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Social value orientation and deception: are proselfs liars?
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ScienceDirect Social value orientation and deception: are proselfs liars? Wolfgang Steinel Ample research has shown that social value orientations influence unethical behavior, and deception in particular: Proselfs (or individuals with situationally induced selfish motives) are often found to use more deception than prosocials (or individuals with induced cooperative goals). Previous research, however, has often focused on self-interest as the main motive for using deception, and overlooked prosocial motives for lying, like ingroup-favoring dishonesty or lies which aim at reaching fair outcomes. An instrumental perspective on deception [18], stating that bargainers select the most effective means to reach their goals, contends that deception by proselfs varies with the availability of alternative means, that proselfs and prosocials may deceive, but that they do so to reach different goals, and that the expectation of a counterpart’s social motive is a crucial predictor of whether deception is an effective means to reach one’s goals. Address Leiden University, PO Box 9555, 2300RB Leiden, Netherlands Corresponding author: Steinel, Wolfgang ([email protected]) Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215 This review comes from a themed issue on Morality and ethics Edited by Francesca Gino and Shaul Shalvi For a complete overview see the Issue and the Editorial Available online 25th September 2015 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2015.09.016 2352-250X/# 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Deception is widely considered a common tactic in negotiation and bargaining, which are seen as breeding grounds for unethical behavior [1]. These mixed-motive settings are characterized by the conflicting motives to cooperate so as to reach an agreement, and to compete so as to achieve personal gain. To solve this conflict, bargainers may be tempted to use deception. In fact, ethical decision-making in negotiation is mostly the choice between truth-telling and deception [2]. Deception, the ‘deliberate attempt, without forewarning, to create in another a belief which the communicator considers to be untrue’ [3], can be active or passive. Deception by commission entails actively falsifying information, while deception by omission, or passive lying, leads others to make incorrect inferences [4]. Deception is usually attributed to self-interest. For example, deception has been studied in an ultimatum game with two www.sciencedirect.com
parties bargaining over money: An allocator proposed a division, and a recipient could accept or reject it. Upon acceptance, the money would be divided as proposed. Upon rejection, both bargainers would receive nothing. Only one party knew the amount of money at stake and informed the other party about it. Results showed that bargainers made their offers appear more generous than they actually were by pretending that a lower amount was at stake [5]. Similarly, bargainers may call their offers fair in order to increase the chance that the opponent will accept them [6]. Corroborating the idea of self-interest triggering deception, bargainers have been found to deceive more under win-oriented rather than cooperative conflict frames [7] or when it yielded higher profits [8]. However, self-interest is not the only goal individuals may pursue. Which goals someone pursues is influenced by the personality characteristic social value orientation, a relatively stable preference for distributions of outcomes [9]. Depending on the weight people assign to their own and others’ outcomes, most people can be classified as either prosocial, individualist or competitive [10]. Prosocials prefer equality, individualists strive for high individual outcomes regardless of the outcomes of others, and competitors aim to maximize their outcomes relative to the outcomes of others. Individualists and competitors are often taken together as proselfs, because both assign more weight to own than to other’s outcomes [11]. Besides being rooted in the personality characteristic of social value orientation, prosocial and egoistic motives can also be situationally induced, for example through instructions from superiors or organizational reward systems — bonuses for individual performance motivate people to act selfishly, while group-based reward systems trigger cooperative goals. Researchers have also used instructions or incentives to induce prosocial and egoistic motives. To induce an egoistic motive, participants in a dyadic negotiation experiment, for example, would be instructed to reach an agreement which is either as valuable as possible for them individually, or they would be promised a reward based on the value of their individual outcome. In order to induce a prosocial motive, participants would be instructed to reach an agreement which is maximally valuable for both negotiators together, or they would be promised a reward based on the collective value of a negotiated outcome (e.g., [4]). A meta-analysis [12] revealed that situationally induced social motives and dispositional social value orientations are functionally equivalent in the context of negotiation. Studies in which researchers used incentives to manipulate social motives Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
212 Morality and ethics
(rather than measuring social value orientations) therefore corroborate the effects of social value orientations in ethical decision-making, and are included in this review (Figure 1).
