“It’s not your fault” How Attribution of Responsibility and Empathy Lead to Helping Behavior for Migrants who are Victims of Labor Trafficking Open Access

Abstract

Human trafficking is slavery. No gender, race, social class, nor state has escaped its impact. Given this abominable human rights violation, every actor—governments, civil societies, individuals— has the responsibility to address it. Studies find that personal stories, narratives that describe the life experiences of an individual, move individuals to action and opinion change on human rights issues. Hence, this study applies such findings in the context of a previously unexamined human rights issue: trafficked migrants. It brings social psychology and political science literature together, drawing from attribution theory to examine the impact of “responsibility” frames on increasing collective mobilization and opinion change. Utilizing an experimental survey design, the study finds that personal-choice migration frames elicit more anger and disgust whereas state-caused migration frames evoke more empathy. However, personal choice frames also lead to greater willingness to help. This study is the first of its kind to conjoin pro-social and framing theories to inform anti-trafficking actors on mechanisms that drive individuals to mobilize for migrants who are victims of labor trafficking.

 

Table of Contents

I.              Introduction……………………………………………………………………………..    1

Section 1.1 The Response to Human Trafficking..……………………………………..…..    1

Section 1.2 The Response to Human Trafficking: Why Collective Action Matters....    3

II.            Literature……………………… ……………………………………………….………..   5

Section 2.1 Human Rights and Empathy……………………………………….……………..   5

Section 2.2 Empathy–Mediator for Helping Behavior and Attitudes……....…………..   8

Section 2.3 Trafficking Victim and the Role of Gender…………………………...………..  13

III.          Theory………………………… ……………………………………………….....……….  15

Section 3.1 Attribution…………….… ………………………………………...……..………….  15

Section 3.2 Gendered Human Trafficking and Migrants ………..….…………..………….  17

Section 3.3 Heterogeneous Treatment Effects ……………………….…………..………….  19

IV.         Research Design…………….……………………………………..………..…………. ... 21

Section 4.1 Survey Experiment Overview………………………….…………..…………...... 21

Section 4.2 Variables…………………………………………………………...…..…………...... 24

Section 4.3 Treatment Rationale.. …………………………………….………..………......... 25

Section 4.4 Methods………………………..……………………………….……..………......... 30

V.           Results ……………………………………………………….....…………………………. 36

VI.         Discussion…………………...………………………...…………………………………. 51

VII.       Conclusion…………..………………........…..…………………………………………. 54

Appendix…………..…………………..........…………………….………………………………. 56

References…………………………………..........…………………………………………………61

 

About this Honors Thesis

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School	Emory College
Department	International Studies
Degree	B.A.
Submission	Honors Thesis
Language	English
Research Field	Political Science, International Relations Psychology, Social Political Science, General
Keyword	Prosocial Behaviors Framing Theory Human Trafficking Collective Action Attribution Labor Trafficking Empathy Immigration
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Davis, David, Emory University
Committee Members	Jung, Danielle, Emory University Reingold, Beth, Emory University

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