The Sensitivity to Mean Intentions (SeMI) Model: Basic Assumptions, Recent Findings, and Potential Avenues for Future Research

Abstract

A large body of research has demonstrated that people who are habitually sensitive towards victimization tend to behave uncooperatively and immorally in socially uncertain situations. The "Sensitivity to Mean Intentions" (SeMI) model ) aims at describing social-cognitive mechanisms that underlie and explain this effect. The model posits that in socially uncertain situations, victim-sensitive individuals are asymmetrically sensitive to cues of untrustworthiness. When such cues are present, suspicious cognitive and motivational reactions are triggered in victim-sensitive individuals, and they behave preemptively selfish to avoid being exploited by others. Although functional at times, victim sensitivity does have dysfunctional side effects. The present article reviews recent findings regarding the SeMI model and sketches potential avenues for future research.

Trustworthy Tricksters: Violating a Negative Social Expectation Affects Source Memory and Person Perception When Fear of Exploitation Is High

“…The crucial difference between this previous research and the present experiments is that previous research on asymmetrical attendance to untrustworthiness cues solely relied on self-reports (about another person’s trustworthiness), whereas the first study in the present article obtained evidence for this effect in a much more unobtrusive measure: participants’ guessing in the absence of source memory. This finding lends support to the “asymmetry hypothesis” formulated by Gollwitzer et al (2013) in their “Sensitivity to Mean Intentions” (SeMI) model.…”

“…So, when fear of exploitation is high, negative social labels such as “X is a trickster” have a stronger influence on one’s trustworthiness perception of X than a positive social labels such as “X is a scientist.” This has been suggested by recent research on victim sensitivity and suspicious cognition (see Gollwitzer and Rothmund, 2009; Gollwitzer et al, 2013, for theoretical reviews). The present study corroborates and extends these findings by asking: what happens if an initial expectation regarding a particular interaction partner is violated, that is, if a “trickster” turns out to be trustworthy rather than untrustworthy?…”

“…However, this aversion is stronger for some people than for others: People who are victim-sensitive harbor a latent fear of being exploited and react particularly strongly toward experiences of unfairness (Gollwitzer et al, 2005, 2013; Gollwitzer and Rothmund, 2009). Because the possibility of exploitation is aversive and present in many contexts, people are well advised to trust others only when there is reason to do so.…”

Distrusting Your Moral Compass: The Impact of Distrust Mindsets on Moral Dilemma Processing and Judgments

“…Note that the potentially positive impact of generalized distrust on moral decision-making stands in opposition to the impact of interpersonal distrust towards a specific target, which can reduce the ethicality of moral decisions as people act selfishly due to fear of being exploited (Gollwitzer, Rothmund, & Süßenbach, 2013). Hence, generalized distrust and particularized distrust of specific individuals may have very different impacts on moral judgment.…”

Solidarity and Social Justice: Effect of Individual Differences in Justice Sensitivity on Solidarity Behaviour

“…There is considerable evidence that JS Others and JS Victim differentially predict cognitive, motivational and behavioural reactions to injustice. Victim-sensitive individuals have been shown to have a rather suspicious mindset, which, coupled with the fear of being exploited, results in a reluctance to cooperate and provide help (Gollwitzer, Rothmund, & Süssenbach, 2013). Specifically, victimsensitive individuals tend to punish less in public good games (Schlösser, Lotz, & Fetchenhauer, 2010), to transfer less money to others in a trust game (if given cues about the unjust behaviour of others, Gollwitzer & Rothmund, 2011) and to be less likely to propose an equal split in a dictator game (Fetchenhauer & Huang, 2004;Lotz et al, 2013).…”