How does social value orientation influence ethical decision-making? The question arises how social value orientation influence ethical decision-making, and deception in particular. To answer this question, I will review theoretical and empirical work, distinguish between different goals for deception and ways to deceive, and conclude with an instrumental model that relates the use of deception to the goals bargainers pursue. In a review of deception research, Gaspar and Schweitzer [13] describe how motivations and cognition of negotiators influence the deception process, and conclude that ‘across negotiation situations, proself negotiators are more deceptive than prosocial negotiators’ (p. 164). This conclusion echoes a prediction of the motivated informationprocessing in groups model [14], that ‘group members with a prosocial motive are more likely to communicate accurate information, whereas group members with a proself motive engage in more lying, deception, and misrepresentation’ (p. 34). Indeed, there is ample evidence that proselfs deceive more than prosocials. In a role-play negotiation study, dyads who were either individualistically or cooperatively motivated negotiated over several issues. One issue was compatible, as both negotiators favored the same solution for it. By misrepresenting one’s preference on this compatible issue, a negotiator could pretend to concede, ask for a concession on another issue in return, and get the preferred outcome on both issues. Most of the deception that occurred were acts of omission (e.g., bargainers
concealed the fact that they held compatible interests on the common-value issue, when the counterpart made a favorable offer) instead of commission (i.e., active misrepresentation of their interests). Importantly, misrepresentations occurred more frequently in individualistically motivated dyads [4]. Similarly, in a group decision-making study [15], more strategic concealment and active lies were observed among individualistically than among prosocially motivated participants. In an ultimatum bargaining study, participants acted as allocators and proposed a division of chips, which were twice as valuable to them as to the recipient. Prosocial allocators were truly fair and compensated recipients for the lower value of chips, no matter whether recipients knew about the exchange rate advantage or not. Proselfs, however, compensated counterparts who knew about the exchange rate differences, but concealed their advantage to counterparts who were unaware [16]. In a study on coalition formation [17], groups of three participants had to form two-person coalitions and divide a number of chips within the winning coalition. One player had an exchange rate advantage, and could either reveal this private information to the other players, or lie and claim that the chips were of the same value to them as to the others. Proselfs lied more often than prosocials. As a consequence, prosocials were more successful, as revealing their exchange rate advantage made them attractive partners who were included in more winning coalitions, the prerequisite for materializing the payoff advantage. So, in view of these findings: Are proselfs liars and prosocials saints? The remainder of this chapter aims to draw a more variegated picture. First, there are not only selfish, but also prosocial lies. Second, and more importantly, many studies qualify the finding of selfish liars, and describe how deception by proselfs depends on aspects of the situation. Furthermore, several studies support an
Figure 1
Availability of Alternative Means
Instrumentality of Deception
Social Value Orientation Proself Prosocial
Deception Selfish Lies Prosocial Lies
Counterpart’s Social Motive Current Opinion in Psychology
Proposed conceptual model: an instrumental approach to deception [18,24] presupposes that people select the means they find most instrumental to their current goal. Proselfs and prosocials alike use deception when they consider it the most effective means to reach their goals, and often refrain from deception when they have alternative means to reach their goals. Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
www.sciencedirect.com
Social value orientation and deception Steinel 213
instrumental account of deception [18], which suggests that deception is instrumental behavior aimed at reaching a goal — proselfs may often avoid deception if they have alternative means to reach their goals, and prosocials may also use deception when it is a means to reach their (prosocial) goals.
were allocators or recipients. For proselfs, however, role mattered: 81% of the selfish allocators lied, compared to 95% of the selfish recipients. Again, proselfs, but not prosocials, adapted their deceptive behavior to the situation.
An instrumental account of deception Exploring the role of bonding and cooperation in shaping dishonesty, Shalvi and De Dreu [19] showed that people told more group-serving lies, but not more self-serving lies, when given oxytocin (a neuropeptide which increases affiliation and cooperation with others) rather than placebo: Prosocial lying thus appears to be rooted in evolved human neurobiology. Levine and Schweitzer [20,21] have disentangled deception from self-interest, and focused on two types of prosocial lies — ‘altruistic lies,’ benefitting the target of deception, and ‘mutually beneficial lies,’ benefitting the liar and the target. They found that people who told prosocial lies were trusted more and were perceived as more moral than people who told the truth. It was not investigated whether social value orientations influence the likelihood of telling prosocial or group-serving lies. Nevertheless, one may predict that prosocials, who care about other people, are more likely to use prosocial lies than proselfs. Several studies show that proselfs are more likely to act unethically than prosocials, yet qualify this finding by various situational moderators. In an ultimatum bargaining game in which only allocators knew the exact size of the endowment, proself allocators deceived the recipients more than prosocial allocators did when the ultimatum game was about losses. When distributing gains, however, prosocial and proself allocators did not differ. Furthermore, deception rates of prosocials did not differ between the loss and the gain domain, while deception rates of proselfs were higher in the loss domain than in the gain domain [22]. These findings suggest that instead of deceiving consistently, proselfs are sensitive to the situation, and use deception depending on situational demands. Similarly, in a study on reactions to procedural injustice, proselfs reported more negative behavioral intentions when they were denied voice than when they were granted voice, while voice did not influence prosocials, and prosocials and proselfs did not differ when they were granted voice [23]. Again, proselfs were more likely than prosocials to behave unethically, yet this was dependent on the situation. Koning, Van Dijk, Van Beest and Steinel [24] investigated deception in ultimatum bargaining, with participants distributing chips with another participant (who, in fact, was programmed). Participants had a favorable exchange rate, which was allegedly not known to their counterparts, and could send an accurate or a deceptive message about their exchange rate before the proposal was made. Results revealed that more proselfs than prosocials sent a deceptive message. Importantly, prosocials lied less, no matter whether they www.sciencedirect.com
