The ODA Section invites you to an ODA research seminar presented by postdoc Francisco Miguel Soler Martínez:

“Informing about inequality’s prevalence can reduce support for addressing it”

Abstract
Public campaigns often aim to increase awareness of economic inequality in order to foster concern and support for redistribution. Yet such efforts may sometimes backfire. Recent research (Eskreis-Winkler et al., 2024) shows that when people learn a problem is highly prevalent, they judge it as less damaging. We test whether this mechanism applies to perceptions of economic inequality. We conducted three preregistered experimental studies with North American participants recruited via Prolific. In Study 1a (N = 300), participants evaluated the case of a person in the bottom income quintile, earning 17 times less than those in the top quintile. When told that such cases are very common, participants judged inequality as less likely to harm this person’s future economic prospects. Study 1b (N = 1,000) replicated this effect and extended it to the domains of health, education, and housing. In Study 2 (N = 1,040), we combined within- and between-subject designs to test both the robustness and broader implications of this effect. Replicating the original finding, adapting a scenario from Eskreis-Winkler et al. (2024), prevalence information reduced perceived individual harm. Crucially, we also found that prevalence information lowered the perceived importance of addressing this societal issue. Across studies, our findings suggest that highlighting how widespread inequality is may inadvertently normalize it, thereby reducing public concern and support for redistributive action. 

Everyone is welcome!