Sep 15, 2021 04:14 PM
(This post was last modified: Sep 15, 2021 04:28 PM by C C.)
(the paper) Signing at the beginning makes ethics salient and decreases dishonest self-reports in comparison to signing at the end
https://www.pnas.org/content/109/38/15197
ABSTRACT: Many written forms required by businesses and governments rely on honest reporting. Proof of honest intent is typically provided through signature at the end of, e.g., tax returns or insurance policy forms. Still, people sometimes cheat to advance their financial self-interests—at great costs to society. We test an easy-to-implement method to discourage dishonesty: signing at the beginning rather than at the end of a self-report, thereby reversing the order of the current practice. Using laboratory and field experiments, we find that signing before—rather than after—the opportunity to cheat makes ethics salient when they are needed most and significantly reduces dishonesty.
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Highly criticized paper on dishonesty retracted
https://retractionwatch.com/2021/09/14/h...ore-123088
INTRO: The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) has retracted a highly influential 2012 paper by Dan Ariely, a behavioral economist at Duke University whose work has been called into question over concerns about the data in some of his publications.
The retraction wasn’t unexpected. Ariely and his colleagues said last month that they would be pulling the article, “Signing at the beginning makes ethics salient and decreases dishonest self-reports in comparison to signing at the end,” in the wake of revelations that some of the data in the study appear to have been fabricated.
As Stephanie Lee of BuzzFeed reported in August: The researchers who published the study all agree that its data appear to be fraudulent and have requested that the journal, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, retract it. But it’s still unclear who made up the data or why — and four of the five authors said they played no part in collecting the data for the test in question.
Ariely was that fifth author, the one responsible for gathering the purportedly bogus data from an insurance company that now says, according to Lee, that it has not been able to provide such figures... (MORE)
https://www.pnas.org/content/109/38/15197
ABSTRACT: Many written forms required by businesses and governments rely on honest reporting. Proof of honest intent is typically provided through signature at the end of, e.g., tax returns or insurance policy forms. Still, people sometimes cheat to advance their financial self-interests—at great costs to society. We test an easy-to-implement method to discourage dishonesty: signing at the beginning rather than at the end of a self-report, thereby reversing the order of the current practice. Using laboratory and field experiments, we find that signing before—rather than after—the opportunity to cheat makes ethics salient when they are needed most and significantly reduces dishonesty.
- - - - - -
Highly criticized paper on dishonesty retracted
https://retractionwatch.com/2021/09/14/h...ore-123088
INTRO: The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) has retracted a highly influential 2012 paper by Dan Ariely, a behavioral economist at Duke University whose work has been called into question over concerns about the data in some of his publications.
The retraction wasn’t unexpected. Ariely and his colleagues said last month that they would be pulling the article, “Signing at the beginning makes ethics salient and decreases dishonest self-reports in comparison to signing at the end,” in the wake of revelations that some of the data in the study appear to have been fabricated.
As Stephanie Lee of BuzzFeed reported in August: The researchers who published the study all agree that its data appear to be fraudulent and have requested that the journal, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, retract it. But it’s still unclear who made up the data or why — and four of the five authors said they played no part in collecting the data for the test in question.
Ariely was that fifth author, the one responsible for gathering the purportedly bogus data from an insurance company that now says, according to Lee, that it has not been able to provide such figures... (MORE)