Social Psychology Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Marc Mertes1a, Robert Böhm2, Joachim Hüffmeier1 1 Department of Psychology, TU Dortmund University, Dortmund, Germany, 2 Faculty of Psychology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria Keywords: terrorist hostage-takings, no-concessions policy, moral dilemma, information processing https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.124482 Collabra: Psychology Vol. 10, Issue 1, 2024 Governmental responses to the frequently occurring terrorist hostage-takings, in which authorities must weigh the lives of the hostages against the lives of potential future victims, depend on popular support for governmental policy. Yet, little is known about how people form their judgement of governmental policies in this moral dilemma. We argue that people typically have imperfect information and their policy support for concessions can be substantially altered by changing the information they possess about different consequences. Across three studies (overall N = 1,547) employing both qualitative and quantitative methods, we found that (a) support for concessions is negatively linked to age and political conservatism, (b) most people either focus only on one aspect or have an imperfect representation of this moral dilemma when thinking about their support for concessions, (c) providing information on the benefits of concessions increases support for concessions, and (d) support for concessions increases when the benefits outweigh the costs and when a salient moral norm prescribes concessions. The potential implications for policymakers are discussed. Most Americans consider terrorism a major threat (Poushter & Fagan, 2020) and debates about acceptable ways to deal with this threat divide the nation (Gramlich, 2018; Tyson, 2017). Should governments concede to terror- ist hostage-takers (Borger et al., 2014), who abduct thou- sands of people every year and threaten to kill them unless authorities meet their demands (Miller, 2020)? Conceding to terrorists’ demands increases the likelihood of a safe hostage release and reduces casualties in hostage-taking situations (Mertes et al., 2020, 2021), but increases the like- lihood of future abductions (Brandt et al., 2016). Thus, ter- rorist hostage-takings pose a moral dilemma, in which gov- ernments must weigh the lives of the hostages currently under threat against the lives of people who might be en- dangered in the future (e.g., Scheuer, 1990). Beliefs on how to respond to this dilemma seem strong and persistent. The U.S., like many countries (e.g., Borger et al., 2014), have a long-standing policy to deny terrorists concessions (The White House, 2015). Given adherence, this no-concessions policy (hereafter NCP) is an effective means of reducing terrorist hostage takings (Brandt et al., 2016). Yet even the most ardent proponents of the NCP vi- olate it from time to time (e.g., Callimachi, 2014a). When governments do violate their official NCP, public opinion may be a critical decision factor (Burstein, 2003), as de- mocratic governments disregarding public opinion risk los- ing voter support (cf. McNair, 2017). The members of a society are collectively and indirectly responsible for the decisions their elected government officials make, includ- ing the decision to grant or not to grant concessions (to terrorist hostage takers). There are even cases where the pronounced and public support for concessions by various (influential) societal members may have directly impacted such decisions (e.g., the recent prisoner exchange between the US and Russia to free Brittney Griner; Shear & Baker, 2022). The NCP is a policy for life-and-death situations. If the enforcement of such a policy depends on public sup- port, it is critical to understand how popular support emerges and what shapes popular support. It is therefore our goal in the current research to investigate popular sup- port for the NCP as a guideline to handle terrorist hostage- takings. Despite the important potential implications for policymaking, previous research has so far ignored the question of how people judge their government’s responses to terrorist hostage-takings. We address this research gap in three studies. We inves- tigate the level of support for the NCP, the reasons why as well as the conditions under which people support the pol- icy. Before we delineate our studies, we want to contextu- alize the NCP and describe the unique features of terror- Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Marc Mertes, Department of Psychology, TU Dortmund University, Emil-Figge-Straße 50, 44227 Dortmund, Germany. E-mail: marc.mertes@tu-dortmund.de. a Mertes, M., Böhm, R., & Hüffmeier, J. (2024). Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings. Collabra: Psychology, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.124482 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.124482 https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.124482 ist hostage-takings in comparison to the Trolley problem as probably the most prominent moral dilemma. The No-Concessions Policy The NCP refers to the general policy of denying terrorists the benefits of concessions (e.g., Jenkins, 2018). As the Obama administration reaffirmed in a presidential policy directive, “[…] the United States Government will make no concessions to individuals or groups holding U.S. nationals hostage. It is United States policy to deny hostage-takers the benefits of ransom, prisoner releases, policy changes, or other acts of concession” (The White House, 2015). Con- cessions to terrorist hostage takers encourage more hostage takings in the future (Brandt et al., 2016). This means that adopting and adhering to the NCP, although it fails to com- pletely eliminate hostage takings as theory would suggest (e.g. Jenkins, 2018), represents an effective means of reduc- ing the frequency of hostage takings (Brandt et al., 2016). Although the recent decades have seen increased efforts to spread the NCP in an attempt to contain global terrorist hostage-taking, the number of states that adopted the NCP is difficult to determine, but it is at least officially widely adopted. For instance, in 2013, the G8 countries (i.e., France, Germany, Italy, the U.K., Japan, the U.S., Canada, and Russia) committed (or reaffirmed their commitment) not to pay ransoms to terrorist groups (Borger et al., 2014; The White House, 2013). Moreover, there have been several UN resolutions with the goal to stop concessions to terror- ist hostage-takers (UN General Assembly Resolution 579, 1985; UN General Assembly Resolution 638, 1989; UN Gen- eral Assembly Resolution 1904, 2009; UN General Assembly Resolution 2133, 2014). These resolutions should, in prin- ciple, affect the policies of 193 states—some of which are themselves known state sponsors of terrorism (e.g., Bureau of Counterterrorism, 2021). It is even more difficult to determine how many of its official adopters actually adhere to the NCP since officially professing to adopting the NCP does not stop countries from paying ransoms or making other kinds of concessions to terrorist hostage-takers (Human Rights Council Advisory Committee of the United Nations, 2013). For instance, shortly after their G8 commitment, Germany (Philippine Militants Release Two German Hostages, 2014), France (Cal- limachi, 2014a), and Italy (Al Jazeera Investigative Unit, 2015) paid millions in ransoms. As another example, in 2014, the U.S. government agreed to release five impris- oned Taliban fighters to ensure the release of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl (Knowlton, 2014). When governments do violate their official NCP, public opinion may be a decisive factor. There is a well-established and substantial link between public opinion and public pol- icy (for an overview, see Burstein, 2003). The support for this general link comes from various sources: studies com- paring public polls with later policymaking (Monroe, 1998), interviews with politicians (see Walgrave et al., 2022), cit- izen resistance and ensuing changes in planned legislation (Park & Ham, 2022), and survey experiments with politi- cians as participants (e.g., Sevenans, 2021). When an issue is salient, the impact of public opinion is further enhanced (Burstein, 2003). Terrorist hostage-takings are salient, es- pecially when they receive news coverage over extended pe- riods of time (e.g., Gaibulloev & Sandler, 2009). Moreover, public opinion affects non-elected (military) officials’ will- ingness to recommend the use of force in conflicts (e.g., Lin-Greenberg, 2021). The case of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl we mentioned above (Knowlton, 2014) serves as an example of this link. Bergdahl was a highly salient hostage. He had been in cap- tivity for five years, labeled “America’s last prisoner of war” by the press (Hastings, 2012). Foreign media suspected that President Obama used the Bergdahl exchange to limit the damages of a scandal involving the deaths of veterans due to negligent treatment in an Arizona Veterans Health Ad- ministrations facility (Ross, 2014; Zezima, 2014). Most De- mocrats agreed that the Bergdahl exchange was the right thing to do and that the United States are responsible for securing the release of captives, no matter the circum- stances (Pew Research Center, 2014). As we mentioned before, terrorist hostage-takings pose a moral dilemma for authorities. We argue that citizens, de- ciding whether they support or oppose their government’s decision in a terrorist hostage-situation, face a parallel moral dilemma, but under different circumstances, which we will describe below. Thus, in the following, we classify terrorist hostage-takings as moral dilemmas and explain the differences from typical dilemmas used in research on moral judgments. Terrorist Hostage-Takings as a Moral Dilemma Terrorist hostage-taking dilemmas differ from many other moral dilemmas typically used in research in three important ways. We want to illustrate these differences by comparing the terrorist hostage dilemma to the Trolley problem (Foot, 1967). We believe that this comparison serves the understanding of terrorist hostage takings as moral dilemmas because the Trolley problem is the most well-known and best-researched moral dilemma (Gawron- ski & Ng, 2024). It is so prominent that research employing it and other structurally similar moral dilemmas is being re- ferred to as trolleyology (Greene, 2023). It exists in various forms, but in its original and most common description, a runaway trolley on a railway track is on collision course with five people who, if hit, are certain to die in the crash. Whoever is presented with this moral dilemma takes the role of an observer witnessing this catastrophe in the mak- ing. They see that there is another track, on which there is only one person. The observer stands next to the lever that controls the switch. If they pull the lever, the trolley will be redirected to the other track, where it will kill only the one person instead of five. This means that pulling the lever will reduce the number of casualties from five to one, but it will make the observer directly responsible for the death of the victim. Would it be acceptable to pull the lever and redi- rect the trolley? By asking this question, the Trolley prob- lem and its structural equivalents “pit moral norms against consequences for the greater good” (Gawronski & Ng, 2024, p. 2). Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 2 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 We use this description as a basis to highlight the three central differences between the terrorist hostage dilemma and trolleyology dilemmas. First, artificial moral dilemmas such as the Trolley problem have been criticized for a lack of experimental, psychological, and mundane realism (Bau- man et al., 2014): Participants often consider them abstract thought experiments rather than situations that they could actually find themselves in, often to a point where they elicit humorous reactions. This reduces the external valid- ity in studies employing such dilemmas. In contrast, ter- rorist hostage-takings represent frequently occurring real- world moral dilemmas with great societal relevance (e.g., Callimachi, 2014a). Second, in artificial moral dilemmas such as the Trolley dilemma, people are typically fully informed about all out- comes of the decision they are presented with. In the Trol- ley problem, pulling the lever results in one rather than five deaths. In contrast, when people become aware of an on- going hostage situation through the media, the dilemma is usually not described in full detail. This may be due to a factual lack of knowledge on the part of the reporting me- dia. Only recently have scholarly efforts led to a more com- prehensive understanding of the consequences of the deci- sion to concede to terrorist hostage-takers (e.g., Brandt et al., 2016; Mertes et al., 2020, 2021). Given that not every scientific insight permeates the general public, and that it typically takes a considerable amount of time to do so, we assume that most people’s understanding of the terrorist hostage dilemma is imperfect. It is thus likely that people try to augment their understanding of the dilemma by re- sorting to other sources of information, such as widespread assumptions about terrorist behavior. Based on the avail- ability and validity of information, this may result in a bi- ased representation of the objective situation and to related inter-individual differences. For example, it is a common misconception that terrorists are generally afflicted by mental illnesses and thus unable to act rationally (e.g., Silke, 1998; see also Noor et al., 2019). A person whose rep- resentation of the terrorist hostage dilemma is informed by this misconception might be more likely to reject the no- tion of conceding or engaging in diplomacy (Pronin et al., 2006). It is also possible that certain information exists but is misrepresented to or even hidden from the public (e.g., Callimachi, 2014a; Sanger, 2016). For example, political fig- ures have often defended the NCP saying that denying con- cessions deters future hostage-takings (e.g., Obama on Pay- ments to Iran, 2016), although adoption of the NCP does not eliminate hostage takings entirely (e.g., Brandt et al., 2016; Jenkins, 2018). Third, in most artificial moral dilemmas, the conse- quences are certain. In the Trolley problem, the deaths of the people bound to be hit by the trolley are unavoidable. Terrorist hostage-taking dilemmas, in contrast, have un- certain outcomes. While conceding increases the likelihood of a safe hostage release (Mertes et al., 2020, 2021), it is a common concern that terrorists might not keep their promises (e.g., Bapat, 2006). Likewise, there are cases in which authorities deny concessions and the terrorists still decide to let the hostages go (Mertes et al., 2020). More- over, while concessions increase the likelihood of future attacks, these attacks may never happen and consistent denial of concessions does not eliminate terrorist hostage- takings entirely (e.g., Brandt et al., 2016). These uncer- tainties may give rise to several psychological effects on individual perceptions and judgements of governmental policies, such as hindsight bias (e.g., Christensen-Szalanski & Willham, 1991) and loss aversion (Tversky & Kahneman, 1991). Depending on which information is available to them, people might perceive the consequences of conces- sions to terrorist hostage-takers as more or less certain. This, in turn, might affect their NCP support: The lower they perceive the likelihood of a safe hostage release and the higher they perceive the likelihood of an increase in ab- ductions in the future, the more they should support the notion that authorities should never concede to terrorist hostage-takers. In sum, terrorist hostage dilemmas differ from the Trol- ley problem and its structural equivalents. First, they are more realistic. Second, individuals often lack a comprehen- sive understanding of the terrorist hostage dilemma as it is typically not fully unfolded. Third, the anticipated con- sequences of the decision required by the terrorist hostage dilemma are uncertain. Understanding people’s support for the NCP has great relevance, but is unlikely to be informed from trolleyology studies, which constitute the bulk of moral dilemma research (e.g., Gawronski & Ng, 2024). Thus, per- tinent empirical research is desirable. Overview of the Current Research Terrorist hostage takings represent a global issue. Many countries have officially adopted the NCP to contain terror- ist hostage situations, yet they frequently violate this pol- icy (e.g., Borger et al., 2014; Callimachi, 2014a). Public sup- port for the NCP likely plays a crucial role in this decision. Despite potential implications for policymaking, previous research has not examined which factors influence public support for the NCP. In three studies, we thus aimed to an- swer the following questions: To what extent, why, and un- der which circumstances do people support the NCP? In Study 1, we surveyed U.S. Americans to gain an overview of the extent to which they support the NCP and whether they are aware that it is the official policy of their government for dealing with terrorist hostage situations. Additionally, we investigated the reasons they provide for their NCP support. In Study 2, we investigated to what ex- tent people understand the consequences of the decision to make concessions in a terrorist hostage taking and whether their support for the NCP can be altered by manipulating the information regarding the benefits and costs of conces- sions available to them. In Study 3, we drew from recent moral dilemma research (e.g., Gawronski et al., 2017; Gawronski & Beer, 2017) to investigate which moral princi- ples drive moral judgments and, consequently, support for the NCP when people are fully informed about the terrorist hostage dilemma. This study enables us to identify charac- teristics of terrorist hostage situations that lead to higher or lower support for the NCP. Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 3 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 In sum, our research contributes to a better understand- ing of (i) the extent to which people support the NCP, (ii) the reasons underlying their support, (iii) whether their support for the NCP is based on a comprehensive under- standing of the terrorist hostage dilemma, (iv) whether pro- viding information on the benefits and costs of concessions can alter their NCP support, and (v) which moral principles guide their support for the NCP. Finally, our work provides insights into (vi) the link between demographic variables (e.g., age, political ideology) and support for the NCP. In the following sections, we will describe our three studies. In each study, we will present the relevant theoret- ical models and derive from them the specific hypotheses and research questions that we will test and investigate. In each study, we briefly discuss the findings before we con- solidate the results in the general discussion. Study 1 In this first exploratory and qualitative survey, we wanted to obtain an overview of whether Americans are aware of what their government’s policy on concessions to terrorist hostage-takers is and to what extent they support it. We further aimed to learn what motivates their NCP sup- port. Method Sample We collected data from N = 301 U.S. American Prolific users (43.85% female, 1.33% other; Mage = 35.09, SDage = 11.33) who were potential voters. We chose this sample size to ensure stable correlations (Schönbrodt & Perugini, 2013). They received $1 as remuneration. A bootstrapped one-sample t-test1 of political ideology (see the Measures section below) against the midpoint of the scale (4) re- vealed a tendency towards liberalism (M = 3.17, SD = 1.69), t(300) = -8.55, p < .001, d = -0.49, 95% CI = [-1.02; -0.63]. Procedure After participants provided informed consent, we told them that we were interested in their opinion on terrorist hostage-takings. As we wanted to know what people think based on their presumably imperfect understanding of hostage dilemmas, we only outlined the basic premise of hostage-takings: “In hostage-takings, terrorists abduct people and threaten to kill them unless the authorities con- cede to their demands.” Participants then filled out a short questionnaire (see below). Study completion took on aver- age five minutes. Measures We measured support for the NCP using one item (“The government should never concede to terrorist demands.”). Participants indicated their support for the NCP on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = fully disagree, 7 = fully agree). We used this item to address the lack of realism that trolleyol- ogy dilemmas have been criticized for in the past (Bauman et al., 2014). People are unlikely to come into a situation, in which they must make the decision to pay or deny ran- som to terrorist hostage-takers (i.e., the government’s de- cision, which they would never have to make). Instead, we ask them to what extent they support the NCP (Studies 1, 2, and 3), how appropriate they would deem ransom pay- ments, and whether they would act with the intent to sway the government to make concessions in a petition (both Study 3). These decisions are in line with decisions that cit- izens might have to make after learning about an ongoing terrorist hostage-taking. We assessed participants’ knowledge of what the U.S. government’s standing policy on concessions to terrorists is using one item (“Please indicate what you think the gov- ernment’s policy on dealing with terrorist hostage-takers is: The government’s policy is to never concede to terror- ists”). We asked participants to rate their agreement with the statement on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = fully disagree, 7 = fully agree). We asked participants to explain which information they factored into their decision when they rated to what extent they agree with the NCP in free text. We assessed the participant’s political ideology using one item by Motta et al. (2018): “When it comes to politics, how do you usually think of yourself?”