The influence of perceived responsibility and personality characteristics on the emotional and behavioral reactions to people with AIDS

The present study examined the effect of a target's personality and respons ibility for a misdeed on a perceiver's emotions and behavior by determining the variables' impact on the perceiver's emotional reactions and willingne ss to help the target. A total of 134 Germans and 171 Americans were given information about the level of responsibility (low, medium, or high) for a person's infection with HIV, 2 variations of information about the target's personality (positive vs. negative), and the transmission mode of the viru s (needle vs. unsafe sex). Although B. Weiner's (1995) model of responsibil ity partially explained the findings, the results showed that the target's personality also contributed to the perceiver's emotional and behavioral re actions.