The Honoring of Accounts

Author(s): Philip W. Blumstein, Kathryn Groves Carssow, Janet Hall, Barbara Hawkins, Ronald
Hoffman, Ernest Ishem, Caroll Palmer Maurer, Dana Spens, John Taylor and D. Lee Zimmerman

Source: American Sociological Review, Vol. 39, No. 4 (Aug., 1974), pp. 551-566
Published by: American Sociological Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2094421
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 THE HONORING OF ACCOUNTS*

PHILIP W. BLUMSTEIN
with
KATHRYN GROVES CARSSOW, JANET HALL, BARBARA HAWKINS,
RONALD HOFFMAN, ERNEST ISHEM, CAROLL PALMER MAURER,
DANA SPENS, JOHN TAYLOR andD. LEE ZIMMERMAN

University of Washington

AmericanSociologicalReview1974, Vol. 39 (August): 551-66

An experimentwithina questionnairewasdesignedto isolate factors that would predict the

honoring of accounts. Subjects acted as bystandersand read short vignettesdescribingan
interactioncontainingan offense by one actor, a demandfor an account by the other, and an
account by the former. The context and offense, the type of account, and the status
relationshipbetween demanderand accounter were systematicallyvaried.After readingeach
vignette, subjects rated the offense, the demand, the account, and the accounter on several
dimensions.Factorsfound to affect the predictionof honoringbehaviorwere: the moralworth
of the offender, his penitence, his superior status relative to the demander, and the
offensiveness of the violation. Honorability was predicted by moral worth, the offender's
personal control over the offense, and the appropriatenessof the demand.Differencesin the
predictionof honoringbehaviorand honorabilitywerediscussed.

If the majortaskof sociologyis to discover "changingthe meaning that otherwise might

the foundations of social order, then it is a be given to an act, transformingwhat could be
useful strategy to focus on events that
threaten or disrupt existing order. A rich
source of data is providedby the microscopic
conflicts that arise among the minutiae of
everyday interaction. A simple tabulation of
such common utterances as, "Excuse me," "I
did it because .. ." and "What I meant to
say. . ." makes it apparentthat what we take
to be routine, smooth-flowing episodes of
interaction are really punctuated by a diverse
set of common disturbances. These distur-
bances threaten the workingconsensusunder-
lying the encounter, and momentarilydisrupt
orderly interaction. Because of the disparity
between our intentions and our acts, between
meaningswe hold and those held by others,
between what we want and what others are
willing to give, we are often called upon to
repair fracturedsociation. We engage in what
Goffman (1971:109) calls remedial work,
*This study was conducted as a project for an
undergraduatehonors seminarat the Universityof
Washington.We wish to thank Lowell Hargensfor offense is only the manifest-and often
his commentson an earlierdraftof this paper.
seen as offensive into what can be seen as
acceptable."
Any line of social action has the potential
for being interpreted as untoward or offen-
sive. When the initiator of the act has any
reason to expect such an interpretation,he
engages the remedial process. He is likely to
proffer an account, "a statement . . . to
explain [the] unanticipated or untoward
behavior.. ." (Scott and Lyman, 1968:46).
Such a remedialinterchangeis triggeredby an
offense, opened by an account on part of the
offender, and closed either with a gesture of
honoring on the part of the offended person
(signalling the restoration of interactive
equilibrium), or else with some form of
disengagementprocess following a failure to
honor. The interchange may have many
rounds, where an initial account is rejectedas
inadequateand others are proffered,or where
the rejection of an account, in turn, requires
accounting.
The desire to learn the motivation for an
secondary-reason for demandingan account.
551

