastically improve and that the workers get the compensation they deserve.
However, the Mingqua factory is backed by the financial and legal power of the electronics corporation they are producing for. Also, it's likely that (ex-)employees will be coerced by the manufacturing company to not take part in the class action lawsuit. Luckily, the manufacturing company is partly based in the US, and thus the case can be taken to court in the US which has nearly always taken the side of exploited employees. Asia Labor Watch is just a small non-profit organizational with limit resources, they will need your help to be able to convince workers to step forward, and battle against the legal and financial power of the electronics corporation. With your help they can make sure working conditions will drastically improve and that the workers get the compensation they deserve.
