A new study suggests that publicly sharing experiences of suffering, a behavior known as victim signaling, can lead observers to form more negative impressions of the person sharing. The research, published in Personality and Individual Differences, provides evidence that these reputational costs can extend to perceptions of personality, job performance, and suitability for leadership.
Many people share accounts of unfair treatment or disadvantage with the aim of seeking support or drawing attention to problems. This kind of communication can serve meaningful purposes. It can help people receive comfort, protection, or resources. It can also draw attention to wider injustices that might otherwise be overlooked.
At the same time, people vary in how they react to these signals. Some audiences may sympathize, while others may be skeptical. This skepticism is partly informed by a growing body of research suggesting that not all such signals are motivated by a simple need for help.
Previous work has identified a specific strategy known as “virtuous victim signaling,” where an individual publicly communicates their suffering while also projecting an image of high moral character. This dual approach can be an effective tool for social influence, encouraging others to offer support while shielding the signaler from scrutiny.
This line of inquiry provides evidence that people with certain personality traits, such as Machiavellianism and narcissism, tend to use this strategy more frequently. The findings suggest that for some, signaling victimhood can be a calculated way to pursue self-interest, sometimes deceptively, to acquire resources or social status. This research does not suggest that all claims of harm are disingenuous, but it does propose a reason why audiences may sometimes react with caution.
Building on this foundation, the research team set out to further examine the potential social costs of victim signaling. They were particularly interested in whether observers, perhaps aware of these potential motivations, would infer that a signaler possesses “dark” personality traits. These traits, sometimes called the “dark factor” of personality, relate to a general tendency to pursue self-interest at the expense of others, often through manipulative or deceitful behavior.
“We observed, as others have, that claiming victimhood has become increasingly common in society and that being recognized as a victim is powerful moral and political currency that people can use to gain status and obtain different outcomes from others,” explained study author Karl Aquino, a professor at the Sauder School of Business at the University of British Columbia. “We wanted to know what inferences about personality and expectations about behavior observers might make about someone who invites recognition from an audience that they are a victim by signaling that they have been harmed in some way.”
To examine this, the researchers conducted a series of four different studies.
The first study explored this idea in a real-world workplace setting. The researchers collected data from 170 pairs of employees and their coworkers at a real estate organization in the Philippines. The primary employees completed surveys to measure their own “dark factor” personality traits and to report how frequently they engaged in victim signaling, such as pointing out how external factors have prevented them from achieving their goals.
Their designated coworkers then completed a separate survey, rating how often the primary employee engaged in counterproductive work behaviors. These are actions that harm the organization or its members, such as starting arguments or deliberately breaking company rules.
The findings from this study indicated a clear connection between the different elements. Employees who reported a higher frequency of victim signaling were perceived by their colleagues as engaging in more counterproductive behaviors. The results also suggested that employees with higher scores on dark personality traits tended to engage in victim signaling more often. The data suggest that the connection between these dark traits and counterproductive behavior appeared to be explained by the frequency of victim signaling.
In a second study, the researchers moved from a workplace survey to a controlled experimental design. They recruited 301 online participants from the platform Prolific and asked them to take on the role of a manager. The participants read a short scenario about an employee named Michael who was upset about his office being relocated.
In one version of the story, Michael expressed his frustration but did not attribute it to any specific cause. This was considered a weak victim signal. In the second version, Michael not only expressed frustration but also claimed he was being treated unfairly because of his gender and threatened to sue the company for discrimination. This was the strong victim signal.
After reading one of the two scenarios, participants rated their impressions of Michael. They assessed him on three personality traits known as the Dark Triad: narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. They also gave their opinion on his likely past job performance.
The results showed that the version of Michael who made the discrimination claim was rated significantly higher on all three dark personality traits. Participants also judged his past job performance to be lower compared to the Michael who only expressed general frustration. This suggests that a strong, contentious victim signal can negatively shape perceptions of both character and competence.
The third study aimed to see if these perceptions would influence expectations of future unethical behavior. For this experiment, 355 employed U.S. participants read a fabricated news article profiling a Black male entrepreneur, Chef Terrell Jackson, who had just opened a new restaurant. In the article, the chef was asked to give advice to other young people of color.