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552 AMERICANSOCIOLOGICAL
REVIEW
An offense requires that an account be
demanded in order to nullify the negative
implications concerning the offender's regard
for the identity of the offended party
(Goffman, 1971:122). Furthermore, the of-
fended party must demand an accounting,
insofar as he has a stake in the continuous
flow of interaction, in order to parry the
offense's stigmatizing implications for the
identity of the offender and his orientationto
the moral order. In focusing on these
motivational factors, we are ignoring situa-
tions where the demandermight wish to sever
the relationship, to pick a fight, or to alter
radically the offender's situational identity.
Given this restriction,we may assumethat the
demanderhas a positive stake in normalizing
the interaction, and should thereforeabet the
offender in issuing the proper ritual expres-
sions (Garfinkel, 1956:423). At the same
time, however, he must demand a minimal
level of satisfaction with the account(s) given;
hence, he will honor only accounts meeting
normativespecifications.
A successfulaccount is one honored by the
demander. But honoring ultimately depends
on the total meaning held by the offended
party, incorporatingnot only the account, but
also the demander'sstake in restoringorder,
and his construction of the nature of the
offense. The decision whetheror not to honor
involves integratingmany different elements
and assessing the goodness of fit between
offense and account. The purpose of this
paper is to examine some of the inferential
elements that go into this process, and to use
them to predictthe likelihood of an account's
being honored.
An account should be honored when the
moral character of the offender has been
restored. Goffman (1971:108) emphasizes
that remedial work allows the offender to
offer a corrective reading of his behavior,
indicatingthat if he has appearedto have the
wrong relationship to the rules, he can be
expected to return to the right path. Scott
and Lyman (1968:47), in their discussionof
the invocation of the account accident, argue
that honoring occurs precisely because the
same accident does not occur repeatedly to
the same person, and is therefore not bound
to that person's social character.As attribu-
tion theory informs us, an effect will tend to
be attributedto the one of its possible causes
with which it covaries over time (Kelley,
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1973:108). A repeated violator is saddled
with a "personattribution,"and is imputed to
have impaired moral character; hence, his
accounts are not honored.
In choosing whether to honor an account,
the demander acts in many ways like a legal
tribunal, integrating all the evidence to
establish the "true" responsibility for the
offense. Because normal actors are awarethat
the responsibility attribution process is
triggered immediately following an offense,
they are eager to manipulate this process to
their advantage. Hence the ubiquity of
accounts claiming such forms of reduced
responsibility as external culprits or forces,
uncontrollable urges and impulses, un-
foreseeability of the consequences of the
deed, lack of intention for such consequences,
etc. (Goffman, 1971:98-9, 110-11; Scott and
Lyman, 1968:47-9). As Goffman (1971:112)
and Weinstein(1966:396) argue,the offender
will often boldly proclaimwhat he would like
the other to interpret as his true motivation,
in an attempt to dissociate the evaluationof
the offense from the evaluation of his moral
character. A successful claim to reduced
personal control over one's acts is likely to
preserveface and insurehonoring.
An offender may also return to a proper
moral position by a display of penitence. By
showing proper respect for the rule he broke,
the offender lays claim to the rightto reenter
the moral gracesof the offended party, who,
by demanding an account, becomes the
momentary guardianof respectability (Goff-
man, 1971:107). Showing penitence, like
claimingreducedpersonalresponsibility,splits
the identity of the offender. He asserts his
own guilt for the act and accepts the
momentaryblow to his moralcharacter,while
at the same time he reaffirmshis overriding
righteousness (awareness of the rules) and
acknowledgesthe offended's right to demand
an account (Gusfield, 1967:179; Sykes and
Matza, 1957:666). Since rituals of contrition
are so commonly the final step in restoringan
encounter to moral balance, their omission is
likely to be a barrierto honoring,which is the
offended party's only way of announcing
normalization.
In all of his accounting behavior, the
offender must establish the credibility of his
account by assuring its internal consistency
and its congruence with all the "facts" (e.g.,
his relevantpast conduct, the consequencesof
 THEHONORINGOF ACCOUNTS
the offense and their foreseeability, the usual
motivation for such an act, etc.). In remedial
work, as in all of social interaction, attention
to the credibility of one's communicative
behavioris a ubiquitous burden(Hovlandand
Weiss, 1952; Weiler and Weinstein, 1972;
Weinstein, 1966). All things being equal,
accounts are honored to the extent the
demanderfinds them credible.
In deciding whether or not to honor an
account, the offended must consider-all
things being equal-if the account were
adequate to the circumstances and the
offense. In real encounters, however, actors
do not have the luxury of "all things being
equal." Situationalfactors must enter into the
honoring decision, including, for example,
characteristicsof the relationshipbetween the
parties prior to the offense (part of what
Scott and Lyman [1968:53] call "back-
ground expectancies"), characteristicsof the
offense itself, and characteristicsof the initial
demandpresentation.
Violations, demands, and accounts do not
occur in a social vacuum, but are "situated
according to the statuses of the interactants"
(Scott and Lyman, 1968:46). Makingcertain
demands with certain gestures, and giving
certain accounts, all have implications for
both the identity of the speaker and the
identity projectedfor the other. The offended
party lays claim to an identity possessingthe
right to take offense at such an act, and
attempts to altercast the offender into an
identity where accountability is required. If
the offender provides an account without
objection, it is tantamount to his accepting
the identity into which he is being cast. Not
only are identities establishedand modified in
this way, but the remedial process often
reflects and reaffirms identities already
established. Such identities are often coordi-
nated through a pattern of relative status. As
Scott and Lyman (1968:57) illustrate, "the
vulnerabilityof actorsto questions concerning
their conduct varieswith the situation and the
status of the actors. Where hierarchies of
authority govern the social situation, the
institutionalized office may eliminate the
necessity of an account, or even prevent the
question from arising." Studies have shown
that the same communicativeexigencies will
be met quite differently depending on the
status relationship between the actors (e.g.,
Jones et al., 1963; Weinsteinand Beckhouse,
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553
1969). It should be the case that those of
lower status are more constrained to honor
accountsby their superiors.
Relative status not only affects the
constraints to honor an actual account, but
somewhat independently,has implicationsfor
whether that account deserves honoring. So,
for example, while a subordinate might be
likely to honor a superordinate'saccount, he
might not feel privately that the account was
adequate. At the same time, an uninvolved
bystander might or might not feel, in the
moral abstract,that the account was appropri-
ate. The relativestatus between offender and
offended should have major influence on
overt honoring behavior, somewhat reduced
impact on the offended party's private
evaluation of honorability, and still smaller
impact, in the abstract, on the account's
worthinessof being honored.
A final concern in predicting account
honoring is the nature of the offense that
instigated the remedialprocess. As Scott and
Lyman (1968:51) point out, a frequently
potent account is to justify an act by
minimizing its offensiveness. If the offender
can successfully argue a denial of injury, he
will suffer less deterioration of moral
character. "An account is treated as illegit-
imate when the gravity of the event exceeds
that of the account" (Scott and Lyman,
1968:54).1
METHOD
Data aimed at predictingthe likelihood of
account honoring were provided by an
experiment within a questionnaire. Subjects
were treatedas bystanders,whose reactionsto
written interaction vignettes provided the
basic data. The assumptionwas made that the
description of a common violation followed
by a demand and then an account, would
allow subjects to predict confidently the
ensuing reaction of the demander,to infer the
1 Whilethis position seemsreasonable,it mightbe
arguedthat the perceivedoffensivenessof a violation
is entirelya function of the successof the accountin
offsetting the negative implications of the act.
Therefore,the seriousnessof the violation,judgedin
a vacuumwould have no independenteffect on the
likelihood of honoring;whereas,the seriousnessof
the deed in its accounted context would have a
strong impact. A somewhat less social construc-
tionist argumentwould hold that both effects might
exist independently.
554 AMERICANSOCIOLOGICAL
REVIEW
motivation and dispositions of the accounted, Georgebeing fellow players,(2) Dan being the
and to give a normative evaluation of the captain of the team on which they both play,
behaviorin question. or (3) Dan being a younger student who has
just joined the team. For each of the eighteen
Instruments different situation-by-relationship combina-
Each instrumentwas presentedto subjects tions there were six different types of
as an "impressionformation questionnaire," accounts.3 In the teammate example, one of
containing six vignettes, each on a separate them was:
page, followed by a battery of questions. Each
vignette described two people in interaction: George responds, "I didn't realize there
an offense was committed by one, an account was a practiceyesterday."
demanded by the other, and an account
offered by the first. While the vignettes did not represent a
There were two types of instruments;in systematic sampling of all remedial inter-
one, each vignette was followed by a page of changes, they were designed to maximize the
standardsemantic differential items designed variability along certain contextual dimen-
to obtain the subject's impressions of the sions. One shortcoming of the sampling was
accounted.In the other, the same vignette was the reduced variabilitycreatedby the absence
followed by a series of contextual questions of intentionally inadequate accounts designed
concerningthe act, the demand, the account, to jeopardize the working consensus, e.g.,
and the internal workings of the accounter. "Whocaresabout basketballpractice."
These questions were standardized across
vignettesand providedthe majorvariables. ExperimentalDesign
The factorialcombinationof six situations,
Vignettes six account types, and three levels of
relationship (demander superordinate, de-
Six different basic vignette situations were
mander and accounter equal, demander
created, each having several variable forms.
subordinate),provided 108 unique vignettes.
Hereis a samplevignette:
These were combined in a modified Graeco-
Dan and George have both been playing Latin square design with each subject
first string for three years on a high school receiving six vignettes: one each of the six
varsity basketballteam. Three days before situations, one each of the six account types,
a league game, Dan and George are in the and two each of the three status relationships.
locker room.
Dan asks George, "How come you missed Subjects
the last practice?The team needed you."2 Subjects were students in sections of
introductory sociology or in a course on the
Each of the six vignette types had three family at the Universityof Washingtonduring
sub-types, varying the relative status of the winter quarter 1973. Half the subjects
demander and accounted, e.g., (1) Dan and received semantic differential instruments,
and half received the contextual questions.
2In this example the victim of the offense is a Withineach half there were eighteen different
group to which both demander and accounter booklet types (108 vignettes, with six per
belong. The other basic vignetteswere: a machinist booklet type), which were randomly distrib-
asked why he is not wearing safety goggles (the uted to subjects. Vignettes were randomly
victim is the accounted);a buyer for a department
store asked why she has not returneda borrowed ordered within each booklet. From each half
book (the victim is the demander);a family member of the subjects, 180 valid booklets were
asked why she failed to bringhome a cake for Dad's returned,providingten subjectsper condition.
birthday (the victim is a person outside the
encounter);one person asked by another why he 3The six account types were: appeal to (1) a
allowed his car to pollute (the victim is society in transsituational internal cause (a trait of the
general);and a newly-wedaskedwhy she has not yet accounted), (2) a situational internal cause (a
sent thank-younotes for weddinggifts (a violation temporary state of the accounted), (3) a cause
of etiquette). Note that the setting of the vignette, external to the accounted,(4) a denial of injuryin
the nature of the offense, and the nature of the the offense, (5) a denialof the victim'srightto claim
demandwereall confounded. an offense, and (6) an appealto a higherloyalty.

