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Underreported: Too Many to Care

Thursday, April 26, 2007

Joseph Stalin said, "A single death is a tragedy. A million deaths is a statistic." Paul Slovic, a psychology professor at the University of Oregon who studies human judgment, decision making, and risk analysis, explores the truth behind that statement. He recently found that donations to aid a starving 7-year-old child in Africa declined sharply when her image was accompanied by a statistical summary of the millions of needy children like her in other African countries.

Comments [2]

Madeline Hatter from Atlanta, GA

The perception is true; at least, by response it is, although the opposite should be the case. A million deaths is a tragedy.
I believe it has to do with people feeling swamped with millions, as if nothing can be done about the problem. Whereas, you can do something about 1 or 3 people in need. It goes back to Margaret Thatcher's TINA.

Apr. 26 2007 02:02 PM
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Laiah Raphael from Greenwich, CT

Is it a stretch to liken your piece about empathy, and to observe that we sit by passively while our government spends millions, billions and trillions of our dollars in ways in which we heartily disapprove, yet we complain bitterly when we have to pay an extra dollar in the supermarket?
And in my own community, the government exhorts that recycling costs much too much money while they spend huge amounts on things that seem to me to be frivolous and wasteful ... Laiah Raphael

Apr. 26 2007 01:40 PM
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