From Hospitality to Hostility : Impact of the Rohingya Refugee Influx on the Sentiments of Host Communities

In 2017, Bangladesh received a sudden influx of Muslim Rohingya refugees from neighboring Myanmar. While the predominantly Muslim host communities initially expressed sympathy for the refugees, the prolonged stay substantially affected their livelihoods, and public sentiment gradually deteriorated. Using an incentivized joy-of-destruction game, we found that as many as 58% of the hosts paid to reduce (destruct) the donation for Rohingya refugees. Our regression analysis revealed that the hosts exposed to the influx reduced the donation significantly more than those not. In contrast, the exposed and non-exposed hosts equally expressed negative opinions toward the refugees. This contrast indicates that the incentivized experiment elicited real (not cosmetic) hostility toward an outgroup population of refugees