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 THEHONORINGOF ACCOUNTS 555
Analysis the subject's need to maintain response
In asking subjects to respond to vignettes, consistency. The measure of Account Ade-
we were not concerned with their assessment quacy (D) used the dimension "adequate,"
of what they would do under such circum- and the measure of Account Credibility (D)
stances, but rather with their impressionsof was the sum of two items, "believable"and
various elements of the accounting episode, "sincere,"which were correlatedr = .740.
and how these would affect their assessment The questions aimed at tapping the
of the likelihood that honoring would be the subject'spersonalmoralassessmentbegan,
outcome. We were not interestedin individual
judgments or in correlations based on the You, as an outside observer, may feel
differently about [the accounter's] answer
experimental subject as unit of analysis. than [the demander] felt. On the following
Rather we were concerned with propertiesof scales indicate how you personally felt
episodes, which were taken to be the mean about [the accounter's] answer.
scores on all variables for a given stimulus
unit. Hence the 108 unique vignettes were The measure of Account Credibility (S) was
units of analysiswith the raw data for subjects again the sum of "believable"and "sincere"
(ten per unit) averagedto give properties of (correlated r = .811). Account Adequacy (S)
vignettes. Correlations and regressionswere was the sum of two items, "adequate"and the
based on these 108 observations.4 responseto the question,
Measures Do you feel [the accounter's] answerwas
Five measures characterizingthe account appropriate?
were generatedfrom the questionnaireitems.
The major dependent measure, the subject's The correlationwas r = .902.
assessment of the likelihood that the de- Two measures characterizedthe demand:
mander would actually honor the account Demand Appropriateness, based on the
(Honoring) was the sum of two items based question,
on the following question:
Do you feel the question [the demander]
After hearing [the accounter's] answer, asked [the accounted] was appropriate?
how do you think [the demander] will
behave? and DemandLegitimacy,measuredby,