. Participants an- swered on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = extremely liberal; 7 = extremely conservative). Finally, we asked participants to indicate their age (in years) as well as their gender (female, male, or other). Results and Discussion Table 1 shows descriptive statistics and intercorrelations for all variables of this study. A bootstrapped one-sample t-test against the maximum of the scale (7)—indicating that the U.S. follow the NCP—revealed that participants had an imperfect understanding of their government’s policy re- garding terrorist hostage-takings (M = 5.41, SD = 1.49), t(300) = -18.51, p < .001, d = -1.07, 95% CI = [-1,75; -1.41]. Overall, participants supported the NCP (M = 4.96, SD = 1.62), which is indicated by the significant deviation from the scale midpoint, t(300) = 10.31, p < .001, d = 0.59, 95% CI = [0.78; 1.14]. Older (r = .15, p < .01) and more conser- vative (r = .22, p < .001) participants indicated higher NCP support. Throughout the manuscript, we used bootstrapping procedures when the normality assumption of t-tests was violated. All bootstrapping procedures were conducted with 1,000 bootstrap samples. In Studies 2 and 3, this is a deviation from the preregistrations. 1 Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 4 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Table 1. Descriptive Statistics and Intercorrelations for All Variables in Study 1 Intercorrelations Variable M (SD) 1 2 3 4 1 NPC support 4.96 (1.62) - 2 Policy knowledge 5.41 (1.49) .47*** - 3 Political ideology 3.17 (1.69) .22*** .06 - 4 Age 35.09 (11.33) .15** .10 .11 - Note. N = 301, *** p < .001, ** p < .01 Qualitative Analysis The open answers to the question of why people support the NCP were segmented into separate statements and an- alyzed. Statements were coded using terms that best de- scribed their content (cf. Glaser & Strauss, 1967). Each dis- tinct reason to support or oppose the NCP became a new category. We compared new statements with existing cat- egories and created new categories when new information did not fit in with previously established categories. These steps were initially undertaken by a single coder and later checked by the first author. Conflicts were resolved through discussion. We also computed the frequencies with which the categories were mentioned to “gain a sense of how rep- resentative and widespread particular instances are” (Seale, 1999, p. 128). This approach yielded ten different categories, each rep- resenting a different motivation to support or oppose the NCP (for an overview, see Table 2). Seven categories oppose the idea of making concessions: deterrence, political appear- ance, distrust, orientation towards official policy, injustice, legitimacy, and principle. One hundred thirty-nine partic- ipants made such contra-concessions statements (47.3%). Many participants expressed worries or expectations that concessions might lead to more abductions in the future and stated that concessions should be withheld to deter these abductions (deterrence). Participants also expressed blatant distrust, stating that terrorists cannot be trusted to keep their promises once concessions are made (distrust). Some participants stated that concessions to terrorist hostage-takers should not be made because they would make the government appear weak to their enemies and other political entities (political appearance) or that they would legitimize the terrorists and their actions (legiti- macy). Others emphasized the moral reasons for withhold- ing concessions, stating that it would be unjust to reward terrorists for hurting people (injustice). All of these reasons are common and legitimate concerns that people have when discussing concessions to terrorist hostage takers (e.g., Bapat, 2006; Brandt et al., 2016; Toros, 2008). The other two categories of statements opposing con- cessions were also interesting because the statements made were less concerned with the outcomes of concessions to terrorist hostage-takers. Rather, they appeared to reflect circular reasoning. Some participants stated that conces- sions should not be made because it is the government’s of- ficial policy to not concede to terrorists (orientation towards official policy). Others stated that the government should not concede to terrorists on principle or because it is taboo without discussing the potential ramifications of conces- sions (principle). Two categories of statements supported the option to concede to terrorist hostage-takers: saving lives and empa- thy. Such pro-concessions statements occurred far less fre- quently than contra-concessions statements (only 29 par- ticipants, 9.9%). Participants prioritized the lives of the hostages, stating that the government should do what is necessary to save them (saving lives). Others stated that their decision was driven by empathy, saying that they ei- ther imagined how they would feel if their loved ones were held captive or what they would want the government to do if they were ever taken hostage (empathy). The distrib- ution of contra-concession and pro-concession statements suggests that people are either more aware of the potential costs of making concessions or that they are more con- cerned with these costs than with the benefits. The overall one-sidedness of the majority of statements indicates that people mainly focus on only one or a few, but not all poten- tial consequences of concessions to terrorists. It, thus, ap- pears as if most people have an imperfect representation of the terrorist hostage dilemma. The final category contained statements saying that there should be no hard stance on concessions and that the government should rather weigh the benefits and costs on a case-by-case basis (consideration). This was the largest cat- egory with the most statements (126 participants, 42.9%). Only statements from this category acknowledged both the positive and negative consequences of concessions to ter- rorist hostage-takers. Exploratory Analyses We wanted to explore links between the degree of pop- ular support for the NCP and the aspects of the terrorist hostage dilemma people focus on. Thus, we recoded the data into three groups for quantitative analysis on a more abstract level: participants only making statements oppos- ing concessions (n = 115), only making statements support- ing concessions (n = 24), and participants with a balanced view who made consideration statements or a mix of pro- and contra-concession statements (n = 129). We compared NCP support between these groups with a Kruskal-Wallis test, showing a significant main effect, H(2) = 112.09, p < .001, partial η² = 0.42. Participants opposing concessions (M = 6.12, SD = 0.95) supported the NCP more than partic- ipants who supported concessions (M = 3.67, SD = 1.83), z = Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 5 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Table 2. Categories Derived from the Qualitative Analysis of Free-Text Answers Category Description Exemplary Quote Frequency Deterrence Statements saying that the government should not concede to terrorist demands because concessions could lead to more attacks or demands in the future. “If the government concede to terrorist demands then this type of thing will occur again in near future.” 94 (32 %) Saving lives Statements saying that the government should concede to terrorist demands to save the hostages. “I believe if a person's life is on the line then the government should do what’s best to save lives.” 25 (8.5%) Consideration Statements saying that the government should decide on a case-by-case basis. These statements acknowledge the existence of positive and negative consequences of concessions and contain wording indicating that these consequences should be weighed against each other. “That (conceding) will simply lead to more demands in future terrorist hostage takings. At the same time the government should do what it can to protect the lives of hostages and at times that means negotiation to a point where the government concedes […]” 126 (42.9%) Political appearance Statements saying that the government should not concede because it would appear weak. “Conceding to terrorist demands undermines our government and makes us appear weaker to enemies, terrorists and foreign countries alike.” 13 (4.4%) Distrust Statements saying that the government should not concede because terrorists cannot be trusted. “[...] in general, terrorists can’t be trusted to keep their word, so meeting their demands serves little purpose.” 8 (2.7%) Orientation towards official policy Statements saying that the person's opinion on the matter is based on the government's official policy. “I guess I always have read in news reports that the government never negotiates with terrorists.” 3 (1.0%) Empathy Statements saying that the person thought about the suffering of the hostages and their families. Also contains statements saying that the person considered what they would want the government to do if they or their family were taken hostage. “I considered how the families of the victims must feel when the government doesn't concede and their loved one gets killed.” 4 (1.4%) Injustice Statements saying that the government should not concede to terrorist demands because it would be unjust to reward terrorists for bad or morally reprehensible behavior. “I do not want terrorists to think they can achieve their goals by hurting people. They should not be rewarded for their bad actions.” 6 (2.0%) Legitimacy Statements saying that the government should not concede to terrorist demands because conceding would ascribe legitimacy to the terrorists, their cause, and their means. “By conceding to terrorist demands they would be legitimating what they do […]” 3 (1.0%) Principle Statements saying that the government should not concede to terrorist demands on principle. This category was only coded when no other explanation was provided. “[…] it is a taboo for government to concede to the demands of terrorists.” 12 (4.1%) Note. Frequencies report how many participants made statements from the category in question. A total of 334 statements were made. 40 of these statements were inapplicable because no useful category could be formed. Percentages were calculated based on the remaining 294 cases. Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 6 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 6.43, p < .001, r = .39, and participants with a balanced view (M = 4.14, SD = 1.42), z = 9.96, p < .001, r = .61. NCP support did not differ between the latter two groups. While these findings are quite intuitive, they emphasize that NCP sup- port is linked to the aspects of the hostage dilemma (i.e., benefits, costs, or both) people focus on. Study 2 Study 1 provided supporting evidence for our assump- tion that (many) people may have an imperfect (i.e., in- complete or otherwise flawed) understanding of the ter- rorist hostage dilemma. In Study 2, we further looked into this assumption by conducting an experiment, in which we provided participants with varying information before they indicated their support. Specifically, we manipulated the availability of information on the benefits of concessions in the form of an increased likelihood of a safe hostage re- lease (hereafter shortened to benefits) and costs of conces- sions in the form of an increased likelihood of more abduc- tions in the future (hereafter simplified to costs) separately. Making a moral decision requires people to weigh the ben- efits and costs of that decision against each other. If people fully understand the consequences of concessions in terror- ist hostage situations, then the one-sided provision of in- formation about the benefits or costs of concessions should not affect their NCP support because they already have that information. If, however, people have an incomplete or otherwise flawed understanding of the consequences, then one-sided information on the benefits or costs might be able to alter their NCP support.2 Theory and Preregistered Hypotheses We derived our hypotheses from the heuristic-system- atic model of information processing (Chaiken & Ledger- wood, 2012; Chen & Chaiken, 1999). The heuristic-system- atic model proposes that there are two stylized ways of processing information: heuristic and systematic processing. Heuristic processing focuses on salient cues and learned judgmental rules, while the more effortful systematic pro- cessing entails attempts to thoroughly understand and process available information. Heuristic processing guides judgement when people lack motivation or ability to sys- tematically process information. Given that most people consider terrorism a major threat (Poushter & Fagan, 2020), we assume that motivation to process information on the matter is high. However, when people have only limited information about the potential consequences of concessions, their ability should be low and their judgement should be guided by heuristic informa- tion, such as stereotypes about terrorist behavior, values, norms, and consensus information (e.g., Lau & Redlawsk, 2001; Silke, 1998). As a result, NCP support should be high. Providing people with information should increase their knowledge and, thus, their ability, resulting in a higher likelihood of systematic processing. The systematic pro- cessing of information on the benefits should lead to more favorable views on concessions. The systematic processing of information on the costs, in turn, should lead to less fa- vorable views. In accordance with these arguments, we de- rived the following hypotheses: Hypothesis 1: People who are given only information on the benefits should support the NCP less than people who receive no information. Hypothesis 2: People who are only given information on the costs should support the NCP more than people who receive no information. Method Design Our experiment used a 2 (information on benefits: given vs. not given) × 2 (information on costs: given vs. not given) between-subjects design. Thus, participants were randomly assigned to one of the following four conditions: no infor- mation, just benefits, just costs, and full information. Sample An a priori power analysis (α = .05, 1-β = .80, number of groups = 4, numerator df = 1) conducted with G*Power 3.1.9.4. (Faul et al., 2007) showed that detecting a small to medium-sized effect (f = .15) in an ANOVA requires a sam- ple of N = 351. Our final sample consisted of N = 417 Ameri- can Prolific users, who received $1 as remuneration (45.56% female, 0.48% other; Mage = 34.05, SDage = 11.44). None of them had participated in Study 1. Using the same question as in Study 1, a one sample t-test against the scale-mid- point showed that participants leaned, again, towards lib- eralism (M = 3.16, SD = 1.65), t(416) = -10.38, p < .001, d = -0.51, 95% CI = [-0.98; -0.70]. Age, gender distribution, and political ideology did not differ across conditions. Procedure After participants gave informed consent, they read a paragraph with general information. In the control con- dition (n = 112), participants received no additional in- formation. Depending on the experimental condition, par- ticipants received another paragraph containing additional information, saying that concessions increased the likeli- hood of a safe hostage release (i.e., benefits; n = 103), that concessions increase the likelihood of future abductions (i.e., costs; n = 101), or both (n = 101; for the exact word- ing see Table 3). We developed these manipulations based on findings from recent pertinent research (Brandt et al., This study was preregistered. The preregistration can be accessed at https://osf.io/ ubqvz/?view_only=ca8829c698fb449c8c4cda37a321501b. 2 Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 7 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 https://osf.io/ubqvz/?view_only=ca8829c698fb449c8c4cda37a321501b https://osf.io/ubqvz/?view_only=ca8829c698fb449c8c4cda37a321501b Table 3. Manipulations Used in Study 2 General paragraph In hostage-takings, terrorists abduct people and threaten to kill them unless the authorities concede to their demands. Many countries, including the United States of America, have a no-concessions policy. This means that they deny hostage-takers the benefits of ransom, prisoner releases, policy changes, or other acts of concession. Additional paragraph Information on benefits: not given Information on benefits: given Information on costs: not given no additional paragraph presented (n = 112) Recent studies have shown that conceding to the demands of terrorist hostage-takers increases the likelihood that the hostages are released safely. This means that concessions can reduce casualties in the hostage situation at hand. (n = 103) Information on costs: given Recent studies have shown that conceding to the demands of terrorist hostage-takers creates an incentive for abductions. This means that concessions increase the likelihood of more hostage- takings in the future. (n = 101) Recent studies showed that conceding to the demands of terrorist hostage-takers increases the likelihood that the hostages are released safely, but creates an incentive for abductions. This means that concessions can reduce casualties in the hostage situation at hand, but increase the likelihood of more hostage-takings in the future. (n = 101) 2016; Mertes et al., 2020, 2021). Participants then filled out a questionnaire (see the Measures section below). Study completion took on average about five minutes. Measures We measured NCP support using the same item as in Study 1. We used one item each to measure the partici- pants’ consideration for the norm (“When I answered the question of how the government should act, I thought pri- marily about the fact that it is the norm not to concede to terrorists.”), the potential benefits of concessions to terror- ists (“…, I thought primarily about the benefits that conces- sions to terrorists could have.”), and the potential costs of concessions to terrorists (“…, I thought primarily about the damages that concessions to terrorists can cause.”). Partici- pants were asked to indicate their agreement to each state- ment on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = completely disagree, 7 = completely agree). We measured the perceived credibility of the information provided in the manipulations using one item (“I found the general information on terrorist hostage-taking that I read in this study to be credible”). Participants answered on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = completely disagree, 7 = completely agree). We further measured the perceived likelihood of a safe hostage release and future attacks after concessions were made using one item each (“The terrorists will safely re- lease the hostages after they receive what they demanded” and “The terrorists will use the resources they gain from authority concessions to execute further attacks in the fu- ture” respectively). Participants answered on a 7-point Lik- ert scale (1 = highly unlikely, 7 = highly likely). Measures for political ideology, age, and gender were identical to those used in Study 1. Results and Discussion Table 4 shows descriptive statistics and intercorrelations for all variables assessed in Study 2. The average NCP sup- port was, again, high (M = 5.06, SD = 1.70), t(416) = 12.79, p < .001, d = 0.63, 95% CI = [0.90; 1.23]. Again, older (r = .12, p < .05) and more conservative (r = .14, p < .01) participants reported stronger NCP support. Confirmatory Analyses Table 5 shows the descriptive statistics, on which the fol- lowing analyses are based. Due to a violation of the normal- ity assumption, we decided to deviate from the preregis- tration and used a robust trimmed-means ANOVA (Mair & Wilcox, 2020) with NCP support as the criterion and infor- mation on benefits and costs as the predictors.3 It revealed a main effect of information on benefits, F(1, 413) = 24.24, p < .001, partial η² = 0.06. Participants who received informa- tion on benefits supported the NCP less than participants who received no information, t(190.787) = 4.45, p < .001, d = 0.61, 95% CI = [0.52; 1.56]. This finding supports Hy- pothesis 1. No other main or interaction effects were found. Contrary to Hypothesis 2, participants who received infor- mation on the costs of concessions and participants who re- ceived no information did not differ in their NCP support, t(211) = -0.22, p = .826, d = -0.03, 95% CI = [-0.43; 0.33]. Figure 1 depicts violin plots of NCP support across the four experimental conditions in Study 2. Exploratory Analyses To further illuminate the results pattern of Study 2, we conducted analyses for variables that we collected for ex- ploratory reasons. In these analyses, we observed relevant effects that were unique to the provision of information on We applied a trimming level of 20%. An uncorrected ANOVA yielded equivalent results. 3 Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 8 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Table 4. Descriptive Statistics and Intercorrelations for All Variables in Study 2 Intercorrelations Variable M (SD) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 1 NCP support 5.06 (1.70) - 2 Consideration of norm 4.39 (1.91) .24*** - 3 Consideration of benefits 4.64 (1.85) -.03 .10* - 4 Consideration of costs 5.75 (1.40) .49*** .18*** .08 - 5 Perceived credibility 5.53 (1.23) .20*** .11* .11* .18*** - 6 Perceived likelihood of hostage release 3.55 (1.59) -.32*** -.17*** .10* -.20*** -.01 - 7 Perceived likelihood of future attacks 5.84 (1.24) .49*** .23*** -.04 .38*** .28*** -.31*** - 8 Political ideology 3.16 (1.65) .14** .03 -.09 -.01 .08 -.10* .10* - 9 Age 34.05 (11.44) .12* -.01 -.10* -.03 .12* .01 .09 .18*** - 10 Information on benefits: given -.25*** -.04 .02 -.07 -.17*** .26*** -.15** .01 -.10 - 11 Information on costs: given .04 -.01 .08 .07 .08 -.03 .01 .00 -.05 .02 - Note. N = 417, *** p < .001, ** p <. 