People do not like to be deceived. Trust is a coveted bridge in any relationship and, as individuals make new relationships with people all around them, the ability to detect deception is a good safeguard to have. The concept of lying dates back to Darwin and Piaget (Darwin, 1877; Piaget, 1932). However, lying and its forms have evolved along with society. The presence of a computer screen has allowed people to deceive others in different ways with relative ease. A study conducted by Jamie Guillory and Dr. Jeffrey T. Hancock determined that people on LinkedIn tended to be more honest on their profile than they were in person (2012). While there are relatively innocent deceptions in terms of morality, such as height or resume building, there have also been countless cases of pedophiles lurking online and manipulating children into pornographic situations or even meeting with children through dating applications and exploiting them in person. Clearly this area of lying is morally reprehensible and, generally, lying is viewed this way (Gneezy, 2005).
People see engaging dishonesty or utilizing forms of deception as wrong or immoral. The morality of a lie has been called into question since the Garden of Eden. Philosophers such as St. Augustine, Aristotle, and Kant all believe that lying is wrong or, as many of them would say, a sin. This is why people like to tell the truth when engaging with others (Grice, 1991). This also means that lying comes at a cost (Gneezy, Kajackaite, & Sobel, 2018). Some studies suggest that the cost of a lie increases with its size (Fischbacher & Föllmi-Heusi, 2013). However, there are several reasons people have reported to lie, and, in fact, report being dishonest often throughout their daily lives (Hofmann, Wisneski, Brandt, & Skitka, 2014; Gneezy et al., 2018). Thomas Aquinas gave lying a hierarchy placing officious (helpful) lies at the bottom as those that can be forgiven.
There are several avenues by which a person can conduct a lie, but there are new areas of research forming that examine not just the lie in itself, but the motivation behind the lie and how that affects its perception and judgment by others. There is a general practice of all individuals placing value on the opinions of everyone around them. Social identity is a large part of how society functions. Research conducted in 1972 “assumed that individuals are motivated to achieve a positive self-image and that self-esteem can be enhanced by a positive evaluation of one’s own group” (Turner, Brown, Tajfel, 1979). There are conflicting opinions surrounding the morality of lying, yet there are not many studies that determine which motivations are morally and societally acceptable. Katz was the first to conduct prosocial research and found that individuals will act in a consciously motivated manner to remain part of a group (Hazzi & Maldaon, 2012). Some people lie to protect themselves or to avoid causing awkward or tense situations that can be avoided by a carefully crafted lie. The question still remains: which lies are socially acceptable and which lies are not? The purpose of this research is to determine how the motivation behind the lie determines the moral judgment received from others.
Research Questions/Hypotheses
It is this researcher’s prediction that lies which are intended to maintain an honest reputation among peers (such as one where a student is asked by an instructor to self-report a grade and underreports a perfect score rather than risk being seen as a liar) is viewed as more moral than one where someone lies to achieve monetary gain (such as lying to keep money found on the ground in a store) even if the lies are of the same caliber. This would be because the first liar is not motivated by greed, though both would achieve personal gain. Despite this, the second hypothesis is that lying to appear honest will still be viewed less favorably than prosocial lying because the motivation behind the lie is selfish. The individual is still hoping to gain from the situation by maintaining their good reputation. The final hypothesis predicts that women will be more likely to view lying to appear honest less favorably than men.
Literature Review
Morality
Morality is, generally, the basis for all decisions. It helps determine what action is “right” and what action is “wrong.” The science behind morality seeks to determine how individuals develop their sense of morality, how each moral experience is unique, and what the psychological implications are of each moral decision, good or bad (Hofmann et al., 2014). Further, the idea of morality drives an individual’s sense of what one should do in various situations. Studies show that conducting a moral deed results in more happiness than conducting an immoral one (Hofmann et al., 2014; Knobe & Roedder, 2009; Phillips, De Freitas, Mott, Gruber, & Knobe, 2017; Phillips, Nyholm, & Liao, 2014). The Theory of Planned Behavior suggests that individuals take other’s perceived opinions, or social pressures, into consideration, but also their individual morality (Ajzen, 1991).
There is research that predicts that women feel more duty-bound to be moral than men when it comes to dilemmas in which the greater good results from harming others. This means women are more willing to harm others to achieve the greater good (Caprarro & Sippel, 2016; Fumagalli, et al., 2009; Friesdorf, Conway, Gawronski, 2015). One of these studies found that men are more likely to make utilitarian decisions whereas women are more likely to make deontological decisions (Friesdorf et al., 2015). A utilitarian decision is the greatest good for the greatest number, while a deontological decision is decided based on the idea that one has a duty to do what is “right.”
It is important to understand how morality impacts the judgment of a lie because it determines the societal norms of the age. Knowing societal norms opens doors for further research to determine why a norm exists and how it has evolved over time. Morality as connected to a personal reputation begins at a young age. Studies have shown that children understand the importance of a reputation and how their behavior affects others’ perceptions of them by the age of 5 (Fu et al., 2015; Gee & Heyman, 2007). Morality relates to prosocial behavior because moral behavior is a widely accepted norm.
Prosocial Lying
As determined in Katz’s research, more prosocial behavior is predictive of one’s desire to connect with a group. One recent study shows that individuals who are placed in a situation where they were primed with a sadness empathy (the ability to understand or share feelings) situation were more likely to lie than if they were in a neutral situation (Xu, Chen, & Li, 2019). Over time, the research has consistently shown that people place value on social identity (Akerlof & Kranton, 2000; Bénabou & Tirole, 2011; Turner, Brown, & Tajfel, 1979). A prosocial lie is one where there is deception in a perceivably socially acceptable manner. There are a variety of reasons people choose to tell prosocial lies. The reasoning can range from protecting a relationship to preventing another individual from experiencing negative emotions to (Guthrie & Kunkel, 2013;)
