Framing organizations as underdogs increase perceived suffering and empathy for them

When in trouble, organizations often seek to elicit empathy. Empathy is often elicited through perceived suffering, but people generally do not perceive organizations to suffer. Across seven studies, we test whether using decoys can increase perceived suffering and hence empathy: we either frame the target organization as an underdog (by presenting it next to a larger decoy organization) or by itself as a sole dog (without any comparison). We find that it does. Further supporting our hypothesis, we find that the underdog effect attenuates if a third, even smaller organization is presented along the target and comparison organizations, and if the underdog organization is in a different industry from the larger organization. Additionally, when people perceive increased suffering and empathy, they are both more likely to expend effort helping it and allow the organization to engage in unethical behaviors. Our work extends research on moral perceptions and judgments of organizations.