01 * p <. 05 Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 9 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Table 5. Means and Standard Deviations for NCP Support, Perceived Likelihood of Hostage Release, and Perceived Likelihood of Future Attacks by Experimental Condition M (SD) No information Information on benefits given Information on costs given Information on benefits and costs given NCP support 5.50 (1.47) 4.46 (1.92) 5.46 (1.47) 4.80 (1.69) Perceived likelihood of hostage release 3.17 (1.56) 4.06 (1.52) 3.14 (1.47) 3.87 (1.59) Perceived likelihood of future attacks 6.05 (1.26) 5.59 (1.37) 5.99 (1.03) 5.72 (1.25) Note. No information n = 112, only information on benefits n = 103, only information on costs n = 101, information on benefits and costs given n = 101 Figure 1. Violin Plots of NCP Support across Experimental Conditions in Study 2 Note. Grey-shaded areas depict rotated kernel density. Thick black bar represents the median. Box represents the interquartile range (IQR). Whiskers depict minimum and maximum values within 1.5 IQR. Black points represent outliers. the benefits (see Table 3). The following analyses always describe comparisons with the control condition (i.e., the condition in which no additional information was pro- vided). Table 5 displays the descriptive statistics on which these analyses are based. Providing participants with the information on the benefits of concessions increased the perceived likelihood of a safe hostage release, MDiff = -0.81, t(415) = -5.40, p < .001, d = -0.53, 95% CI = [-1.11; -0.52]. This finding shows that the manipulation worked as in- tended. However, providing participants with this information also decreased their perceptions of the likelihood of future attacks, MDiff = 0.37, t(403.212) = 3.04, p = .003, d = 0.30, 95% CI = [0.13; 0.60]. This is interesting for two reasons. First, the presented information on the benefits of conces- sions did not entail any statement about the likelihood of future attacks (see Table 3). Second, participants did not deem future attacks more likely even when they were ex- plicitly told that concessions may increase the likelihood of future abductions (Brandt et al., 2016), MDiff = -0.02, t(412.124) = -0.20, p = .845, d = -0.02, 95% CI = [-0.26; 0.22]. Providing participants with this information may, thus, have confirmed their pre-existing expectations about ter- rorist behavior (e.g., that terrorist behavior is irrational and malevolent; e.g., Silke, 1998). This suggests that the participants may have already expected that concessions to terrorist hostage takers lead to more attacks in the fu- ture—this expectation was not increased by additional, cor- responding information. By contrast, the information that concessions can increase the likelihood of a safe hostage re- lease may have violated their expectations. There is further evidence for this interpretation: Provid- ing participants with information on the benefits of con- cessions led them to perceive the information they received as less credible, MDiff = 0.43, t(415) = 3.60, p < .001, d = 0.35, 95% CI = [0.20; 0.66], while providing them with in- formation on the costs did not, MDiff = -0.19, t(405.755) = -1.56, p = .120, d = -0.15, 95% CI = [-0.42; 0.05]. These asymmetrical findings revealed by our confirmatory and ex- ploratory analyses can be explained with one of the cen- Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 10 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 https://collabra.scholasticahq.com/article/124482-popular-support-for-the-no-concessions-policy-in-terrorist-hostage-takings/attachment/248606.png?auth_token=eAIRICguTDGsMaOG_kK2 tral tenets of the heuristic-systematic model. The model proposes that people balance their aspiration to be confi- dent in a decision with their preference to conserve cogni- tive resources (Chaiken & Ledgerwood, 2012). The differ- ence between a person’s confidence in their decision and the degree of confidence they desire is called the confidence gap. Closing bigger confidence gaps requires more effort- ful systematic processing. By challenging peoples’ expecta- tions about terrorist behavior, information on the benefits of concessions might widen the confidence gap, resulting in more systematic processing. This, in turn, may explain why only the provision of information on the benefits lead to changes in NCP support, while information on the costs of concessions did not. In sum, we find evidence supporting the notion that people have an imperfect understanding of the benefits but not of the costs of concessions in a terrorist hostage situation. Study 3 In Study 2, we investigated people’s responses to ter- rorist hostage-takings as a moral dilemma while varying the availability of information on potential benefits and costs of concessions. Building on these results, in Study 3, we were interested in people’s responses to this dilemma under complete information as it would be presented in modern moral dilemma research: Which moral principles drive moral judgements (and, thus, NCP support) in terror- ist hostage dilemmas? In the classic Trolley problem, the decision to take ac- tion—and thus killing one person so that five others can live—has been interpreted as utilitarian (i.e., maximizing overall wellbeing), while the decision to not take action has been interpreted as deontological (i.e., adhering to moral norms). Gawronski and his colleagues (2017) criticized this interpretation of choices in moral dilemmas for two rea- sons: First, the consequences and moral norms (i.e., the core aspects of the utilitarian and deontological principals) are typically confounded because they are rarely (if ever) subject to experimental manipulation. Second, interpreting moral decisions as either utilitarian or deontological disre- gards the possibility that a moral decision might be driven by a general preference for action or inaction, irrespective of the consequences and moral norms. Guided by Gawron- ski et al.‘s (2017) CNI model (consisting of the sensitivity to consequences, sensitivity to moral norms, and general preference for inaction versus action irrespective of conse- quences and moral norms), we addressed these limitations in our investigation of terrorist hostage-taking policies in Study 3 via independent manipulations of (i) the conse- quences of concessions, (ii) the salient moral norm, and (iii) whether supporting concessions was the action or inaction default. We also included further criterion variables beyond NCP support that are often employed in moral dilemma re- search (e.g., Körner et al., 2019, 2020): the perceived appro- priateness of taking action (i.e., making concessions) and participants’ intention to take action (i.e., support conces- sions).4 Theory, Preregistered Hypotheses, and Research Questions In the following, we will describe our theorizing about the relationship between the three main factors of Gawron- ski et al.'s (2017) CNI model adapted to our research (i.e., consequences of concessions to terrorist hostage-takers, the moral norms salient in terrorist hostage-takings, and whether support for concessions is the action or inaction default) and NCP support. Consequences Making concessions in terrorist hostage taking situa- tions will likely result in hostage release (Mertes et al., 2020, 2021), but also more attacks in the future (Brandt et al., 2016). Even if these future attacks endanger “only” the same number as people as the hostage-taking at hand (i.e., if the gains and losses are equivalent), losses are assumed to loom larger than corresponding gains (e.g., Tversky & Kahneman, 1991). When concessions to terrorist hostage- takers are assumed to lead to attacks involving more people (i.e., the benefits are lower than the costs), people should be particularly loss-averse (Tversky & Kahneman, 1991) and thus less inclined to support concessions. When conces- sions are not assumed to lead to more attacks (i.e., the ben- efits are greater than the costs), people should be more in- clined to support concessions. Thus, we hypothesized: Hypothesis 1a: When the benefits of concessions are greater (vs. lower) than the costs, people should ex- press more intent to support concessions. Hypothesis 1b: When the benefits of concessions are greater (vs. lower) than the costs, people should per- ceive concessions as more appropriate. Hypothesis 1c: When the benefits of concessions are greater (vs. lower) than the costs, people should ex- press less NCP support. Salient moral norms Moreover, in uncertain situations, people often turn to salient norms to inform their decision-making (e.g., Cial- dini & Goldstein, 2004). As mentioned earlier, terrorist hostage-takings entail uncertainty even when the dilemma is laid out in detail. When a norm prescribing concessions is made salient (e.g., “human life in danger should be saved”), people should be more inclined to support concessions than when a norm prohibiting concessions is made salient (e.g., “terrorist demands should never be granted”). We, thus, derived the following hypotheses: The preregistration for this study can be accessed at https://osf.io/nszve/?view_only=68b18d4270ee416880f2a6a5e629ca95. 