Past research has led to conflicting predictions about how hindsight bias is influenced by the self-relevance of an event. Some research suggests that self-relevance will increase hindsight (a) as individuals are motivated to restore a sense of predictability and (b) as self-relevant outcomes elicit sense making, which in turn leads to hindsight. Other research suggests that self-relevance will reduce hindsight, at least in the case of negative outcomes, (a) as individuals seek to avoid blame and (b) as the memories of the reaction to the self-relevant outcomes serve as a memory cue that inhibits hindsight bias. These contrasting predictions were tested by examining retrospections about the foreseeability of a job layoff. Responses were obtained from laid-off workers, from survivors of the layoffs, and from community members. Community members reported more foreseeability than survivors, who in turn reported more foreseeability than laid-off workers. The results held across several analyses, including a regression-discontinuity analysis of survivors and laid-off respondents. The self-relevance of an event such as a layoff seems to reduce hindsight.We contributed equally to this project, and order of authorship was determined by a coin toss.We thank three anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on a previous version of this article.

Death and injury due to terrorist bombings continue to exercise civilian and military surgeons alike. In this paper 828 servicemen killed and injured by explosions in Northern Ireland have been studied, using data stored in the Hostile Action Casualty System (HACS). Because of the nature of the conflict in Northern Ireland, the magnitude of each explosion and the distance of the victims from it are quite accurately known. The overpressure (blast loading) to which the victim was exposed can be estimated from the information on the HACS forms and standard tables, giving overpressures for a given change at a known distance. Using the HACS data, the numbers of injuries due to overpressure (primary blast injury), missiles energized by the blast (secondary injury), displacement of the victim by the blast wind (tertiary injury) and flash burn can be determined. Of the 828 servicemen involved in explosions, 216 were killed, most of them before any treatment could be instituted. Of the servicemen in the survey, 90 per cent were wearing body armour. Although body armour affords considerable protection from secondary missiles, it is unlikely to reduce the number of deaths due to primary blast injury.

Death and injury from explosion are becoming ever more frequent. In this study an attempt is made to relate the blast loading suffered by individual victims of explosions to the injuries sustained. It includes 828 servicemen killed or injured by explosions in Northern Ireland. Two hundred sixteen servicemen were killed, most of them before any assistance could be rendered. In those exposed to a higher blast loading, blast lung was common. Those exposed to lower blast loading died primarily of head injuries. Body armour was worn by 90% of the servicemen and probably reduced the number of fatal secondary missile injuries.

The authors tested the influence of structural features of local unions (N = 43) on members' union commitment (N = 539) as moderated by members' gender. By using a cross-level analysis, they identified local structure with officers' ratings of innovation, formalization, and centralization. An anticipated interaction between gender and innovation was not found. However, as predicted, women's commitment was positively related to formalization and negatively related to centralization. In contrast, men's commitment was only slightly influenced by local formalization but was positively related to centralization. The need for structural redesign to enhance member's commitment, particularly among women, was discussed.

We examined a phenomenon related to hindsight bias, specifically, retrospective judgements about the foreseeability of an outcome. We predicted that negative, self-relevant outcomes would be judged as less foreseeable by the recipient of the outcome than by others, unlike either positive outcomes or outcomes that are not self-relevant. In the context of a "stock market decision-making game", the hypothetical stock selected by one of two players showed an extreme increase or decrease. As predicted, the player who received an extreme negative outcome reported that this outcome was less foreseeable than did the opponent and an observer, for whom the outcome was less self-relevant. For no other kind of outcome was there a difference between the recipient of an outcome, the opponent, and the observer. The findings have several implications, including the possibility that hindsight bias should be considered as a special case of retrospective foreseeability.