The instrumental account of deception, proposed by Koning et al. [24], can explain why deception is more situation-specific for proselfs than for prosocials. It relates the use of deception to the goals bargainers pursue and the means they have available in order to reach their goals. The instrumentality approach presupposes that people select the means they find most instrumental to their current goal [18,24]. In the ultimatum game described above, lying (i.e., pretending the chips had the same value as for the counterpart) was functional to increase one’s chances to receive good outcomes for allocators and recipients alike: By pretending that chips are less valuable to themselves as they actually are, allocators, on the one hand, could make self-serving offers appear fair, and thus increase the likelihood of getting self-serving offers accepted. Recipients, on the other hand, could expect to receive more favorable offers by not revealing their exchange rate advantage. Importantly, allocators do have alternative means to secure a good outcome: Besides deception, they could increase offers to improve their chances of getting the offer accepted. Recipients lack this alternative means. The results by Koning et al. [24] support the instrumental model of deception: In a zero-sum game like ultimatum bargaining, the goal of prosocials (achieving equal outcomes) may be easier to reach without using deception than the goal of proselfs (increasing their individual outcome at the expense of the other bargainer), which explains the higher deception rates of proselfs. Importantly, a considerable number of proselfs tried to reach their goal without deception, when an alternative means was available (i.e., when they were in the allocator role). Note that contrary to the general prediction that selfish motives trigger deception, and prosocial motives reduce deception, an instrumental model of deception predicts that people use deception whenever it is the most appropriate means to reach their goal. In order to test this prediction, Koning et al. [25] developed a game in which deception can serve selfish as well as prosocial goals (i.e., increasing own outcome or achieve equal distributions). In this motivated deception game, decision-makers choose between three distributions, without knowing how many valuable points each distribution gives themselves and a dependent other player. Participants were the other player and knew that Distribution 1 favored the decision-maker over themselves, Distribution 2 favored themselves over the decision-maker, and Distribution 3 resulted in equal, but lower, outcomes for both. They could mislead the decision-makers about the points both Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
214 Morality and ethics
players could earn. Pretending that Distribution 2 earned many points for the decision-makers could lure them in choosing that distribution — a self-serving lie, as Distribution 2 actually favored the participant. Even though participants could fill in any numbers they wanted, results revealed that most bargainers pursued one of three strategies — no deception, deception to increase own outcomes (i.e., make Distribution 2 appealing to the decision-maker), and deception to achieve equal outcomes (i.e., make Distribution 3 appealing). In a first experiment, the vast majority of proselfs used deception to increase own outcomes, while prosocials chose all three strategies in comparable numbers. In a second experiment, participants received bogus information about the orientation of their opponent. Results showed that proselfs, again, mainly used deception to increase their own outcomes. For prosocials, again, the results were more varied. They hardly ever deceived a prosocial decisionmaker — deception is unnecessary as both bargainers pursue the same goal. With a proself decision-maker, however, prosocials used deception to achieve equal outcomes. These results show that lies are not necessarily motivated by self-interest. Instead, bargainers use deception if it helps them attain their goals in bargaining, and the type of deception used depends on the goals they have (see also [24]). The findings by Koning et al. [25] further show that whether or not deception is an instrumental means to reach one’s goal also depends on a bargainer’s expectations about the counterpart’s social motive. The relevance of a counterpart’s social motive has previously been demonstrated in a series of studies using the so-called information provision game [26]. This game was similar to the paradigm used by Koning et al. [25], as participants were dependent on the decisions allegedly made by other participants, who were unaware of the value of their decision to the dependent other. Results revealed that participants deceived decision-makers more when those were portrayed as competitive rather than cooperative. Interestingly, this tendency was stronger for prosocials than for proselfs, possibly because punitive sentiment motivated them to punish competitive counterparts. In a similar vein, the importance of a counterpart’s social motive for ethical decision making became evident in a study in which participants could choose between entering an ultimatum bargaining game with an exchange rate advantage or leave the situation in exchange for a payment lower than what they could have earned by deceiving the counterpart. Results showed that people were averse to entering a situation in which they are tempted to deceive a prosocial counterpart, while they were willing to take the temptation and deceive a competitive counterpart [27].
