Hate crimes are considered to be worse than similarly egregious crimes because they are believed to be more likely to provoke retaliatory crimes and inflict distinct emotional distress on victims and members of the victims' social group or category. In this study, analogous samples of African American and white males observed two videotaped assaults motivated by racial bias in one case, and by an ambiguous motive in the other. Emotional responses and expressed desire for retaliation were associated with observers' race but did not differ for the two types of assault. Among African Americans (who some contend are the most frequent victims of racist hate crimes), retaliation may appear to be an especially practical option. Future research is necessary to examine the generalizability of these laboratory findings to real world settings. Notes, references