4 Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 11 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 https://osf.io/nszve/?view_only=68b18d4270ee416880f2a6a5e629ca95 Hypothesis 2a: When a prescriptive norm prescribes concessions (vs. when a proscriptive norm prohibits them), people should express more intent to support concessions. Hypothesis 2b: When a prescriptive norm prescribes concessions (vs. when a proscriptive norm prohibits them), people should perceive concessions as more ap- propriate. Hypothesis 2c: When a prescriptive norm prescribes concessions (vs. when a proscriptive norm prohibits them), people should express less NCP support. Support as the action or inaction default Finally, people experience stronger regret for negative outcomes when these outcomes result from actions rather than inactions (Gilovich & Medvec, 1995; Kahneman & Tversky, 1982). Thus, they should be hesitant to support concessions because they want to avoid the regret of a potential negative outcome. However, this so-called action effect is reversed when prior negative outcomes suggest taking action (inaction effect, Zeelenberg et al., 2002), for example, when denying concessions has led to hostage ex- ecutions in the past. Although most people are not directly involved with hostage-takings, they acquire knowledge about past hostage situations through media coverage, which is likely to include examples in which denying con- cessions has led to negative outcomes (e.g., Callimachi, 2014b). In sum, both the action effect (Kahneman & Tver- sky, 1982) and the inaction effect (Zeelenberg et al., 2002) might apply. Therefore, we pose the following research question: Research Question 1: Is there higher support for conces- sions to terrorist hostage- takers when supporting con- cessions is the action default or the inaction default? Method Design We implemented a 2 (consequences: benefits of conces- sions greater vs. lower than costs) × 2 (norm: prescrip- tive norm prescribes concessions vs. proscriptive norm pro- hibits concessions) × 2 (action/inaction: supporting concessions is the action default vs. the inaction default) between-subjects design. We assigned participants ran- domly to the resulting eight conditions. Sample An a priori power analysis (α = .05, 1-β = .80, number of groups = 8, numerator df = 1) in G*Power 3.1.9.4 (Faul et al., 2007) showed that detecting a small-sized effect (f = .10) in an ANOVA requires a total sample size of N = 787. As pre- registered, we excluded all participants who failed one or more attention checks.5 In accordance with this approach, recruiting 1080 participants left us with a final sample of N = 829 American Prolific users who had answered all atten- tion checks correctly and had not participated in the pre- vious studies (50.54% female, 2.53% other; Mage = 35.01, SDage = 12.33). Participants received $0.60 as remunera- tion. Again, participants expressed an, on average, liberal political orientation (M = 3.09, SD = 1.64), t(828) = -16.06, p < .001, d = -0.56, 95% CI = [-1.03; -0.81]. Age, gender, and political ideology did not differ across conditions. Procedure After participants provided informed consent, they were presented with a scenario describing a newspaper article about a terrorist hostage situation. Information given in the scenario differed depending on the experimental condi- tions. Participants were either told that the terrorists would use the ransom to execute further attacks (i.e., costs greater than benefits; n = 423) or support their communities (i.e., benefits greater than costs; n = 406). Next, the scenario de- scribed a poll that showed that the majority of people be- lieve that human life should be saved (i.e., norm prescribes concessions; n = 421) or that the government should not negotiate with terrorists (i.e., norm proscribes concessions; n = 408). Finally, participants were informed that there was a petition urging the government to either not pay the ran- som (i.e., action default; n = 423) or pay the ransom (i.e., inaction default; n = 406). For the exact wording used in the scenario, see Table 6. We asked participants to read the sce- nario carefully and informed them that they would be asked questions to check for attentive reading. The scenario and the manipulations are described in Table 6. We then asked participants to complete a questionnaire (see below). Com- pleting the study took on average five minutes. Measures We measured the behavioral intention to support con- cession by asking participants to indicate whether they would sign the petition as described in the manipulation (yes/no). We then recoded the variable to indicate whether participants indicated that they would support concessions depending on the experimental condition they were in. This means that in the condition in which supporting conces- sions was the action default, participants who indicated that they would sign the petition were marked as support- ing concessions. In contrast, participants in the condition in which supporting concessions was the inaction default, were marked as supporting conditions if they indicated that they did not want to sign the petition. We measured perceived appropriateness of concessions using one item (“How appropriate would it be for the gov- ernment to pay the ransom in order to secure the release of Among all participants, n = 112 answered the consequences attention check item incorrectly; n = 123 answered the norms attention check item incorrectly; n = 89 answered the action/inaction attention check item incorrectly. 5 Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 12 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Table 6. Scenario and Manipulations Used in Study 3 Factor Text “You read a newspaper article about an ongoing terrorist hostage-taking. A terrorist organization has abducted a journalist from your country and threatens to kill him if the government does not pay a ransom of one million dollars. A rescue mission is not an option because the terrorists' current location is unknown. The terrorists have a reputation for adhering to agreements with the authorities and acting on deadlines. If ransom is paid, they will release the hostage safely. If ransom is denied, they will execute the hostage. In this particular case, the authorities state that they have no reason to believe otherwise.” Consequences Benefits of concessions greater than costs Benefits of concessions lower than costs “Based on information on their past activities, it is highly likely that the terrorists would use the ransom money to support their communities. Thus, it is rather unlikely that more people would come to harm.” (n = 406) “Based on information on their past activities, it is highly likely that the terrorists would use the ransom money to execute more attacks in the future. Thus, it is rather likely that more people would come to harm.” (n = 423) Norm Prescriptive norm prescribes concessions Proscriptive norm prohibits concessions “The article reports results of a recent poll, which showed that the absolute majority of people in your country believe that human life in danger should be saved whenever possible.” (n = 421) “The article reports results of a recent poll, which showed that the absolute majority of people in your country believe that terrorist demands should not be granted.” (n = 408) Action/ Inaction Supporting concessions is the action default Supporting concessions is the inaction default “The article tells about a petition urging the government to pay the ransom.” (n = 423) “The article tells about a petition urging the government not to pay the ransom.” (n = 406) “You do not know who initiated the petition. The petition is less than 24 hours old, so there is no information on how many people already signed it. The platform hosting the petition is considered trustworthy. Signing the petition would not require you to create an account or to give any sensitive information about yourself.” Note. The consequences manipulation was adapted from Gawronski et al. (2017). the hostage?”; Körner et al., 2019). Participants answered on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = not appropriate at all, 7 = com- pletely appropriate). We measured NCP support using the same item as in Studies 1 and 2. NCP support and support behavior inten- tion correlated with r = -.51. NCP support and perceived ap- propriateness correlated with r = -.70. These correlations indicate convergent validity and, thus, construct validity of the NCP support measure. Using one item each, we measured consideration of norms (“When I answered the question of how the gov- ernment should act, I thought primarily about what the majority of the people in my country think.”), hostage re- lease (“…, I thought primarily about that the terrorists will release the hostage when they receive what they de- manded.”), and future consequences (“…, I thought pri- marily about potential future consequences of the ransom payment”). Participants indicated their agreement to these statements on 7-point Likert scales (1 = completely disagree, 7 = completely agree). The perceived likelihood of a safe hostage release and future attacks were measured using the same items as in Study 2. We assessed the perceived plausibility of the scenario us- ing one item (“I found the scenario I read to be plausible”). Participants answered this item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = completely disagree, 7 = completely agree). We assessed the perceived plausibility of the notion that in the scenario there is no alternative to (not) paying the ransom using one item (“How plausible is it that there are no alternative ac- tions to achieve the release of the hostage other than to pay the ransom in the scenario?” Körner et al., 2019). Partici- pants answered this item on 7-point Likert scales (1 = not at all, 7 = completely). We measured the perceived credibility of the information provided in the study using one item (“I found the general information on terrorist hostage-takings that I read in this study to be credible”). Participants answered this item on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = completely disagree, 7 = completely agree). Measures of political ideology, age, and gender were identical to those used in Studies 1 and 2. Results and Discussion Table 7 shows descriptive statistics and intercorrelations for all variables assessed in this study. In this study, the av- erage NCP support was descriptively lower than in the pre- vious studies (M = 4.06, SD = 1.68). To contextualize this lower level: NCP support in this study is generally in line with the NCP support expressed by participants who had a balanced view on the terrorist hostage dilemma in Study 1. Therefore, the descriptive increase in support for conces- sions might be the result of presenting the terrorist hostage dilemma in full detail in Study 3. Once again, older (r = .15, p < .001) and more conserv- ative (r = .20, p < .001) participants reported stronger NCP support. Confirmatory Analyses Table 8 shows the results of a logistic regression analysis with the intention to support concessions as the criterion variable and consequences, norms, and action/inaction as Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 13 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Table 7. Descriptive Statistics and Intercorrelations for All Variables in Study 3 Intercorrelations M (SD) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 1 Consequences 0.49 (0.50) - 2 Norms 0.51 (0.50) -.02 - 3 Action/inaction 0.49 (0.50) .03 -.02 - 4 Support behavior intention 0.65 (0.48) .17*** .08* .30*** - 5 NCP support 4.06 (1.68) -.16*** -.06 .02 -.51*** - 6 Perceived appropriateness 4.56 (1.81) .20*** .13*** .03 .57*** -.70*** - 7 Consideration of norms 2.73 (1.75) .00 .07 -.06 .01 .04 .04 - 8 Consideration of hostage release 5.24 (1.79) .17*** .04 .03 .50*** -.54*** .64*** -.02 - 9 Consideration of future consequences 5.24 (1.71) -.10** -.05 -.09* -.35*** .44*** -.42*** .05 -.30*** - 10 Perceived likelihood of hostage release 5.10 (1.59) .09** .00 -.03 .33*** -.43*** .48*** -.03 .54*** -.24*** - 11 Perceived likelihood of future attacks 5.07 (1.86) -.49*** -.05 -.06 -.37*** .40*** -.39*** .05 -.33*** .30*** -.30*** - 12 Scenario plausibility 5.46 (1.39) -.13*** -.01 .04 -.00 .03 .00 .05 .05 .05 .09** .15*** - 13 Scenario plausibility (no alternatives) 3.85 (1.70) .07 .06 .01 .17*** -.19*** .20*** .10** .19*** -.09* .17*** -.10** .28*** - 14 Perceived credibility 5.16 (1.31) -.15*** .00 .02 -.00 .03 .00 .08* .06 .01 .13*** .13*** .64*** .32*** - 15 Political ideology 3.09 (1.64) -.03 .01 .02 -.12*** .20*** -.21*** .09** -.17*** .11** -.19*** .11** .00 -.03 -.00 - 16 Age 35.01 (12.33) .01 .01 .09** -.04 .15*** -.20*** -.12*** -.15*** .05 -.09* .07* .04 .05 .09* .17*** - Note. N = 829, *** p < .001, ** p < .01, * p < .05. Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 14 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Table 8. Logistic Regression of Support Behavior Intention on Consequences, Norms, and Action/Inaction b SE Wald-χ(1) p OR 95% CI OR Consequences 0.76 0.16 23.47 < .001 2.15 [1.58; 2.93] Norms 0.43 0.16 7.51 .006 1.54 [1.13; 2.09] Action/Inaction 1.38 0.16 73.65 < .001 3.99 [2.11; 5.47] Constant -0.55 0.15 13.47 < .001 0.58 Note. χ²(3) = 109.49, p < .001. Cox & Snell R² = .12. Nagelkerke’s R² = .17. the predictors. As hypothesized (Hypothesis 1a, Hypothesis 2a), people were more likely to express intent to support concessions when the benefits were greater than the costs and when a prescriptive norm prescribed concessions. Fur- ther, they were more likely to express intent to support concessions when support was the inaction default (RQ 1), which provides evidence for the action effect. As the normality assumption was violated, we deviated from the preregistration by using a robust trimmed-means ANOVA with perceived appropriateness of concessions as the criterion variable and consequences, norms, and action/ inaction as predictors.6 It revealed main effects of conse- quences, F(1, 825) = 29.92, p < .001, partial η² = .04, f = 0.20, and norms, F(1, 825) = 15.67, p < .001, partial η² = .02, f = 0.14. Concessions were considered more appropriate when the benefits outweighed the costs (M = 4.92, SD = 1.69) than when the costs outweighed the benefits (M = 4.22, SD = 1.86). Concessions were seen as more appropriate when a prescriptive norm prescribed concessions (M = 4.79, SD = 1.81) than when a proscriptive norm prohibited them (M = 4.33, SD = 1.78). Figure 2 depicts violin plots of NCP sup- port across the eight experimental conditions in Study 3. These findings support both Hypothesis 1b and Hypothesis 2b. An ANOVA with NCP support as the criterion variable and consequences, norms, and action/inaction as predic- tors showed a main effect of consequences, F(1, 825) = 21.95, p < .001, partial η² = .03, f = 0.18. NCP support was lower when the benefits of concessions outweighed the costs (M = 3.79, SD = 1.65) than when the costs outweighed the benefits (M = 4.32, SD = 1.66). Figure 3 depicts violin plots of NCP support across the eight experimental condi- tions in Study 3. Thus, H1c was supported, but H2c, for a lack of a main effect of norms, was not. In sum, confirma- tory analyses revealed that consequences and—to a lesser extent—norms were important influences, indicating that participants’ decisions were guided by both utilitarian and deontological considerations. Exploratory Analyses To further illuminate the results pattern of Study 3, we again conducted analyses for variables that we collected for exploratory reasons. Our manipulation of the conse- quences had unique effects that could not be observed for the salient moral norm and action/inaction manipulations. Informing participants that the terrorists would use the ransom money to support their communities rather than to execute further attacks reduced the perceived likelihood of further attacks, MDiff = 1.83, t(734.567) = 16.14, p < .001, d = 1.13, 95% CI = [1.61; 2.05]. This finding shows that the ma- nipulation of the consequences worked as intended. However, giving people the information about support for the communities (vs. execute further attacks) also led to an increase in the perceived likelihood of a safe hostage release, MDiff = -0.30, t(827) = -2.70, p = .005, d = -0.19, 95% CI = [-0.51; -0.08]. This is particularly interesting be- cause irrespective of the condition, participants were in- formed that the terrorists were known to honor their com- mitments. Yet, across all conditions, the perceived likelihood that the terrorists would release the hostages safely upon receiving the ransom (M = 5.10, SD = 1.59) strongly deviated from 7 (the maximum of the scale), t(828) = -34.41, p < .001, d = -1.20, 95% CI = [-2.00; -1.79]. This reinforces the findings of the previous studies and indicates that participants distrust terrorists to keep their promises, even when they are told that the terrorists have established a reputation as reliable negotiators. There is further evi- dence for this interpretation. When participants were told that the terrorists would use the ransom money to support their communities rather than execute further attacks, they saw the totality of information they had received as less credible, MDiff = 0.39, t(827) = 4.37, p < .001, d = 0.30, 95% CI = [0.22; 0.57], and the scenario in general as less plau- sible, MDiff = 0.36, t(827) = 3.75, p < .001, d = 0.26, 95% CI = [0.17; 0.55]. These findings suggest that this information conflicted with the participants’ expectations about terror- ist behavior and trustworthiness. Thus, paralleling the re- sults of Study 2 and the effects of providing information on the benefits of concessions to terrorists, we again see that information conflicting with prior negative expecta- tions about terrorist behavior is at least partially discred- ited. General Discussion In terrorist hostage-takings, people’s lives depend on their government’s willingness to concede to terrorists’ de- mands. Although adherence to the NCP does not fully elim- inate terrorist hostage-takings, it represents an effective We again applied a trimming level of 20%. An uncorrected ANOVA once again yielded equivalent results. 6 Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 15 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Figure 2. Violin Plots of Perceived Appropriateness of Concessions across Experimental Conditions in Study 3 Note. Consequences conditions: ben> = benefits greater than costs, ben< = costs greater than benefits, norms conditions: pre = prescriptive norm prescribes concessions, pro = proscriptive norm prohibits concessions, Action/inaction conditions: act = supporting conces- sions is the action default, inact = supporting concessions is the inaction default. Grey-shaded areas depict rotated kernel density. Thick black bar represents the median. Box represents the interquartile range (IQR). Whiskers depict minimum and maximum values within 1.5 IQR. Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 16 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 https://collabra.scholasticahq.com/article/124482-popular-support-for-the-no-concessions-policy-in-terrorist-hostage-takings/attachment/248610.png?auth_token=eAIRICguTDGsMaOG_kK2 Figure 3. Violin Plots of NCP support across Experimental Conditions in Study 3 Note. Consequences conditions: ben> = benefits greater than costs, ben< = costs greater than benefits, norms conditions: pre = prescriptive norm prescribes concessions, pro = proscriptive norm prohibits concessions, Action/inaction conditions: act = supporting conces- sions is the action default, inact = supporting concessions is the inaction default. Grey-shaded areas depict rotated kernel density. Thick black bar represents the median. Box represents the interquartile range (IQR). Whiskers depict minimum and maximum values within 1.5 IQR. Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 17 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 https://collabra.scholasticahq.com/article/124482-popular-support-for-the-no-concessions-policy-in-terrorist-hostage-takings/attachment/248611.png?auth_token=eAIRICguTDGsMaOG_kK2 means of reducing them (Brandt et al., 2016). However, governments often contravene their official policy of with- holding concessions from terrorists (e.g., Callimachi, 2014a). Given that public support for a policy affects gov- ernment adherence to that policy (see Burstein, 2003), we investigated what shapes people’s support for the no-con- cessions policy in three studies with a mixed-methods ap- proach. Theoretical Implications We found converging evidence that people have an im- perfect understanding of the consequences of concessions in the terrorist hostage dilemma. Their NCP support de- pends on which information they have and on the under- standing of the dilemma that results from their informa- tion. Participants in Study 1 supported or opposed the NCP for a variety of reasons, most of which were concerned with preventing the direct and indirect short-term (i.e., the death of the hostages) and long-term consequences (e.g., an increase in abductions in the future, the loss of polit- ical prestige). It was noteworthy that most participants in this study focused only on a single or a few aspects of the terrorist hostage dilemma when pondering to what extent they supported the NCP. One possible conclusion from this finding is that most participants had an incomplete repre- sentation of the terrorist hostage dilemma. Consistent findings from all three studies suggest that people are averse to the notion of making concessions to terrorists to resolve hostage situation because they tend to have pessimistic expectations about the outcomes of con- cessions. On the one hand, they seem to expect that mak- ing concessions will lead the terrorists to engage in further abductions in the future. On the other hand, they seem to doubt that terrorists will release the hostages safely once concessions are made. These expectations can serve as heuristics when the motivation and ability to process data systematically are low (Chen & Chaiken, 1999). They likely (at least partly) originate in internal attributions of terror- ist behavior: Terrorists engage in extreme and violent acts and are thus seen as irrational and malevolent (see also Silke, 1998). This is often reflected in political rhetoric and media coverage of terrorist events (e.g., Borger et al., 2014; “Bush’s Statement,” 2002; Pronin et al., 2006). However, while the expectation that concessions to hostage-takers leads to more abductions in the future is supported by re- search (e.g., Brandt et al., 2016), recent findings showed that concessions also reliably increase the likelihood of a safe hostage release (Mertes et al., 2020, 2021). In line with our hypotheses derived from the heuristic- systematic model (Chen & Chaiken, 1999), simply giving people a one-sided statement about the benefits of conces- sions to terrorist hostage-takers reduced their support for the NCP (and, thereby, increased their support for