Conclusion To answer the question how social value orientations influence deception, I turn to the instrumental model of deception [18]. Bargainers choose the means they Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
consider most instrumental for reaching their goals, and the different goals of proselfs and prosocials may lead to a different selection of means. In addition, the model does not only focus on deception as a means, but also stresses the importance of the availability of alternative means. Whether someone, proself or prosocial, uses deception depends on whether they consider it the most effective means to reach their goals.
Conflict of interest statement I, Wolfgang Steinel, certify that I have NO affiliation with or involvement in any organization or entity with any financial interest (such as honoraria; educational grants; participation in speakers’ bureaus; membership, employment, consultancies, stock ownership, or other equity interest; and expert testimony or patent-licensing arrangements), or non-financial interest (such as personal or professional relationships, affiliations, knowledge or beliefs) in the subject matter or materials discussed in this manuscript.
References and recommended reading Papers of particular interest, published within the period of review, have been highlighted as: of special interest of outstanding interest 1.
Tenbrunsel AE: Misrepresentation and expectations of misrepresentation in an ethical dilemma: the role of incentives and temptation. Acad Manage J 1998, 41:330-339 http:// dx.doi.org/10.2307/256911.
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Lewicki RJ, Saunders DM, Barry B: Negotiation. 7th Ed.. McGrawHill; 2014.
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Vrij A: Detecting Lies and Deceit: The Psychology of Lying and the Implications for Professional Practice. John Wiley & Sons; 2000.
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O’Connor KM, Carnevale PJ: A nasty but effective negotiation strategy: misrepresentation of a common-value issue. Personal Social Psychol Bull 1997, 23:504-515 http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1177/0146167297235006.
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Boles TL, Croson RTA, Murnighan JK: Deception and retribution in repeated ultimatum bargaining. Organ Behav Hum Decision Process 2000, 83:235-259 http://dx.doi.org/10.1006/ obhd.2000.2908.
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Pillutla MM, Murnighan JK: Being fair or appearing fair: strategic behavior in ultimatum bargaining. Acad Manage J 1995, 38:1408-1426 http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/256863.
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Schweitzer ME, DeChurch LA, Gibson DE: Conflict frames and the use of deception: are competitive negotiators less ethical? J Appl Social Psychol 2005, 35:2123-2149 http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1111/j.1559-1816.2005.tb02212.x.
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Gneezy U: Deception: the role of consequences. Am Econ Rev 2005, 95:384-394 http://dx.doi.org/10.1257/0002828053828662.
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Messick DM, McClintock CG: Motivational bases of choice in experimental games. J Exp Social Psychol 1968, 4:1-25 http:// dx.doi.org/10.1016/0022-1031(73)90039-5.
10. Van Lange PAM: The pursuit of joint outcomes and equality in outcomes: an integrative model of social value orientations. J Personal Social Psychol 1999, 77:337-349 http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1037//0022-3514.77.2.337. 11. Van Lange PAM, Kuhlman DM: Social value orientations and impressions of partner’s honesty and intelligence: a test of the might versus morality effect. J Personal Social Psychol 1994, 67:126-141 http://dx.doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.67.1.126. www.sciencedirect.com
Social value orientation and deception Steinel 215
12. De Dreu CKW, Weingart L, Kwon S: Influence of social motives on integrative negotiation: a meta-analytic review and test of two theories. J Personal Social Psychol 2000, 78:889-905 http:// dx.doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.78.5.889.
The authors study reactions to people who lie in order to benefit others. These prosocial liars are perceived to be more moral than honest individuals, which shows that benevolence may be more important than honesty for judgments of moral character.
13. Gaspar JP, Schweitzer ME: The emotion deception model: a review of deception in negotiation and the role of emotion in deception. Negotiation Conflict Manage Res 2013, 6:160-179 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/ncmr.12010. The authors review deception research and introduce the emotion deception model, which broadens our understanding of deception in negotiations and accounts for the important role of emotions in the deception decision process.
21. Levine EA, Schweitzer ME: Prosocial lies: when deception breeds trust. Organ Behav Hum Decision Process 2015, 126:88106 http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2266091. The authors challenge the assertion that deception harms trust and demonstrate across five studies, that prosocial lying increases both behavioral and attitudinal measures of trust. They find that perceived benevolence is more important than perceived integrity in predicting trust behavior.
