The honest truth about dishonesty

February 21, 2013 — confession, Dan Ariely, Duke, Honest, honesty, ten commandments, truth

Dan Ariely Professor of Psychology and Behavioural Economics at Duke University has been looking into cheating. His research suggests that we all cheat, even if its just a little bit, but we can do it because we rationalise it to ourselves.

In any population there are a few big cheaters, but a lot of small ones, and the economic cost of the small cheaters far exceeds that of the big ones. That doesn’t make it right.

He looked at how you could eradicate or reduce cheating in a group. He was surprised that religion had some of the answers. When he asked people to read The Ten Commandments, even if they were not religious, their cheating levels reduced. He feels its because they were reminded of higher moral values. Next he asked people to confess about their cheats and again he found that cheating levels went down. We feel better when we start a new page.

Remind yourself of your own moral values, confess, start a new page. Try not to cheat today.

Have a curious day.