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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