Catching Compromise

This past weekend I spent some time reviewing some very interesting research in the field of behavioral economics (I’m sorry, does that sound nerdy to you? I can feel your judgment, but I don’t care. Some people have friends, I have books.) These various studies all explored the tendency humans have to indulge in unethical behavior or compromise once a certain threshold of “giving in” had been reached. For example, participants in one study were far more likely to make a large diet blunder – like eating a piece of cake or an entire donut – if they had already splurged on a small piece of candy. Similarly, researchers found people were more likely to falsify their level of completion of a new task if they had already embellished their resume or previous achievements in some way. In another study, participants were more likely to cheat on an exam if they had already made a relatively small “adjustment of the truth” prior to beginning the exam. Furthermore, the researchers noticed that once a participant took the opportunity to cheat in the exam, he or she was far more likely to continue cheating and cheat much more frequently.

One of the psychologists who had designed some of the experiments called this the “What the $%&#” effect. His assumption was that people who had already succumbed once would tell themselves, “what the heck, I’ve already gone this far, what’s a bit more?” Perhaps their image of themselves – with their moral fibers already frayed – had been tainted and they found it easier to give in. In any case, giving in to temptation is a slippery slope. Even if the dishonest or unethical behavior was relatively “small” – a little white lie or “borrowing” some office supplies from work – compromise can be a snowball that continues to increase in both mass and momentum. I think we already knew that a lack of discipline or integrity can spread within a group, but even within ourselves, compromise is contagious.

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