Good enough for me
Does power corrupt the mind? The influence of power on moral reasoning and self-interested behavior
Laura Giurge et al.
Leadership Quarterly, forthcoming
Abstract:
We test whether leaders' power shapes their reasoning about moral issues and whether such moral reasoning subsequently influences leaders' display of self-interested behavior. We use an incentivized experiment to manipulate two components of leader power: power over more versus fewer followers and power to enforce one's will by having discretion over more versus fewer payout options to allocate between oneself and one's followers. We find that having power over more followers decreased leaders' principled moral reasoning, whereas having higher power to enforce one's will enabled leaders to engage in self-interested behavior. We also find suggestive evidence that power over increases self-interested behavior by decreasing principled moral reasoning; the effect of power to was not mediated by moral reasoning. These results illustrate that power activates self-interest within and outside the context in which power is held. They also show that moral reasoning is not a stable cognitive process, but that it might represent an additional path via which power affects self-interested behavior.
Fall from grace: The role of dominance and prestige in the punishment of high-status actors
Hemant Kakkar, Niro Sivanathan & Matthias Gobel
Academy of Management Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
When actors transgress social norms, their social status colors the severity with which they are punished. While some argue that high-status transgressors attract severe punishment when accused of ambiguous transgressions, others contend the opposite. In this paper, we attempt to reconcile this theoretical inconsistency. We propose that the capacity for social status to color third-party judgments of transgressions may depend on the status type of high-status actors. Drawing on the evolutionary theory of dominance and prestige as two alternate forms of status within social hierarchies, we suggest that actors associated with dominance-based status will be penalized more harshly than actors whose status is based on prestige. Across multiple studies employing archival field data, controlled lab experiments, and different instantiations of dominance, prestige, and misconduct, we consistently demonstrate that high-status dominant actors are punished more harshly than their prestigious counterparts. Further, we find that attributions of intentionality and lack of moral credentials explain the harsher punishments meted out to dominant (versus prestigious) high-status actors. In this way, we provide both a parsimonious reconciliation of the inconsistency in the extant literature and a theoretical explanation of how status type of high-status actors differentially impacts the judgment, decisions, and behaviors of third parties.
A reason-based explanation for moral dumbfounding
Matthew Stanley, Siyuan Yin & Walter Sinnott-Armstrong
Judgment and Decision Making, March 2019, Pages 120–129
Abstract:
The moral dumbfounding phenomenon for harmless taboo violations is often cited as a critical piece of empirical evidence motivating anti-rationalist models of moral judgment and decision-making. Moral dumbfounding purportedly occurs when an individual remains obstinately and steadfastly committed to a moral judgment or decision even after admitting inability to provide reasons and arguments to support it (Haidt, 2001). Early empirical support for the moral dumbfounding phenomenon led some philosophers and psychologists to suggest that affective reactions and intuitions, in contrast with reasons or reasoning, are the predominant drivers of moral judgments and decisions. We investigate an alternative reason-based explanation for moral dumbfounding: that putatively harmless taboo violations are judged to be morally wrong because of the high perceived likelihood that the agents could have caused harm, even though they did not cause harm in actuality. Our results indicate that judgments about the likelihood of causing harm consistently and strongly predicted moral wrongness judgments. Critically, a manipulation drawing attention to harms that could have occurred (but did not actually occur) systematically increased the severity of moral wrongness judgments. Thus, many participants were sensitive to at least one reason — the likelihood of harm — in making their moral judgments about these kinds of taboo violations. We discuss the implications of these findings for rationalist and anti-rationalist models of moral judgment and decision-making.
Juggling work and home selves: Low identity integration feels less authentic and increases unethicality
Mahdi Ebrahimi, Maryam Kouchaki & Vanessa Patrick
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, forthcoming
Abstract:
This research investigates the effect of individuals’ subjective perceptions of the overlap among different identities on their feelings of authenticity and the likelihood of engaging in unethical behavior. Across four studies we found that low (vs. high) identity integration led to greater feelings of inauthenticity and a higher likelihood of engaging in unethical behavior. Manipulation of low (vs. high or control) identity integration led to higher feelings of inauthenticity (Study 1) and greater cheating behavior (Study 2). Feelings of inauthenticity mediated the causal effect of low identity integration on dishonesty (Study 3). In a field survey, using supervisor–employee dyads, we replicated the results from the lab to show that employees who reported lower identity integration felt more inauthentic and were more likely to behave unethically as measured by their supervisors’ report of interpersonal and organizational deviance (Study 4). Our results demonstrate that the manner in which individuals view their multiple identities influences feelings of inauthenticity and unethical behavior.