The two dimensions, "favorably" and "ac- Do you feel that [the demander] had the
ceptingly," were correlated r = .868. (All right to ask that question of [the
items were seven-pointpolar opposite scales.) accounted]?
The four other account measuresfit into a
two-by-two classificationscheme: (1) whether These two measuresseemed to tap somewhat
the adequacy or credibility of the account different content; their correlation was r =
were being measured, and (2) whether the .618.
subject were to role-take the demander's The Offensiveness of the Violation was
perspective or to give his or her own moral measuredby askingthe subject to
perspective.The demanderoriented questions
began, ... indicate [his] feelings about the
seriousness of the behavior . . . being
objected to.
After hearing [the accounter's] answer,
[the demander] will behave in a certain The six offenses
were presented for separate
way. But how will he reallyfeel about [the
accounter's] answer? responses(e.g., "Georgemissingthe basketball
practice").RelativeStatus was the sum of two
This wording was purposely used to minimize items:
In general in their relationship, is [the
4The use of mean data increasesreliabilityby demander] or [the accounted] more likely
reducingerrorvariance(Shaycoft, 1962). to give adviceand makesuggestions?

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556
AMERICANSOCIOLOGICAL
and
.. . more likely to need help or guidance
from the other?
The items correlated r = .756, with a high
score given for the demanderbeing superordi-
nate.
Three measures tapping the subjects'
inferences about the causes and motivations
behind the account were Incorrigibility,
Personal Causation, and Penitence. Incorrigi-
bility was based on the question,
How likely do you think it is that in a
similarsituation [the accounted] would do
something like [the offense] again?
PersonalCausationwas based on the question,
In your opinion, was the true reason [the
accounter committed the offense] within
his control, or was it out of his hands?
Penitence was measuredby,
How bad do you think [the accounted] felt
about [the offense] ?
Finally, the MoralWorth of the accounter
was measuredby the sum of four items from
the semantic differential questionnaire: "un-
trustworthy/trustworthy," "worthless/valu-
able," "irresponsible/responsible,"and "sin-
cere/insincere" (the coefficient alpha was
.820).
Model
Predictedrelationshipsamongthe measures
were generated from the earlier theoretical
discussion,andhavebeen illustratedin Figure1.
The four blocks in the figurerepresentclasses
of measures,whose causal sequencingreflects
the inferential steps by which people process
information about an encounter, beginning
with backgroundexpectanciesand an offense,
proceeding to a demand, and ending with an
account. Briefly, it was expected that
Incorrigibility,PersonalCausation,and Offen-
siveness would have negative effects on Moral
Worth, Credibility, Adequacy, and Honoring,
while the effect of Penitence would be
positive.
Within the three blocks with more than
one measure, some predictions were made.
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REVIEW
The inference measures were expected to be
interrelated, but no causal model was
designated. Among the dependent measures
(the accounts block) the expectations were
straightforward:Honoringbehaviorshould be
a joint function of both the perceived
credibility of the account and its judged
adequacy, with adequacy also being a partial
function of credibility. The five accounts
measureswere not expected to be uniformly
affected by other measures. It was argued
above that RelativeStatus wouldX have greatest
impact on Honoring, less impact on the
demander'sevaluation of adequacy, and least
impact on the subject's evaluation.The effect
of status on credibility was an open question:
high status people are often given greater
trust; yet since they are seldom called to
account, any demand might signal their true
untrustworthiness. The model within the
situation block reflects a simple temporal
sequence in the bystander's interpretation
process.
RESULTS
Before evaluating the predictionsfrom the
model in Figure 1, let us consider the
variation produced by the experimental
manipulations. Table 1 shows the variance
explained in each of the measures by the
manipulation of situation, account, and the
interaction of these two.5 It is encouragingto
observe that the two manipulationsaccounted
for such a substantialbulk of the variation.
Among the five account measures,the nature
of the offense (the situation manipulation)
had no significant independent effect, while
the account manipulationexplained substan-
tial variation, both alone and in interaction
with situation. Moral Worth and the three
inference measureswere significantlyaffected
by both manipulations as well as their
'Variation explained by the situation and
account manipulationswere the R2's derived from
two dummy variable analyses, each with five
independent variables.Because these two sets of
variableswere orthogonal,there was no redundant
explained variance. Variation explained by the
interactionof the two variableswas the incrementin
R2 providedby the twenty five dummy crossprod-
ucts, over and above that explained by the ten
dummy variables alone. For all measures but
RelativeStatus,the relationshipmanipulationand its
interactionsfailed to explain significantportionsof
variance.Hencetheircontributionsarenot presented
in the table.
 THEHONORINGOF ACCOUNTS 557

