Smug Alert! Exploring self-licensing behaviour in a cheating game

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13 March 2014

We test experimentally a prediction of the ‘moral credit model’, in which committing a virtuous act creates moral credits that can license immoral behaviour in a succeeding decision. We use a basic cheating experiment that was either preceded by a virtuous deed or not in a developing country context. We found that people who previously achieved a good deed cheat more. Gender and origin are also significant explicative variables for cheating.