As the business world increasingly collides with social issues, it is more important than ever to understand how personal values influence consumer decision-making and how brands can effectively navigate them. These are the kinds of dynamics Ike Silver, an assistant professor of marketing at USC Marshall School of Business, grapples with in his research.

“I tend to say that I study three things — doing good, taking sides, and getting angry. Each of these is a moral signaling process and a place where consumers’ morals intersect with marketing strategy,” Silver explained.

One topic Silver has been exploring recently is the psychology of “cancellation” and why people might be prone to escalate rather than de-escalate their anger in public settings. In a new research paper, “Reluctance to Downplay: Asymmetric Sensitivity to Differences in the Severity of Moral Transgressions,” Silver and collaborators Amanda Geiser of the University of California, Berkeley, and Deborah Small of Yale University investigate why this occurs.

“We were really interested in the idea of outrage culture and what compels people to engage in condemnation," Silver said. “We condemn corporations, public figures, politicians, and acquaintances all the time. Here, we focused on anger at people who do bad things.”

The researchers wanted to understand why observers are reluctant to show leniency or offer opportunities for redemption, even when they might see nuance in the case.

In a series of social-psychological experiments, the researchers presented participants with pairs of crimes — such as sexual misconduct cases of notable public figures — for which one was objectively worse than the other. Participants were asked to indicate how outraged they were at each case and how much each offender should be punished.

The researchers found that when people are asked to compare different crimes in a way that allows them to express stronger condemnation (by saying one is worse than another), they are willing to do so. But when asked to compare the crimes in a way that forces them to de-escalate condemnation (by saying that one is less bad than another), they become uncomfortable acknowledging moral differences between the cases. In other words, people are far more comfortable saying a more severe infraction deserves more punishment, than they are saying a less severe infraction deserves less punishment.

According to Silver, people resist de-escalating condemnation (i.e. saying A is not as bad as B) because — unlike escalating (i.e. saying B is worse than A) — it can look like minimizing the offense, which in turn, reflects bad moral character. Scaling down can be perceived as downplaying harm and, therefore, can have negative reputational consequences to the person in the judge’s seat.