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Hallmark: Credits enable sins too often

Posted: July 6, 2012 - 9:54pm
  Amarillo Globe-News
Amarillo Globe-News

We all have friends who act like “jerks” from time to time, but we tolerate their behavior because they generally behave well. 

This, in a nutshell, is the theory of idiosyncrasy credits, as posited more than 50 years ago by social psychologist Edwin Hollander.

Essentially, this theory posits that individuals “bank” credits with others by engaging in beneficial behaviors.  These beneficial behaviors create “positively disposed impressions,” providing the individual a wide range of benefits, one being people view the person’s behavior more positively than a more objective perception would provide.  Furthermore, the person has “credits” that come in handy when the person engages in negative behavior.

Because of idiosyncrasy credits, we give people “the benefit of the doubt.” We extend grace to them. This also means people get away with things perhaps they shouldn’t.

I find this to be a useful theory that explains a wide range of behaviors from abusive relationships to oddly matched partnerships.  Hollander’s theory does not require the banking and credits be rational, only that they exist. 

Without idiosyncrasy credits, we would quickly unfriend offending individuals and move on. However with idiosyncrasy credits, the offending individual burns a credit or two (or 12) because of their bad behavior, but they continue to be part of the group.

I have generally shied away from comment on the Jerry Sandusky trial and conviction.  Much can and has been said about his conviction and about child abuse in general.  What I find most puzzling, however, is not that predators abuse our children, but that otherwise good citizens observe evidence of this horrific behavior and look the other way, or conclude nothing unusual is happening.

The telling moment for me was June 18 when longtime assistant coach Richard Anderson testified coaches routinely saw Sandusky take young boys into the shower with him but never saw him do anything wrong or inappropriate.

Really? Never saw anything wrong or inappropriate? How about that he took little boys into the shower with him?

What could lead otherwise honorable people to this interpretation?

The only explanation I can fathom is idiosyncrasy credits.  Sandusky had banked credits within this subculture such that behavior otherwise inappropriate, if not criminal, was reinterpreted as “nothing wrong or inappropriate.” 

The obvious life lesson from Anderson’s absurd statement is to not let our good judgment be clouded by the loyalty that comes from holding idiosyncrasy credits. 

I would bet Sandusky’s behavior would not have been tacitly condoned were it not for his existing status, power, influence and goodwill.

Of course I am no less disturbed by the number of times I might have played the role of Richard Anderson, of the person who observed unacceptable behavior but looked the other way or convinced myself it was not as it appeared.

Frankly, I have been in situations where I allowed unacceptable behavior to continue longer than should have been allowed.  I have dismissed a complaint against a faculty member because I “knew it just couldn’t be true” of that person.  It was true, but I allowed the faculty member’s extant idiosyncrasy credits to cloud my judgment and to allow an untenable situation to continue. 

Certainly, children were not being molested nor laws broken, but students were nonetheless disadvantaged by the poor performance. I am sure this has happened more than I would like to admit.

Idiosyncrasy credits are useful mechanisms of social interaction, allowing for grace and forgiveness among individuals, and certainly we need more grace and forgiveness.   Still, we must guard against them lest they lead us to tacitly condone and enable unacceptable behavior.

Dr. James Hallmark is vice chancellor for academic affairs for Texas A&M University.

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