Hurricane Katrina and Attributions of Responsibility MARK J. MARTINKO DENISE M. BREAUX ARTHUR D. MARTINEZ JAMES SUMMERS PAUL HARVEY A nyone who witnessed the events unfolding after the landfall of Hurricane Katrina had to ask why there were so many differences in the perceptions of the causes and consequences of the catastrophe.At one point, Mayor Ray Nagin estimated that there were possibly more than 10,000 casualties. The President of the United States was sitting on his farm in Crawford- ville Texas,apparently failing to recognize that there was an emergency that required his attention. Governor Blanco appeared teary eyed on national television, ask- ing for a prayer meeting and blaming the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA’s) poor response for the plight ofher state.Michael Brown, the Director of FEMA, appeared unaware of the immedi- ate needs for food and water in the city of New Orleans. The news media expressed almost complete disbelief and frustration that no one was coming to the aid of the people in the Superdome and the Convention Center. On the surface,it appeared that the reactions ofpublic officials to the catastrophe ranged from apathy to panic, with almost everyone appearing to shirk and deny responsibility – and the news media had a field day exploiting the apparent incompetence of government officials. We were all motivated to ask: ‘‘How can these people have been so unaware of the pressing needs for action and their own responsibilities?’’ The purpose of this article is to explain, at least in part,how and why there were so many different per- ceptions about the need and responsibility for aid and rescue efforts following Hurricane Katrina. Our primary explanatory construct is the actor–observer bias. We will begin by defining and explaining this well-known bias and its implications.We will then illustrate this bias in action with examples of statements by actors and observers associated with the Hurricane Katrina disaster.The article will end with a discussion of the strategies that can be used to reduce the negative con- sequences ofthe actor–observer bias by facilitating unbiased causal statements in both disaster situations and the larger context of leader-member relations. T H E O R E T I C A L B A C K G R O U N D T h e A c t o r – O b s e r v e r B i a s The actor–observer bias is defined as the tendency of actors to attribute their outcomes (e.g., failures) to situational factors, while observers tend to explain the actors’ outcomes with inferences about the actors’ personal characteristics. The actor is the person behav- ing or performing. In the case of Hurricane Katrina, the actors were Mayor Nagin, Governor Blanco, President Bush, and Michael Brown, all of whom were attempt- ing to explain their actions.The observers were the news media, average citizens, and congressional inves- tigators. According to attribution theory, the primary cause of the actor–observer bias is the difference in the focus of attention of the actors versus the observers. More specifically,when actors are performing, the focus of their attention is on their situation. As a result of their focus on the situation, actors tend to explain their outcomes and behaviors in terms of the situation that they were confronted with at the time of their perfor- mance.Because ofthe differences in their physical locations and status, different information was received by President Bush, Mayor Nagin, Michael Brown and Governor Blanco. Thus their explanations of what was happening and why were naturally based on the information and the situation that they were attending to at the time of the disaster. On the other hand,the news media,the television viewing public, and the members of Congress who later investigated the incident were focusing their attention on the actors. As predicted by the actor–observer bias, many observers blamed the negative outcomes associated with Hurricane Katrina on the characteristics of the actors,while minimizing situational factors. There are many examples that can help illustrate this bias in action.A baseball game is a good exam- ple. The fans are the observers.The players are the actors. When Mark McGuire, Sammie Sosa, and Barry Bonds were challenging the season home run records, they were often interviewed after the games. When they failed to hit a home run, the players (i.e.,actors) most frequently explained their failure in terms of the situational factors that they were attending to when they were batting. Thus they oftentimes explained that the pitcher failed to give them a pitch they could hit. Similarly, when they hit a home run, they also often referred to the situa- tional factors that they were attending to at the time such as ‘‘the pitcher made a mistake and threw a fast ball right in my sweet spot.’’On the other hand,the Organizational Dynamics, Vol. 38, No. 1, pp. 52–63, 2009 ISSN 0090-2616/$ – see frontmatter ß 2008 Elsevier Inc.All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.orgdyn.2008.10.003 www.elsevier.com/locate/orgdyn 52