Measures
Situational

Measures
Inference MoralWorth

LIIIIL LIE

AccountsMeasures

- RelativeStatus 7 - Penitence
2- Offensiveness 8 - MoralWorth
3- DemandAppropriateness 9 - Credibility(D)
4- DemandLegitimacy 10 - Credibility(S)
5- Incorrigibility II - Adequacy(D)
6- PersonalCausation 12 - Adequacy(S)
13 - Honoring
Figure1. ModelIncorporatingMeasuredVariables

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 558 AMERICANSOCIOLOGICAL
REVIEW
Table 1. Variance Explained (R2 ) in Measured Variables by Manipulated
Variables and Their Interaction

Manipulated Variable
Measured Variable Sum
Situation Account Interaction

Honoring .070 .457** .167t .694**

Adequacy (D) .027 .448** .173 .647**

Adequacy (S) .023 .606** .185** .814**

Credibility (D) .077 .278** .307** .663**

Credibility (S) .042 .441** .262** *745**

Moral Worth 130* .499** .194** .824**

Incorrigibility .125* .365** .193* .684**
Personal Causation .181** .428** .219** .829**
Penitence .162** .280** .205* .647**

Relative Status .080 .093 t .077 .250

Offensiveness .611** .030 .085 .726**

Demand Appropriateness .462** .051 .150 .633**

Demand Legitimacy .435** .033 .159 .627**

t .05 ' p < .10.

* p < .05.

** p < .01.

interaction; but again, the account had the to the account'scorrectivereading.

greatest independent effect. These data lend
systematic support to the assertion that
people do not react so much to what we do,
but ratherto the interpretationwe providefor
our acts.
The situational measuresshould obviously
have only been subject to situational varia-
tion, and such was exactly the case. The
findings for Offensiveness(61 per cent of the
variance explained by the situation, while
only 3 per cent explained by the account and
8.5 per cent by their interaction) reflect the
notion that an act may be judged in the moral
abstract even after an account has been
invoked. Offensiveness,then, was not simply a
construction based on the subject's response
RelationshipsAmong DependentMeasures
Before evaluating the overall regression
model, let us considerthe relationshipsamong
the measureswithin the accounts block (see
Figure 2). Given this submodel, Credibility
had no independent effect on Honoring,
although it did have a sizable impact on
Adequacy, which in turn affected Honoring.
The substantial zero-order relationships be-
tween the Credibilitymeasuresand Honoring
(r = .590 for the demanderand r = .626 for
the subject) were totally vitiated by the
intervention of Adequacy. Whateverimpor-
tance the credibility of accounts has for
ultimate honoring, it is only in conjunction

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 THEHONORINGOF ACCOUNTS 559

.836**

Credibility (D) Credibility (S)

.371 *.839*

.379 -.045

Adequacy (D) Adequacy(S)

.080 -.068
-2= 516 * R2 =-.643 **

.430** .413**

Honoring

| 2 =.664 * ** p <.01.

Figure2. Honoringas a Functionof Credibilityand Adequacy.

with other judgments that enter into the
assessment of adequacy. It is not surprising
that the subject's feeling of credibility alone
affected his judgement of adequacy, but it is
curious that his imputation of the demander's
assessment of adequacy was colored by both
credibility perspectives. It is as though the
subject felt he had a private insight into the
account's credibility which could be trans-
lated into some factor the demander would
consider-along with credibility-when evalu-
atingthe overalladequacyof the account.
6The substantialzero-orderrelationshipbetween
the two adequacymeasures(r = .818) was too large
to be accounted for solely by their shared
dependence on the credibility measures.To assess
how much of this relationshipoccurredbecauseall
measureswere based on a singleset of vignettes,and
how much was independent of these stimuli, the
situation and account manipulations (dummied)

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560 REVIEW
AMERICANSOCIOLOGICAL

.250

RelativeStatus Offensiveness

-.003 _

Incorrigibility PersonalCausation Penitence

R-=.020 R2= 114 R2=03

.094 -.136 -.397** .202* .

MoralWorth t of < p< IC

* p < .05.
R2= .185** ** p < .01.

Figure 3. Moral Worth as a Function of Relative Status, Offensiveness and Inference Measures

Relationships Among Independent Measures inference measures or on Moral Worth.7

The effects on the inference measuresand Situational factors had little impact on the
on Moral Worth of the situational factors inference measures,the only exception being
appear in Figure 3. The demand measures the tendency for accounts following more
were not included in the figure because offensive violations to be seen as within the
neither had a significanteffect on any of the offender's personal responsibility and as not
engendering penitence. The offensiveness of
were partialledout. The resultingpartialcorrelation the deed had an independent effect on the
between the two adequacy measures,removingthe accounter's ascribed MoralWorth,but not in
effects of both the manipulationsand the credibility the expected direction:the more offensive the
measures,was only reduced to r = .578, suggesting
that there were other factors common to the two
measuresof adequacythan those we haveisolated.A
similar analysis was performed on the credibility 7This might be attributableto the redundancyof
measures,to determineif their zero-ordercorrelation the demand measures. To assess this possibility,
(r = .836) was produced fully by the vignette multiple-partialcorrelationswere computed, using
variations.The resultingpartial correlationwas r = the demand measuresas independentvariablesand
.679, again suggesting unspecified sources of the appropriatemeasuresas controls. Therewereno
association. significantcoefficients.