14. De Dreu CKW, Nijstad BA, Van Knippenberg D: Motivated information processing in group judgment and decision making. Personal Social Psychol Rev 2008, 12:22-49 http:// dx.doi.org/10.1177/1088868307304092.
22. Reinders Folmer CP, De Cremer D: Bad for me or bad for us? Interpersonal orientations and the impact of losses on unethical behavior. Personal Social Psychol Bull 2012, 38:760771 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0146167211436252.
15. Steinel W, Utz S, Koning L: The good, the bad and the ugly thing to do when sharing information: revealing, concealing and lying depend on social motivation, distribution and importance of information. Organ Behav Hum Decision Process 2010, 113:85-96 http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/ e673512012-107.
23. Van Prooijen J-W, De Cremer D, Van Beest I, Sta˚hl T, Van Dijke M, Van Lange PAM: The egocentric nature of procedural justice: social value orientations as moderator of reactions to decision-making procedures. J Exp Social Psychol 2008, 44:1303-1315 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2008.05.006.
16. Van Dijk E, De Cremer D, Handgraaf MJJ: Social value orientations and the strategic use of fairness in ultimatum bargaining. J Exp Social Psychol 2004, 40:697-707 http:// dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2004.03.002. 17. Van Beest I, Steinel W, Murnighan JK: Honesty pays: on the benefits of having and disclosing information in coalition bargaining. J Exp Social Psychol 2011, 47:738-747 http:// dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2011.02.013. 18. Koning LF, Steinel W, Van Beest I, Van Dijk E: Power and deception in ultimatum bargaining. Organ Behav Hum Decision Process 2011, 115:35-42 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/ j.obhdp.2011.01.007. 19. Shalvi S, De Dreu CKW: Oxytocin promotes group-serving dishonesty. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2014, 111:5503-5507 http:// dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1400724111. The authors explore the biological foundations of immoral behavior and demonstrate in a placebo-controlled experiment that oxytocin promotes ingroup-serving, but not self-serving dishonesty. 20. Levine EA, Schweitzer ME: Are liars ethical? On the tension between benevolence and honesty,. J Exp Social Psychol 2014, 53:107-117 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2014.03.005.
www.sciencedirect.com
24. Koning LF, Van Dijk E, Van Beest I, Steinel W: An instrumental account of deception and reactions to deceit in bargaining. Business Ethics Quart 2010, 20:57-73 http://dx.doi.org/10.5840/ beq20102015. 25. Koning LF, Steinel W, Van Beest I, Van Dijk E: Goals and the use of deception: lying for the greater good. Leiden University; 2015:. Unpublished manuscript. The relation between social value orientation and the use of deception was studied in two experiments. Results showed that proselfs used deception mainly to increase their own outcomes. This was different for prosocials, who used deception often against proself opponents to reach high joint outcomes, but rarely used deception when facing a prosocial opponent. This shows that both social value orientation of the participants and their expectations about the goals of their opponent influenced the use of deception. 26. Steinel W, De Dreu CKW: Social motives and strategic misrepresentation in social decision making. J Personal Social Psychol 2004, 86:419-434 http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/00223514.86.3.419. 27. Shalvi S, Handgraaf MJJ, De Dreu CKW: People avoid situations that enable them to deceive others. J Exp Social Psychol 2011, 47:1096-1106 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2011.04.015.
Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
ScienceDirect Social value orientation and deception: are proselfs liars? Wolfgang Steinel Ample research has shown that social value orientations influence unethical behavior, and deception in particular: Proselfs (or individuals with situationally induced selfish motives) are often found to use more deception than prosocials (or individuals with induced cooperative goals). Previous research, however, has often focused on self-interest as the main motive for using deception, and overlooked prosocial motives for lying, like ingroup-favoring dishonesty or lies which aim at reaching fair outcomes. An instrumental perspective on deception [18], stating that bargainers select the most effective means to reach their goals, contends that deception by proselfs varies with the availability of alternative means, that proselfs and prosocials may deceive, but that they do so to reach different goals, and that the expectation of a counterpart’s social motive is a crucial predictor of whether deception is an effective means to reach one’s goals. Address Leiden University, PO Box 9555, 2300RB Leiden, Netherlands Corresponding author: Steinel, Wolfgang ([email protected]) Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215 This review comes from a themed issue on Morality and ethics Edited by Francesca Gino and Shaul Shalvi For a complete overview see the Issue and the Editorial Available online 25th September 2015 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2015.09.016 2352-250X/# 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Deception is widely considered a common tactic in negotiation and bargaining, which are seen as breeding grounds for unethical behavior [1]. These mixed-motive settings are characterized by the conflicting motives to cooperate so as to reach an agreement, and to compete so as to achieve personal gain. To solve this conflict, bargainers may be tempted to use deception. In fact, ethical decision-making in negotiation is mostly the choice between truth-telling and deception [2]. Deception, the ‘deliberate attempt, without forewarning, to create in another a belief which the communicator considers to be untrue’ [3], can be active or passive. Deception by commission entails actively falsifying information, while deception by omission, or passive lying, leads others to make incorrect inferences [4]. Deception is usually attributed to self-interest. For example, deception has been studied in an ultimatum game with two www.sciencedirect.com
parties bargaining over money: An allocator proposed a division, and a recipient could accept or reject it. Upon acceptance, the money would be divided as proposed. Upon rejection, both bargainers would receive nothing. Only one party knew the amount of money at stake and informed the other party about it. Results showed that bargainers made their offers appear more generous than they actually were by pretending that a lower amount was at stake [5]. Similarly, bargainers may call their offers fair in order to increase the chance that the opponent will accept them [6]. Corroborating the idea of self-interest triggering deception, bargainers have been found to deceive more under win-oriented rather than cooperative conflict frames [7] or when it yielded higher profits [8]. However, self-interest is not the only goal individuals may pursue. Which goals someone pursues is influenced by the personality characteristic social value orientation, a relatively stable preference for distributions of outcomes [9]. Depending on the weight people assign to their own and others’ outcomes, most people can be classified as either prosocial, individualist or competitive [10]. Prosocials prefer equality, individualists strive for high individual outcomes regardless of the outcomes of others, and competitors aim to maximize their outcomes relative to the outcomes of others. Individualists and competitors are often taken together as proselfs, because both assign more weight to own than to other’s outcomes [11]. Besides being rooted in the personality characteristic of social value orientation, prosocial and egoistic motives can also be situationally induced, for example through instructions from superiors or organizational reward systems — bonuses for individual performance motivate people to act selfishly, while group-based reward systems trigger cooperative goals. Researchers have also used instructions or incentives to induce prosocial and egoistic motives. To induce an egoistic motive, participants in a dyadic negotiation experiment, for example, would be instructed to reach an agreement which is either as valuable as possible for them individually, or they would be promised a reward based on the value of their individual outcome. In order to induce a prosocial motive, participants would be instructed to reach an agreement which is maximally valuable for both negotiators together, or they would be promised a reward based on the collective value of a negotiated outcome (e.g., [4]). A meta-analysis [12] revealed that situationally induced social motives and dispositional social value orientations are functionally equivalent in the context of negotiation. Studies in which researchers used incentives to manipulate social motives Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
212 Morality and ethics
(rather than measuring social value orientations) therefore corroborate the effects of social value orientations in ethical decision-making, and are included in this review (Figure 1).
How does social value orientation influence ethical decision-making? The question arises how social value orientation influence ethical decision-making, and deception in particular. To answer this question, I will review theoretical and empirical work, distinguish between different goals for deception and ways to deceive, and conclude with an instrumental model that relates the use of deception to the goals bargainers pursue. In a review of deception research, Gaspar and Schweitzer [13] describe how motivations and cognition of negotiators influence the deception process, and conclude that ‘across negotiation situations, proself negotiators are more deceptive than prosocial negotiators’ (p. 164). This conclusion echoes a prediction of the motivated informationprocessing in groups model [14], that ‘group members with a prosocial motive are more likely to communicate accurate information, whereas group members with a proself motive engage in more lying, deception, and misrepresentation’ (p. 34). Indeed, there is ample evidence that proselfs deceive more than prosocials. In a role-play negotiation study, dyads who were either individualistically or cooperatively motivated negotiated over several issues. One issue was compatible, as both negotiators favored the same solution for it. By misrepresenting one’s preference on this compatible issue, a negotiator could pretend to concede, ask for a concession on another issue in return, and get the preferred outcome on both issues. Most of the deception that occurred were acts of omission (e.g., bargainers
