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bilby commented on the word ben franklin effect
"When we do a person a favor, we tend to like them more as a result. This is because we justify our actions to ourselves that we did them a favor because we liked them.
Benjamin Franklin himself said, 'He that has once done you a kindness will be more ready to do you another than he whom you yourself have obliged.'
The reverse effect is also true, and we come to hate our victims, which helps to explain wartime atrocities. We de-humanize the enemy, which decrease the dissonance of killing and other things in which we would never normally indulge."
- 'Ben Franklin Effect', changingminds.org
The coinage comes from research by Jecker, J. and Landy, D. (1969), 'Liking a person as function of doing him a favor', published in Human Relations, 22, pp. 371-378.
July 19, 2008
seanahan commented on the word ben franklin effect
Sounds a lot like cognitive dissonance.
July 21, 2008