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 THEHONORINGOF ACCOUNTS 561
act, the more uprightits perpetrator.8Of the .250*
inference measures, only Personal Causation
had an independent effect on MoralWorth:if
the offender was seen as responsible for the
act, his moralcharacterwas blemished.9
The inference measureswere significantly RelativeStatus Offensiveness
interrelated.The zero-ordercorrelationof r=
.488 between Incorrigibility and Personal
Causation was predictable from attribution
theory (Kelley, 1973): any deed perceivedas
likely to occur with relativefrequencyshould .118 .174k 457** .247**
also be perceived as emanatingcausally from
the actor. A negative association between
Incorrigibilityand Penitence (r = - .528) was Demand Demand
not surprising, considering that a major Appropriateness Legitimacy
element of contrition is the promiseof future R2 =.250** R2 = .113**
moralconduct. It would have been difficult to
predict a relationship between Personal
Causationand Penitence(r = - .598): one can t .05 <p < .10.
imagine different accounts which would * p<.O5.
produce either a negative or a positive ** pc.OI.
association.'0
Relationships among the situational mea- Figure4. DemandAppropriateness andLegitimacyas
Functionsof RelativeStatusandOffensiveness.
sures appearin Figure 4. Since there were no
firm theoretical grounds for predicting a
causal link between Relative Status and
Offensiveness,the relationshipis presentedas
a significant correlation coefficient: the violations were judged more offensive when
the perpetratorwas of lower relative status.
The cause of this finding was not intuitively Since DemandAppropriatenesswas somewhat
obvious, so rather than attempt to construct an more situational, and Demand Legitimacy
explanation, it was assumedthat it reflected some based more on the identities of the parties,
unique patternof vignette elements.Any interpreta- the regressioncoefficients in the figureare not
tion should be made in light of the significant
interventionof PersonalCausation,since when this startling. Relative Status had no effect on
factor was deleted from the analysis,the Offensive- Appropriateness, but did tend to affect
ness effect on MoralWorthwas not significant(b* = Legitimacy (p = .065). The higher status of
.126). the demandergave him the right to make a
9 Zero-ordercorrelationsbetween inferencemea-
demand. Offensiveness, on the other hand,
sures and Moral Worth were: Incorrigibility,r =
-.129 (n.s.);PersonalCausationr = -.367 (p < .01); affected both demand measures. The more
Penitence,r = .248 (p < .01). offensive a violation, the more likely its
1 0These zero-orderassociationsobviouslycould ensuing demandwould be appropriateand the
not be attributed to the impact of the situational demanderwould be allowed (or required)to
factors,so a regressionwas againperformed,adding make it. "'
the manipulationsto test whether the common
vignettebase would explainthe correlations.Two of
the observedcorrelationswere washed out by this Predictionof Accounts Measures
analysis, while that between Incorrigibilityand
Penitence was only reduced to the partial of r = In order to observe the relationships
- .355 (p < .01). Failureto removethis association between each of the independent measures
suggests that the validity of the ac.-ounter's and the accounts measures,zero-ordercorrela-
expressed penitence was inferred, at leas! in part, tions are presented in Table 2. All of the
from the incorrigibilityimplied by the account,
ratherthan from the content of the accountdirectly. independent measureswere significantlyasso-
Becauseof the durabilityof this associationit was
momentarilyappropriateto treat the measuresas I IRegression analysesincorporatingthe manipu-
though indicatorsof the same variable.A multiple- lated variables failed to wash out the zero-order
partial correlation to assess their joint effect on correlations between Offensiveness and Relative
MoralWorthproduceda non-significantr2 = .0 1. Statusandbetweenthe demandmeasures.

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562 AMERICANSOCIOLOGICAL
REVIEW
Table 2. Correlations between Dependent Measures and Independent Measures

Dependent Measure
Independent
Measure Honoring Adequacy Credibility
(D) (S) (D) (S)

Moral Worth .492** .503** .571** .506** .585**

Incorrigibility -.272** -.345** -.430** -.255** -.325**

Personal Causation -.480** -.581** -.701** -.371** -.538**

Penitence .387** .428** .553** .378** .489**

Relative Status -.302** -.241* -.224* -.047 -.112

Offensiveness -.353** -.317** -.343** -.002 -.117

Demand Appropriateness -.217* -.229* -.251** .033 -.144

Demand Legitimacy -.223* -.108 -.154 .031 -.102

* p < .05.