concealed the fact that they held compatible interests on the common-value issue, when the counterpart made a favorable offer) instead of commission (i.e., active misrepresentation of their interests). Importantly, misrepresentations occurred more frequently in individualistically motivated dyads [4]. Similarly, in a group decision-making study [15], more strategic concealment and active lies were observed among individualistically than among prosocially motivated participants. In an ultimatum bargaining study, participants acted as allocators and proposed a division of chips, which were twice as valuable to them as to the recipient. Prosocial allocators were truly fair and compensated recipients for the lower value of chips, no matter whether recipients knew about the exchange rate advantage or not. Proselfs, however, compensated counterparts who knew about the exchange rate differences, but concealed their advantage to counterparts who were unaware [16]. In a study on coalition formation [17], groups of three participants had to form two-person coalitions and divide a number of chips within the winning coalition. One player had an exchange rate advantage, and could either reveal this private information to the other players, or lie and claim that the chips were of the same value to them as to the others. Proselfs lied more often than prosocials. As a consequence, prosocials were more successful, as revealing their exchange rate advantage made them attractive partners who were included in more winning coalitions, the prerequisite for materializing the payoff advantage. So, in view of these findings: Are proselfs liars and prosocials saints? The remainder of this chapter aims to draw a more variegated picture. First, there are not only selfish, but also prosocial lies. Second, and more importantly, many studies qualify the finding of selfish liars, and describe how deception by proselfs depends on aspects of the situation. Furthermore, several studies support an
Figure 1
Availability of Alternative Means
Instrumentality of Deception
Social Value Orientation Proself Prosocial
Deception Selfish Lies Prosocial Lies
Counterpart’s Social Motive Current Opinion in Psychology
Proposed conceptual model: an instrumental approach to deception [18,24] presupposes that people select the means they find most instrumental to their current goal. Proselfs and prosocials alike use deception when they consider it the most effective means to reach their goals, and often refrain from deception when they have alternative means to reach their goals. Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
www.sciencedirect.com
Social value orientation and deception Steinel 213
instrumental account of deception [18], which suggests that deception is instrumental behavior aimed at reaching a goal — proselfs may often avoid deception if they have alternative means to reach their goals, and prosocials may also use deception when it is a means to reach their (prosocial) goals.
were allocators or recipients. For proselfs, however, role mattered: 81% of the selfish allocators lied, compared to 95% of the selfish recipients. Again, proselfs, but not prosocials, adapted their deceptive behavior to the situation.
An instrumental account of deception Exploring the role of bonding and cooperation in shaping dishonesty, Shalvi and De Dreu [19] showed that people told more group-serving lies, but not more self-serving lies, when given oxytocin (a neuropeptide which increases affiliation and cooperation with others) rather than placebo: Prosocial lying thus appears to be rooted in evolved human neurobiology. Levine and Schweitzer [20,21] have disentangled deception from self-interest, and focused on two types of prosocial lies — ‘altruistic lies,’ benefitting the target of deception, and ‘mutually beneficial lies,’ benefitting the liar and the target. They found that people who told prosocial lies were trusted more and were perceived as more moral than people who told the truth. It was not investigated whether social value orientations influence the likelihood of telling prosocial or group-serving lies. Nevertheless, one may predict that prosocials, who care about other people, are more likely to use prosocial lies than proselfs. Several studies show that proselfs are more likely to act unethically than prosocials, yet qualify this finding by various situational moderators. In an ultimatum bargaining game in which only allocators knew the exact size of the endowment, proself allocators deceived the recipients more than prosocial allocators did when the ultimatum game was about losses. When distributing gains, however, prosocial and proself allocators did not differ. Furthermore, deception rates of prosocials did not differ between the loss and the gain domain, while deception rates of proselfs were higher in the loss domain than in the gain domain [22]. These findings suggest that instead of deceiving consistently, proselfs are sensitive to the situation, and use deception depending on situational demands. Similarly, in a study on reactions to procedural injustice, proselfs reported more negative behavioral intentions when they were denied voice than when they were granted voice, while voice did not influence prosocials, and prosocials and proselfs did not differ when they were granted voice [23]. Again, proselfs were more likely than prosocials to behave unethically, yet this was dependent on the situation. Koning, Van Dijk, Van Beest and Steinel [24] investigated deception in ultimatum bargaining, with participants distributing chips with another participant (who, in fact, was programmed). Participants had a favorable exchange rate, which was allegedly not known to their counterparts, and could send an accurate or a deceptive message about their exchange rate before the proposal was made. Results revealed that more proselfs than prosocials sent a deceptive message. Importantly, prosocials lied less, no matter whether they www.sciencedirect.com
