Which MBA? Naughty But Nice

MODERN society depends on people acting honestly towards each other. We all rely on those around us not to pick our pockets, read our mail or pretend to need our help getting gold out of a Kenyan bank. Meanwhile, most people consider themselves ethical. So acting dishonestly ought to come with some sinking feeling of having violated social and personal codes.

A series of experiments carried out by Nicole Ruedy of the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business, Celia Moore at London Business School, Francesca Gino at Havard Business School and Maurice Schweitzer at Wharton (detailed in this working paper) set out to test whether bad behaviour is actually followed by bad feelings. Given an experimental setup that made it both easy and worthwhile to cheat, the participants predicted that, if they cheated, they would feel worse afterwards. Then the experimenters asked them to solve word puzzles, with a bonus for each word unscrambled, and check their own work. Two-fifths of participants cheated—and afterwards, the cheaters reported feeling significantly more cheerful than did their honest counterparts. Read More...