** p < .01.

ciated with the major dependent measure,
Honoring. As expected, an account was
judged more likely to be honored if the
accounter's moral worth was not impaired,if
he was unlikely to repeat the offense, if he
was not totally responsible for the violation,
and if he was properly repentant. Honoring
was more likely when the violation was less
offensive, when the initial demand was
inappropriate or illegitimate, and when the
violatorwas of higherrelativestatus.
The patterns for both the demander's
attributed assessment, and the subject's
personal assessment, of whether the account
should be honored were parallel to those for
honoring behavior,except that the legitimacy
of the demand did not reach significance.
Different patterns emerged among the Credi-
bility findings. Not surprisingly,there was an
intimate relationshipbetween Credibilityand
the moral character of the accounted, and
again, not surprisingly,there was no relation-
ship between Credibilityand factors external
to the account (situational measures). There
were, however, interesting relationships be-
tween Credibility and the inferences drawn
from the accounts. Accounts that reducedthe
probabilityof the offense's repetition, or that
denied full responsibility for the offense, or
that implied properregretwere more likely to
be believed.
Table 1 showed the considerableimpact of
the situation and account manipulationson
reactions to the vignettes. It was appropriate
to ask how much of this variancecreated by
the manipulationscould be explainedwith the
measured independent variables. While the
data in Table 2 could easily be translatedinto
measuresof the explained proportion of the
total variationin the dependent measures,we
might instead want to look at the explained
proportion of the variance produced by the
manipulations.These quantities are presented
under the heading ratio in Table 3.1 2 The
ratios show that the four independent
measures had a strong impact on the
dependent measures.That so much variation
could be explained by so few measuresin this
areaof researchis encouraging.
Table 4 presentsregressiondata to evaluate
the model in Figure 1. Looking first at the
prediction of Honoring, we find independent
effects for MoralWorth,Penitence, Offensive-
1 2 Only the inference measuresand MoralWorth
are presentedin the Table,since these were the only
independentmeasuresexpected or observedto vary
with the accountmanipulation.

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 THE HONORINGOF ACCOUNTS 563
Table 3. Variance Explained in Dependent Measures by Selected Independent
Measures, and Ratio of that Variance to the Variance Explained by
the Intersection of the Respective Independent Measures and the
Manipulated Variables

Dependent Measurea

Independent Measure Honoring Adequ cy Credi'bility

(D) (S) (D) (S)

R2 ratio RZ o R2 r atio R2 ratio R2 ratio

Moral Worth .242 .337 .253 .377 .326 .393 .256 .385 .342 .458

Inference Measures .246 .299 .349 .491 .521 .586 .176 .162 .333 .367

Incorrigibility .074 .107 .119 .181 .185 .223 .065 .045 .106 .367

Personal Causation .230 .291 .337 .475 .491 .554 .137 .155 .289 .329

Penitence .150 .201 .183 .275 .306 .364 .143 .167 .239 .299

Moral Worth and

Inference Measures .359 .454 .446 .634 .634 .721 .331 .395 .501 .592

R2 in all cases significant beyond the .01 level.

Table 4. Standardized Partial Regression Coefficients for Regression of

Accounts Measures on Moral Worth, Inference Measures, and
Situational Measures

Dependent Measur..
Independent

(D) (S) (D) (S)

Moral Worth .384** .362** .384** .427** .438**

Incorrigibility -.043 -.071 -.092 -.045 -.045

Personal Causation -.085 -.301** -.358** -.094 -.228*

Penitence .194* .091 .16 .196t .218*

Relative Status -.174* -.108 -.075 -.014 -.021

Offensiveness -.253** -.139 -.130t .021 .036

Demand Appropriateness .030 -.175t - .162* .023 -.132

Demand Legitimacy -.069 .154 .097 .079 .061

R2 .466** .513** .689** .340'" .510**

t <
.05 < p .10.

* p < ..05.

** p < .01.

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564 REVIEW
AMERICANSOCIOLOGICAL
ness, and Relative Status. Honoring was a and one near significant effect (p =..079 for
joint function of the righteousness of the Credibility D); whereas, Personal Causation
accounter,his display of ritualrepentance,the affected the subject's trust, but not the
unimportance of the transgression,and the demander's.1 4 There was no support for
relative superior status of the accounter. either the common finding that high status is
Qualities of the demand were irrelevant to accompanied by greater trust, nor for the
honoring, as were the likelihood that the opposite contention that higher status per-
offense would be repeated and the personal sons, by virtue of having committed an
responsibilityof the offender. offense, are more likely to be deemed
Turning now to a comparision of the untrustworthy.Note that for none of the five
adequacy measureswith Honoring,recallthat dependent measures was there a significant
the only expectation generated was that the effect for Incorrigibility or for Demand
effect of Relative Status would decline as one Legitimacy.'5
moved from Honoring to Adequacy (D), then
to Adequacy (S). Such was the case, although DISCUSSION
there seemed to be no sizable difference
The purpose of this study was to
between the two adequacy measures. Status
investigate the factors contributing to the
was seen by subjects as relevant to overt
restoration of smooth flowing interaction
honoring behavior, but not to either the
demander's nor the subject's view of honor- following an accountable violation. The
research question was framed in terms of a
ability. Moral Worth had quite the same
effect on all three measures, while Personal bystander's prediction of whether or not an
Causation had a strong impact on the account would be honored by the offended
party. The most important predictor of
adequacy measuresalone. This result suggests
that accounts were deemed more appropriate honoring was too obvious to be discussed
directly-the nature of the account itself. The
when they reduced personal responsibility,
content of the accounts provided in the
but this judgment did not carryover into the
vignettes-both the general account types and
demander'sovert response.
the accounts specific to the situated viola-
Penitence affected the subject'sevaluation
tions-explained a great deal of the variation
but not the demander'simputed judgment. in honoring, and in other related measures.
Offensiveness had less impact on adequacy This was particularlystrikingwhen compared
than on honoring (p = .064 in the subject's
case and not significant in the demander's).
question. In all cases the regression coefficients
The natureof the offense seemed to affect the obtained produced a reduction in slope significant
actual response to the violation, but not the beyond the .05 level, suggestingthat the observed
internal reaction to it. In comparison, the relationships between Moral Worth and the
characterof the demand affected the internal accounts measureswere producedby the account,
judgment of adequacy (p = .079 for the rather than by the offender's preaccount moral
stature.
demander), while it was irrelevantto honor- 1 4In order to consider again the impact of the
ing. redundancyof Incorrigibilityand Penitence, multi-
MoralWorthhad even a greaterimpact on ple-partialswere calculated,treatingthe five account
the Credibilitymeasuresthan on Honoringor measuresas dependent variables.The only signif-
icant findings reflected the observed significant
Adequacy. 3 Penitence had one significant regressioneffects for Penitence.
I I Perhaps Incorrigibility failed to produce
significanteffects becauseof its redundancywith the
1 3There remains a question of interpretation other inference measures.To assessthis
possibility,
concerningall the significantMoralWortheffects in regression analyses were performed eliminating
the Table: Are people who are perceived to be either PersonalCausation,Penitence,or both. When
generally more righteous also more likely to have one was omitted, the other invariably became
their accounts honored, or do accounts affect significant;but Incorrigibilitydid not. Whenboth
righteousness,and hence affect honoring?The data were omitted, Incorrigibilitybecame significantfor
in Table 1 indicated that Moral Worth was more each of the five account measures.It can be argued
strongly affected by the account than by the that Incorrigibilitywas the least rich of the three
situation.By addingthe accountmanipulationto the substantivelyoverlappingvariables,and hence was
regressionanalysesreportedin Table4 and observing eclipsed by the others. Further multiple-partial
any reduction in the Moral Worth effects, it was correlations showed no joint effects of the two
possible to gain an imperfect purchase on this demandmeasureson any of the dependentmeasures.