The instrumental account of deception, proposed by Koning et al. [24], can explain why deception is more situation-specific for proselfs than for prosocials. It relates the use of deception to the goals bargainers pursue and the means they have available in order to reach their goals. The instrumentality approach presupposes that people select the means they find most instrumental to their current goal [18,24]. In the ultimatum game described above, lying (i.e., pretending the chips had the same value as for the counterpart) was functional to increase one’s chances to receive good outcomes for allocators and recipients alike: By pretending that chips are less valuable to themselves as they actually are, allocators, on the one hand, could make self-serving offers appear fair, and thus increase the likelihood of getting self-serving offers accepted. Recipients, on the other hand, could expect to receive more favorable offers by not revealing their exchange rate advantage. Importantly, allocators do have alternative means to secure a good outcome: Besides deception, they could increase offers to improve their chances of getting the offer accepted. Recipients lack this alternative means. The results by Koning et al. [24] support the instrumental model of deception: In a zero-sum game like ultimatum bargaining, the goal of prosocials (achieving equal outcomes) may be easier to reach without using deception than the goal of proselfs (increasing their individual outcome at the expense of the other bargainer), which explains the higher deception rates of proselfs. Importantly, a considerable number of proselfs tried to reach their goal without deception, when an alternative means was available (i.e., when they were in the allocator role). Note that contrary to the general prediction that selfish motives trigger deception, and prosocial motives reduce deception, an instrumental model of deception predicts that people use deception whenever it is the most appropriate means to reach their goal. In order to test this prediction, Koning et al. [25] developed a game in which deception can serve selfish as well as prosocial goals (i.e., increasing own outcome or achieve equal distributions). In this motivated deception game, decision-makers choose between three distributions, without knowing how many valuable points each distribution gives themselves and a dependent other player. Participants were the other player and knew that Distribution 1 favored the decision-maker over themselves, Distribution 2 favored themselves over the decision-maker, and Distribution 3 resulted in equal, but lower, outcomes for both. They could mislead the decision-makers about the points both Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
214 Morality and ethics
players could earn. Pretending that Distribution 2 earned many points for the decision-makers could lure them in choosing that distribution — a self-serving lie, as Distribution 2 actually favored the participant. Even though participants could fill in any numbers they wanted, results revealed that most bargainers pursued one of three strategies — no deception, deception to increase own outcomes (i.e., make Distribution 2 appealing to the decision-maker), and deception to achieve equal outcomes (i.e., make Distribution 3 appealing). In a first experiment, the vast majority of proselfs used deception to increase own outcomes, while prosocials chose all three strategies in comparable numbers. In a second experiment, participants received bogus information about the orientation of their opponent. Results showed that proselfs, again, mainly used deception to increase their own outcomes. For prosocials, again, the results were more varied. They hardly ever deceived a prosocial decisionmaker — deception is unnecessary as both bargainers pursue the same goal. With a proself decision-maker, however, prosocials used deception to achieve equal outcomes. These results show that lies are not necessarily motivated by self-interest. Instead, bargainers use deception if it helps them attain their goals in bargaining, and the type of deception used depends on the goals they have (see also [24]). The findings by Koning et al. [25] further show that whether or not deception is an instrumental means to reach one’s goal also depends on a bargainer’s expectations about the counterpart’s social motive. The relevance of a counterpart’s social motive has previously been demonstrated in a series of studies using the so-called information provision game [26]. This game was similar to the paradigm used by Koning et al. [25], as participants were dependent on the decisions allegedly made by other participants, who were unaware of the value of their decision to the dependent other. Results revealed that participants deceived decision-makers more when those were portrayed as competitive rather than cooperative. Interestingly, this tendency was stronger for prosocials than for proselfs, possibly because punitive sentiment motivated them to punish competitive counterparts. In a similar vein, the importance of a counterpart’s social motive for ethical decision making became evident in a study in which participants could choose between entering an ultimatum bargaining game with an exchange rate advantage or leave the situation in exchange for a payment lower than what they could have earned by deceiving the counterpart. Results showed that people were averse to entering a situation in which they are tempted to deceive a prosocial counterpart, while they were willing to take the temptation and deceive a competitive counterpart [27].
Conclusion To answer the question how social value orientations influence deception, I turn to the instrumental model of deception [18]. Bargainers choose the means they Current Opinion in Psychology 2015, 6:211–215
consider most instrumental for reaching their goals, and the different goals of proselfs and prosocials may lead to a different selection of means. In addition, the model does not only focus on deception as a means, but also stresses the importance of the availability of alternative means. Whether someone, proself or prosocial, uses deception depends on whether they consider it the most effective means to reach their goals.
Conflict of interest statement I, Wolfgang Steinel, certify that I have NO affiliation with or involvement in any organization or entity with any financial interest (such as honoraria; educational grants; participation in speakers’ bureaus; membership, employment, consultancies, stock ownership, or other equity interest; and expert testimony or patent-licensing arrangements), or non-financial interest (such as personal or professional relationships, affiliations, knowledge or beliefs) in the subject matter or materials discussed in this manuscript.
References and recommended reading Papers of particular interest, published within the period of review, have been highlighted as: of special interest of outstanding interest 1.
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