The effect of culture in the attribution of responsibility for accidents involving children in the USA

The attribution of safety responsibility for product use by children can be critical to product design engineers, legal professionals, marketers, and other parties. Product designers must decide how much time and effort must be dedicated to safety features to mitigate potential risk. In our highly litigious society, a juror's perception of who is responsible for product safety may be a deciding factor in a product liability case. Marketers must know how much emphasis to place on safety in product packaging and advertising. Recent studies have focused on identifying which parties the general population perceives as being responsible for accidents involving children. However, given the increase in demographics of minority and immigrant populations and the large number of products being designed for export, there may be a cultural interaction that affects these attributions. This study compares the attribution of safety responsibility of two of the fastest growing minority populations in the USA, Hispanics and Asians, with a previous study which quantified that of the general US population. The results show substantial differences in the perceptions of these groups, and discusses the implications of these differences.

Keywords:

• Design
• Liability
• Safety
• Jury Selection
• Insurance Claims