Wait, There's Torture in Zootopia?: Examining the Prevalence of Torture in Popular Movies
Casey Delehanty & Erin Kearns
University of Alabama Working Paper, February 2019
Abstract:
Despite prohibitions on torture, recent public opinion polls show that approximately half of adults in the United States think that torture can be acceptable in counterterrorism. While democracies and their citizens tend to be less supportive of human rights violations, torture appears to be an exception. One potential explanation for this is the role of media in framing torture as an efficacious “necessary evil” to avoid disasters. Media influences public perception on many issues, particularly when people lack direct, personal experience with the subject. While recent research has demonstrated that dramatic depictions of torture increase public support for the practice, it is unclear how prevalent torture actually is in mass media. Thus, we do not know how frequently — and in what context — torture is depicted across popular media. To examine this, we coded each incident of torture in the top 20 grossing films each year from 2008 to 2017. We expected that torture is generally shown to be effective. Further, we expected to see differences in how torture is used and who it is used against depending on whether the perpetrator is a protagonist or an antagonist. Results show that the majority of films — including films aimed toward children — have at least one torture scene. As expected, movies tend to depict torture as effective. Further, protagonists are more likely to torture for instrumental reasons or in response to threats, and are more likely to do so effectively. In contrast, antagonists are more likely to use torture as punishment and to target vulnerable victims. The frequency and nature of torture’s depiction in popular films may help explain why many in the public support torture.
Signaling when no one is watching: A reputation heuristics account of outrage and punishment in one-shot anonymous interactions
Jillian Jordan & David Rand
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Moralistic punishment can confer reputation benefits by signaling trustworthiness to observers. However, why do people punish even when nobody is watching? We argue that people often rely on the heuristic that reputation is typically at stake, such that reputation concerns can shape moralistic outrage and punishment even in one-shot anonymous interactions. We then support this account using data from Amazon Mechanical Turk. In anonymous experiments, subjects (total n = 8,440) report more outrage in response to others’ selfishness when they cannot signal their trustworthiness through direct prosociality (sharing with a third party) — such that if the interaction were not anonymous, punishment would have greater signaling value. Furthermore, mediation analyses suggest that sharing opportunities reduce outrage by decreasing reputation concerns. Additionally, anonymous experiments measuring costly punishment (total n = 6,076) show the same pattern: subjects punish more when sharing is not possible. Moreover, and importantly, moderation analyses provide some evidence that sharing opportunities do not merely reduce outrage and punishment by inducing empathy toward selfishness or hypocrisy aversion among nonsharers. Finally, we support the specific role of heuristics by investigating individual differences in deliberateness. Less deliberative individuals (who typically rely more on heuristics) are more sensitive to sharing opportunities in our anonymous punishment experiments, but, critically, not in punishment experiments where reputation is at stake (total n = 3,422); and not in our anonymous outrage experiments (where condemning is costless). Together, our results suggest that when nobody is watching, reputation cues nonetheless can shape outrage and — among individuals who rely on heuristics — costly punishment.
Dishonest Behavior: Sin Big or Go Home
Jason Aimone, Brittany Ward & James West
NBER Working Paper, April 2019
Abstract:
Economic agents face many different types of economic incentives when making financial and moral decisions. We provide experimental data from a population that uniquely responds to incentives to lie compared to previously studied populations. We conduct a standard 6-sided die rolling lying study within a population that believes that God has knowledge of all their actions. Within this population, we find that those who attend church frequently appear to refrain from lying while those that do not frequently attend church do lie, but do not disguise their lies like more secular populations. We further explain how our data fits into the theoretical work on lying.
Short-sighted greed? Focusing on the future promotes reputation-based generosity
Hallgeir Sjåstad
Judgment and Decision Making, March 2019, Pages 199–213
Abstract:
Long-term thinking and voluntary resource sharing are two distinctive traits of human nature. Across three experiments (N=1,082), I propose a causal connection: Sometimes people are generous because they think about the future. Participants were randomly assigned to either focus on the present or the future and then made specific decisions in hypothetical scenarios. In Study 1 (N=200), future-focused participants shared more money in a public dictator game than present-focused participants (+39%), and they were willing to donate more money to charity (+61%). Study 2 (N=410) replicated the positive effect of future-focus on dictator giving when the choice was framed as public (+36%), but found no such effect when the choice was framed as private. That is, focusing on the future made participants more generous only when others would know their identity. Study 3 was a high-powered and pre-registered replication of Study 1 (N=472), including a few extensions. Once again, future-focused participants gave more money to charity in a public donation scenario (+40%), and they were more likely to volunteer for the same charity (+17%). As predicted, the effect was mediated by reputational concern, indicating that future-orientation can make people more generous because it also makes them more attuned to the social consequences of their choices. Taken together, the results suggest that focusing on the future promotes reputation-based generosity. By stimulating voluntary resource sharing, a central function of human foresight might be to support cooperation in groups and society.
Fooling Myself or Fooling Observers? Avoiding Social Pressures by Manipulating Perceptions of Deservingness of Others
James Andreoni & Alison Sanchez
Economic Inquiry, forthcoming
Abstract:
We present a novel experiment demonstrating strategies selfish individuals utilize to avoid social pressure to be altruistic. Subjects participate in a trust game, after which they have an opportunity to state their beliefs about their opponent's actions. Subsequently, subjects participate in a task designed to “reveal” their true beliefs. Subjects who initially made selfish choices falsely state their beliefs about their opponent's kindness. Their “revealed” beliefs were significantly more accurate, which exposed subjects' knowledge that their selfishness was unjustifiable by their opponent's behavior. The initial false statements complied with social norms, suggesting subjects' attempts to project a more favorable social image.