conces- sions). Providing a one-sided statement on the costs, how- ever, had no effect. Information on the costs of concessions (i.e., that they will lead to further abductions) is congru- ent with peoples’ expectations, so the resulting confidence gap should be small (cf. Chaiken & Ledgerwood, 2012). In- formation on the benefits (i.e., that they reliably increase the likelihood of a safe hostage release) widens the con- fidence gap by challenging their expectations, resulting in more systematic processing. These findings underscore the applicability of the heuristic-systematic model in investiga- tions of popular support for the NCP and political decision- making in general (cf. Chaiken & Ledgerwood, 2012). We further investigated how people decide to what ex- tent they support the NCP (or concessions) when the hostage dilemma is outlined in detail (see Study 3). The de- tailed presentation of the dilemma in Study 3 provided peo- ple with more information and thereby increased their abil- ity to systematically process the dilemma (Chen & Chaiken, 1999). Thus, they may have been able and motivated to make their decision in the moral dilemma based on its mer- its rather than by drawing on easily accessible heuristics on terrorist behavior. This probably resulted in descriptive dif- ferences in NCP support across studies. People expressed less support for the NCP in Study 3 than in the previous studies, where participants were provided with incomplete information. Following recent moral dilemma research (Gawronski et al., 2017; Gawronski & Ng, 2024), we addressed a common limitation of more traditional research on moral dilemmas in Study 3. In traditional moral dilemma research, moral judgements were interpreted as either motivated by utili- tarian (i.e., the desire to maximize overall well-being) or deontological considerations (i.e., the desire to adhere to the moral norm of preserving life). The interpretation was typically confounded as the consequences for overall well- being and the salient moral norm were not manipulated in- dependently. Furthermore, this interpretation ignored the possibility that moral judgments may be based on a general preference for action or inaction. We addressed these limi- tations by independently manipulating the consequences of making concessions, the salient moral norm, and whether supporting concessions was the action or inaction default (see Gawronski et al., 2017). NCP support was mainly dri- ven by utilitarian considerations, but the perceived appro- priateness of concessions and people’s intention to support concessions were also driven by deontological considera- tions. Although these moral principles were traditionally interpreted as opposites, both do affect support for con- cessions when manipulated independently in our study (cf. Gawronski et al., 2017). This finding significantly extends the current knowledge about the motives underlying moral decision-making. Finally, our work addresses a common concern about the internal and external validity of moral dilemma research. Artificial moral dilemmas such as the Trolley problem have been criticized for their lack of realism and validity, as the scenarios described were often abstract thought exper- iments rather than situations in which individuals might find themselves (Bauman et al., 2014). The scenario we em- ployed reflects the reality of terrorist hostage situations, and the response formats we chose mirrored realistic de- cisions that U.S. citizens could face when learning about a hostage-taking. Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 18 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Practical Implications Our findings highlight the chances of tailoring political communication (cf. McNair, 2017). Press conferences, in- terviews, and speeches addressing terrorist hostage situa- tions (e.g., Hudson, 2014) give administrations a platform to communicate information to both the media and the public. Our findings point out several ways in which the government can potentially increase popular support for their decision to concede to terrorist hostage-takers and thereby mitigate the political damage that violating the NCP could bring about. First, they can defend their decision by informing people about the existence of evidence show- ing that concessions to terrorist hostage-takers do in fact increase the likelihood of a safe hostage release (Mertes et al., 2020, 2021). As we demonstrated, people seem to doubt that terrorists can be trusted to keep their promises. There- fore, information on the short-term benefits of concessions to terrorist hostage-takers might reduce these doubts. Sec- ond, they can emphasize the moral norm of preserving hu- man life by acknowledging the government’s responsibility to save the hostages. Third, we found that describing the moral dilemma of a terrorist hostage situation in more de- tail leads to lower overall NCP support and, thus, higher support for concessions. Although some information should not be made public because it is sensitive or could endanger the hostages, providing more information about the general structure of terrorist hostage-takings as a moral dilemma situation might increase popular support for the decision to concede. Furthermore, our study adds further evidence to the no- tion that different audiences might respond differently to their government’s reaction to concede to terrorist hostage-takers. For example, the hostage exchange of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl was more popular among Democrats than among Republicans (Pew Research Center, 2014). Across all three studies we found small to medium-sized correla- tions between NCP support, age, and political ideology, in- dicating that concessions to terrorist hostage-takers find more support among younger and more liberal-leaning au- diences. Limitations and Future Research Our research may be limited by our exclusively American samples. In 2001, nearly 3000 Americans were killed in the 9/11 attacks, arguably the most impactful terrorist attacks in recent history (e.g., Hartig & Doherty, 2021). As a re- sult, Americans might be more ardent in their support of government anti-terror policies than citizens from other countries. Yet, we were able to show that even Americans’ support for the NCP differs depending on the available in- formation. Nevertheless, future research should investigate whether these findings generalize to nations with a more lenient stance on concessions to terrorist hostage-takers. Furthermore, our samples consisted of Prolific users. Prolific is a platform that allows people to gain additional income by participating in surveys. Thus, it is conceivable that Prolific users are, on average, of lower socioeconomic status than the general population, which might affect their decision-making in moral dilemmas: People lacking mate- rial resources pass harsher moral judgements because they are more vulnerable to the consequences of others’ harmful actions (Pitesa & Thau, 2014). As a result, Prolific users might be more inclined to agree with the NCP. However, our findings show that even under these conditions, support for the NCP differed depending on the information available to our participants. Future research could nevertheless test the influence of socioeconomic status on moral judgement in terrorist hostage dilemmas. Another limitation is that we exclusively used single- item measures to keep processing time short and reduce dropout. This might pose a threat to the construct validity, especially for our central criterion variable NCP support. However, in Study 3, we found strong negative correlations with related measures such as perceived appropriateness and the intention to support concessions, which demon- strate convergent validity and thus ensure construct valid- ity. Future research could nevertheless utilize multi-item measures. Conclusion Despite the wide-spread policy of denying terrorists con- cessions, terrorist hostage-takings pose a difficult moral dilemma. Governments do not only have to carefully weigh the expected benefits and costs of their decision, but also consider whether their voters will support their decision. Popular support for government policies in terrorist hostage-takings depends on the information that people have available to make their judgement. More detailed po- litical communication focusing on the benefits of conces- sions, emphasizing the moral norm to preserve human life in danger, as well as generally describing the moral dilemma of a terrorist hostage situation in detail may in- crease public support for concessions. Author Contributions All authors designed this research. Marc Mertes col- lected, processed, and analyzed the data. All authors in- terpreted the findings. Marc Mertes wrote the manuscript. Robert Böhm and Joachim Hüffmeier revised the draft. Competing Interests No author involved in this project has any interests—fi- nancial or non-financial—that might be interpreted as in- fluencing this research. Funding This research was supported by a grant from the German Research Foundation (DFG) awarded to Joachim Hüffmeier (HU 1772/5-1). The DFG had no role in the design of this study, in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data, in the writing of this report, or in the decision to submit the article for publication. Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 19 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 Ethics This research was conducted out of Germany, where ethics approval is not mandatory for all studies. This re- search has been conducted in compliance with the Amer- ican Psychological Association’s Ethical Principles for Re- search with Human Participants. Consent Across all three studies, informed consent was obtained from each participant. Data and Material Availability Raw and processed data is available at https://osf.io/ y9s4x/?view_only=0bea30e47dfb47e5a26ea7de0b221c33. Submitted: September 14, 2023 PST, Accepted: September 02, 2024 PST This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CCBY-4.0). View this license’s legal deed at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 and legal code at http://creativecom- mons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode for more information. Popular Support for the No-Concessions Policy in Terrorist Hostage Takings Collabra: Psychology 20 D ow nloaded from http://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article-pdf/10/1/124482/843266/collabra_2024_10_1_124482.pdf by Technical U niversity O f D ortm und user on 03 February 2025 https://osf.io/y9s4x/?view_only=0bea30e47dfb47e5a26ea7de0b221c33 https://osf.io/y9s4x/?view_only=0bea30e47dfb47e5a26ea7de0b221c33 References Al Jazeera Investigative Unit. (2015, October 9). Exclusive: Italy paying ransoms in Syria and Somalia. Al Jazeera. https://www.aljazeera.com Bapat, N. A. (2006). 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