The Necessity of Empathy for Self-Correction
Last December, two news stories began circulating around the same time. One concerned the appalling acts of torture committed by the CIA, and sanctioned by members of the executive and legislative branches of government, during the years after 9/11. Another, appalling in its own way, concerned Korean Air Vice President Heather Cho, who demanded that her plane return to the terminal, causing the flight to be delayed 20 minutes, after the flight attendant served her a bag of macadamia nuts without opening it for her (even though company protocol dictates that the bags be delivered to passengers unopened).
Both of these stories illustrate a phenomenon that has recently been getting a lot of attention among psychologists and social scientists: the fact that high socioeconomic status predicts low levels of empathy for others. Why would an airline executive think that a minor flaw in service warranted delaying the trips of hundreds of people and publicly humiliating several employees? Why would high-level politicians and government lawyers think that waterboarding, beating, sleep deprivation, and “rectal feeding” are consistent with laws banning torture? Why would Mitt Romney think that half the country are nothing but lazy moochers? And why does Donald Trump say, well, pretty much everything he says?
According to a 2011 paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (“Higher social class predicts increased unethical behavior”), which gathered together findings from seven different studies on the effect of socioeconomic status on ethical decision making, persons of high social status were more likely to (1) break the law while driving, (2) exhibit unethical decision making tendencies, (3) take valued goods from others, (4) lie during negotiations, (5) cheat to increase their chances of winning a prize, and (6) endorse unethical behavior at work.
In one particularly interesting study, two subjects at a time were invited to play the board game Monopoly for fifteen minutes, but with one twist. A coin was flipped at the beginning of the game, and the winner of the toss received 2000 dollars to start the game, the right to collect 200 dollars for passing Go, and could roll two dice to move. The loser received 1000 dollars to start, 100 dollars for passing Go, and was only allowed to roll one dice to move. They were even given tokens that symbolized the differences between them, with the winner of the coin toss getting the Rolls Royce and the loser getting the shoe.
The privileged players inevitably crushed the poorer ones. “Initially, [the privileged player] reacted to the inequality between him and his opponent with a series of smirks, an acknowledgment, perhaps, of the inherent awkwardness of the situation. “Hey,” his expression seemed to say, “this is weird and unfair, but whatever.” Soon, though, as he whizzes around the board, purchasing properties and collecting rent, whatever discomfort he feels seems to dissipate. He’s a skinny kid, but he balloons in size, spreading his limbs toward the far ends of the table. He smacks his playing piece (in the experiment, the wealthy player gets the Rolls-Royce) as he makes the circuit—smack, smack, smack—¬ending his turns with a board-shuddering bang! Four minutes in, he picks up Glasses’s piece, the little elf shoe, and moves it for him. As the game nears its finish, T-Shirt moves his Rolls faster. The taunting is over now: He’s all efficiency. He refuses to meet Glasses’s gaze. His expression is stone cold as he takes the loser’s cash.” http://nymag.com/news/features/money-...
When asked after the game to account for why they had won, privileged players also invariably pointed to their decisions to purchase certain properties. Rarely did they acknowledge the lucky coin flip that essentially determined the outcome. For them, history was revised to validate their sense of agency and responsibility for their success.
These findings demonstrate why addressing inequality isn’t just about fairness. Highly unequal societies have a diminished capacity for self-correction, whereas more equal societies foster the empathy and honesty that makes it possible to learn from our mistakes.
Both of these stories illustrate a phenomenon that has recently been getting a lot of attention among psychologists and social scientists: the fact that high socioeconomic status predicts low levels of empathy for others. Why would an airline executive think that a minor flaw in service warranted delaying the trips of hundreds of people and publicly humiliating several employees? Why would high-level politicians and government lawyers think that waterboarding, beating, sleep deprivation, and “rectal feeding” are consistent with laws banning torture? Why would Mitt Romney think that half the country are nothing but lazy moochers? And why does Donald Trump say, well, pretty much everything he says?
According to a 2011 paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (“Higher social class predicts increased unethical behavior”), which gathered together findings from seven different studies on the effect of socioeconomic status on ethical decision making, persons of high social status were more likely to (1) break the law while driving, (2) exhibit unethical decision making tendencies, (3) take valued goods from others, (4) lie during negotiations, (5) cheat to increase their chances of winning a prize, and (6) endorse unethical behavior at work.
In one particularly interesting study, two subjects at a time were invited to play the board game Monopoly for fifteen minutes, but with one twist. A coin was flipped at the beginning of the game, and the winner of the toss received 2000 dollars to start the game, the right to collect 200 dollars for passing Go, and could roll two dice to move. The loser received 1000 dollars to start, 100 dollars for passing Go, and was only allowed to roll one dice to move. They were even given tokens that symbolized the differences between them, with the winner of the coin toss getting the Rolls Royce and the loser getting the shoe.
The privileged players inevitably crushed the poorer ones. “Initially, [the privileged player] reacted to the inequality between him and his opponent with a series of smirks, an acknowledgment, perhaps, of the inherent awkwardness of the situation. “Hey,” his expression seemed to say, “this is weird and unfair, but whatever.” Soon, though, as he whizzes around the board, purchasing properties and collecting rent, whatever discomfort he feels seems to dissipate. He’s a skinny kid, but he balloons in size, spreading his limbs toward the far ends of the table. He smacks his playing piece (in the experiment, the wealthy player gets the Rolls-Royce) as he makes the circuit—smack, smack, smack—¬ending his turns with a board-shuddering bang! Four minutes in, he picks up Glasses’s piece, the little elf shoe, and moves it for him. As the game nears its finish, T-Shirt moves his Rolls faster. The taunting is over now: He’s all efficiency. He refuses to meet Glasses’s gaze. His expression is stone cold as he takes the loser’s cash.” http://nymag.com/news/features/money-...
When asked after the game to account for why they had won, privileged players also invariably pointed to their decisions to purchase certain properties. Rarely did they acknowledge the lucky coin flip that essentially determined the outcome. For them, history was revised to validate their sense of agency and responsibility for their success.
These findings demonstrate why addressing inequality isn’t just about fairness. Highly unequal societies have a diminished capacity for self-correction, whereas more equal societies foster the empathy and honesty that makes it possible to learn from our mistakes.
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