Is revenge about retributive justice, deterring harm, or both?

• Published in: Social and personality psychology compass 2017-01, Vol.11 (1), p.n/a
• Main Author: Osgood, Jeffrey M.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: deterrence; justice; punishment; retribution; revenge
• ISSN: 1751-9004; 1751-9004
• DOI: 10.1111/spc3.12296

This paper explores the vast literature on revenge and retributive punishment to ascertain whether revenge seekers are primarily seeking retribution or to deter future harm. This review considers research findings from social, consumer, evolutionary, and industrial/organizational psychology. Revenge is defined as an action in response to some perceived wrongdoing by another party that is intended to inflict damage, injury, discomfort, or punishment on the party judged responsible. In support of the perspective that revenge is about retribution, vengeance is typically triggered only by unjust harms, revenge‐seekers report a moral imperative, justice beliefs predict revenge, and justice‐related information has the greatest influence on punishment calculations. On the other hand, a plethora of findings in economic games such as serial prisoner dilemmas reveal that tit‐for‐tat style revenge is an effective means of deterring future harm. Overall, the evidence seems to support a retribution model of revenge over a deterrence model; however, as this review describes in its conclusion, the psychology of revenge is in need of further investigation along several key dimensions.