Attributions of responsibility and affective reactions to decision outcomes

Immediate affective reactions to outcomes are more intense following decisi ons to act than following decisions not to act. This finding holds for both positive and negative outcomes. We relate this "actor-effect" to attributi on theory and argue that decision makers are seen as more responsible for o utcomes when these are the result of a decision to act as compared to a dec ision not to act. Experiment 1 (N = 80) tests the main assumption underlyin g our reasoning and shows that affective reactions to decision outcomes are indeed more intense when the decision maker is seen as more responsible. E xperiment 2 (N = 40) tests whether the actor effect can be predicted on the basis of differential attributions following action and inaction. Particip ants read vignettes in which active and passive actors obtained a positive or negative outcome. Action resulted in more intense affect than inaction, and positive outcomes resulted in more intense affect than negative outcome s. Experiment 2 further shows that responsibility attributions and affectiv e reactions to outcomes are highly correlated; that is, more extreme affect ive reactions are associated with more internal attributions. We discuss th e implications for research on post-decisional reactions. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. PsycINFO classification. 2340; 2360; 300 0.