title: Ingroup favoritism or the black sheep effect: Perceived intentions modulate subjective responses to aggressive interactions.
abstract: Social categorization plays an important role in provoking the victim's responses to aggressive interactions. Pioneering studies suggested that uncertainty in the perpetrator's hostile intention influences whether ingroup favoritism or the black sheep effect (ingroup strictness) will be manifested to a greater extent. However, when the hostile intention is ambiguous, subjective perception of the perpetrator's intention may still be quite different due to the inherent information gap between participants, and this discrepancy in perceived intentions may further modulate subjective responses to social aggression. In the present study, subjects played as responders of the Ultimatum Game, and received varied offers proposed by either ingroup or outgroup members. Electrophysiological results showed that, when proposers were perceived to be intentional, unfair offers from ingroups elicited significantly larger Feedback-related Negativity (FRN) than those from outgroups, potentially providing neural evidence for the black sheep effect. The opposite FRN pattern was observed when proposers were perceived to be unintentional, which might suggest ingroup favoritism. Interestingly, despite contrary neural patterns, perceived intentions did not modulate behavioral response to aggressive interactions. Thus, converging results suggested that, when the perpetrator's hostile intention remained ambiguous, perceived intentions modulated the victim's electrophysiological response while not the rational behavioral response to aggressive interactions.
authors: School of Management, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China; Neuromanagement Lab, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
authors: Lei
authors: L
authors: Wang
authors: School of Management, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China; Neuromanagement Lab, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
authors: Jiehui
authors: J
authors: Zheng
authors: School of Business Administration, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, China. Electronic address: promise_land@zju.edu.cn.
authors: Liang
authors: L
authors: Meng
authors: School of Management, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
authors: Qiang
authors: Q
authors: Lu
authors: Neuromanagement Lab, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China. Electronic address: maqingguo3669@zju.edu.cn.
authors: Qingguo
authors: Q
authors: Ma
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000374:Aggression; D006126:Group Processes; D006801:Humans; D033182:Intention; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D012933:Social Identification; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Aggressive interactions; Black sheep effect; Feedback-related negativity; Ingroup favoritism; Perceived intention; Ultimatum Game