His response was manipulated to create two conditions. In the victim-signaling condition, he highlighted the systemic racial barriers he had to overcome. In the non-signaling condition, he acknowledged facing barriers but stated they had not held him back from success.
Participants then rated the entrepreneur’s personality, the likelihood that he would engage in unethical business practices, and how likely it was that he had made claims of victimization in a previous job. The initial analysis showed that the entrepreneur who signaled victimhood was perceived as more narcissistic and was thought to be more likely to have signaled victimhood in the past. However, the study’s primary predictions were not fully supported until the researchers conducted a follow-up analysis that accounted for the participants’ political beliefs.
This exploratory analysis revealed that political ideology played a significant role in how the signal was interpreted. For participants who identified as more conservative, the victim signal tended to produce more negative judgments about the entrepreneur’s personality. For participants who identified as more liberal, the opposite pattern sometimes emerged. These participants tended to rate the entrepreneur who signaled victimhood more favorably on some traits compared to the one who denied that racial barriers had obstructed his success.
The fourth and final study examined whether a more subtle victim signal could affect a hiring decision. A sample of 604 participants from the United States and Canada were asked to evaluate three candidates for a senior management position. The candidates included one White male and two Black males. One of the Black candidates was the focal target of the experiment. In his job motivation statement, this candidate either included a subtle victim signal, beginning with the phrase “As someone who has experienced injustice…,” or he did not. The other two candidates always provided neutral statements.
Participants were asked to choose which candidate they would promote, to rank all three candidates from best to worst, and to rate each candidate on personality traits related to psychological entitlement and Machiavellianism. The presence of the subtle signal had a noticeable effect on the outcomes. The focal candidate was less likely to be chosen for the promotion when his statement included the reference to injustice.
He was also more likely to be ranked last among the three candidates. Observers also rated him higher on entitlement and Machiavellianism traits when he used the victim signal. A subsequent analysis of political ideology showed that while more conservative participants tended to rate the signaling candidate more negatively on personality, this did not appear to influence the final hiring decision itself.
“In the final study of our paper, we found that in a hiring situation when one minority job candidate victim signals by saying that they have experienced injustice, and there is another minority candidate who doesn’t say this, people judged the latter candidate as a more desirable person for the job,” Aquino told PsyPost. “This finding suggests that when people victim signal, it could make them less attractive as a job candidate than someone is a member of the same demographic group and who doesn’t victim signal.”
Together, the findings provide evidence that signaling one’s suffering may sometimes bring support, but it can also negatively affect how others view a person’s character and suitability as a colleague or leader.
“Signaling, or publicly communicating, one’s experiences of harm can influence the inferences and judgments an audience makes about the signaler and whether these responses are advantageous or disadvantageous depends on who the audience is and if the potential benefits of signaling (i.e., obtaining help, support, or relief from harm) outweigh the reputational cost of being perceived as having certain traits that have been associated with self-serving, deceitful, or manipulative behavior,” Aquino said.
The researchers emphasize that the research does not suggest people should discount reports of harm. Instead, the findings address how audiences interpret these signals.
“We are not suggesting that people should be skeptical of people who claim to have been harmed or that these claims are inaccurate,” Aquino explained. “Our research is agnostic about the accuracy of the claims presented to our study participants and we left it up to them to decide for themselves how to incorporate this assessment into their judgments.”
“All we were trying study was what the perceptions might be of people who signal that they have been harmed and thereby potentially invite others to see them as victims. Whether the reputational costs of victim signaling that our studies revealed are worth the possible benefits of emitting the signal is something we cannot answer.”
As with all research, there are some limitations. The studies primarily measured perceptions and behavioral intentions rather than actual behaviors toward people who signal victimhood. Additionally, the scenarios were specific and may not represent all contexts in which victim signals occur. The way people respond could also depend on whether a claim of harm is easily verifiable or more subjective and ambiguous.
“We hope to do more research into the contexts under which claims of victimhood are advantageous or costly for those who signal victimhood, the recipients of those signals, and society at large, as well as how they influence the recognition of victims and the willingness of others to alleviate their suffering,” Aquino said.
The study, “The reputational consequences of victim signaling,” was authored by Karl Aquino, Stefan Thau, Maja Graso, Cory Clark, Constantin Lagios, Simon Lloyd D. Restubog, and Tianyujun Lu.
