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morality
You judge harmful inaction as less severe than action.
Research indicates that people rate harmful consequences resulting from inaction as more acceptable than identical harm caused by active intervention.
This omission bias persists even when the final outcome of the inaction and the action are objectively the same. Participants consistently assign more moral blame to the person who intervened, even if the harm caused by doing nothing was equivalent.
We value doing nothing over taking responsibility for change.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Ritov and Baron, 1992
- What the check found
- Ritov and Baron's 1992 research is the foundational study of the omission bias, and the claim accurately summarizes their findings regarding the preference for inaction over intervention.
- Confidence
- Well replicated
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.