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 THEHONORINGOF ACCOUNTS
to the insignificant amount of variation
explained by the nature of the violation and
the situation in which it occurred.It cannot
be overstated that people respond to our
symbolic restructuringof our deeds, much
more than to the deeds themselves.
It was reassuringto observethat within the
variation produced by the manipulationsof
account and situation, a small number of
measures could be summoned to provide a
high level of prediction. The post-account
moral character of the offender, plus the
combination of inferences drawn from the
account had uniformly strong impact on the
honoring of the account, on the account's
adequacy,and on its credibility.
Five dependent measureswere included in
order to determine the internal dimensions
leading immediately to a decision to honor or
not to honor an account. Not surprisingly,the
relationships among honoring behavior, the
account's adequacy, and its credibility were
quite intimate. Subjects expected the of-
fended person'sbehavioralresponseto parallel
closely his internaldispositionsconcerningthe
account, and they further expected that the
latter would also parallel their own moral
evaluations.Honoringlargelydependedon the
adequacy of the account, what we might call
its honorability.
While honorability was a major facet of
honoring, these two were by no means
measures of the same variable, as was amply
demonstratedby the differentialeffects of the
independent measures on them. While the
moral character of the accounter strongly
affected both honoring and honorability,
none of the other causalfactors affected both
measures. Honoring was influenced by the
ritual repentance displayedin the account, by
the offensivenessof the violation, and by the
relativesuperiorstatus of the accounted.None
of these factors played a significant role in
honorability. Instead, this internal response
was a product of the mitigation of personal
responsibility for the deed and the appropri-
ateness of the demand. Honorability hinged
partly on a considerationof motivation(what
caused the accounter to do it?), partlyon the
credibility of the account, and partly on the
demand(if the demand should not have been
posed in the first place, how could it deserve
to be honored?). Beyond these factors,
honorability was determined in a situational
vacuum:,what status constraints might come
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565
to bear, how bad was the misdeed, and what
ritual gestures were mobilized to atone, all
seemed irrelevant. In deciding actually to
honor an account, its honorabilityseems only
to have been a part of what was necessary.
Honoringwas a blend of honorability,proper
ritualdisplay and situationalconstraints.
A general problem concerning researchin
this area has become evident as a result of this
initial study: There is a criticalneed for more
sophisticated taxonomies for arrangingsitua-
tions and interaction contexts. In attempting
to createvignettes, our majordifficulty was in
classifying situated violations and account
types. In the latter case, the classification
scheme used by Scott and Lyman(1968) was
helpful; but ultimately it was only partly
adequate for mapping the universe of
accounts observedin the real world.
A major shortcomingof the present study
was the use of written vignettes as stimulus
materials.While this researchstrategyis often
objectionable, the results obtained seem
informative enough, while they await further
validation. An important next step for
removing some of the limitations of this
technique might be to create videotape
recordings of actual account behavior which
could vary in quite the same ways as the
written vignettes.
Another weaknessof the presentstudy was
its failureto integrateadequatelythe remedial
process into other themes in the current
literature on interaction and interpersonal
control. It was suggested above that the
remedialprocess normalizesthe encounterby
reestablishing the orderly arrangement of
social identities among participants.As Scott
and Lyman (1968:59) argue, every remedial
interchange is a "manifestation of the
underlying negotiation of identities." In an
attempt to make explicit the relationship
between remedial work and identity negotia-
tions, we are beginninga study to considerthe
effects of varying the degree of consensus
about situationalidentities on the interaction
processes that follow an accountable viola-
tion. With this design, we hope to be able to
predict more firmly the maintenance or
destructionof social order.
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