According to the standard economic view, people choose to lie or come clean based on what they expect to receive in return, that is, based on how it affects their own material benefit. Researchers from the Autonomous University of Madrid (UAM) and the University of Quebec in Montreal (Canada) deny this view and reveal that in many casesa person is sincere “because he has internalized it, and the opposite makes them feel a negative emotion such as guilt or shame,which we know as pure aversion to lies ”, Raúl López, a researcher at the UAM and co-author of the work, explains to the SINC agency.
To demonstrate this, they carried out a trial with 258 people who shared the roles of messenger and receiver. The messenger had a computer screen in front of him and saw what experts call a random signal; in this case, a green or blue circle that appeared indistinctly. Once the messenger observed the color, he had to send a message to the receiver indicating “the blue circle has appeared” or “the green circle has appeared”, in other words, he could lie or tell the truth. The recipient was unaware of the color at all times, only received the message. In addition, monetary payments were given depending on what was decided, lying or telling the truth. “The receiver always received 10 euros, whatever happened. The messenger, if he sent the green message, he received 15 euros, and if he sent blue, 14 euros ”.
The subjects therefore faced the dilemma of lying or not to earn more money. To elucidate the motivation and see if conformity was influencing – why people tell the truth because they think it is what they are expected to say – the test was repeated, first with a high probability of green, and then blue.
Since lying only brings monetary benefits when the signal is blue, the receiver would be expected to lie more likely when the probability of blue was high. “We verified that conformity did not influence the decision and that there were 40% of people who always told the truth. This fact is in favor of the hypothesis that these people were averse to lying. It is apparently very strong evidence, ”argues the study co-author.
Neither religious bias, nor gender, nor political preference were related to being honest. On the other hand, the authors also analyzed the expectations of people who always tell the truth and liars, encouraging them with money. And they saw that while honest people believe that others are honest, those who are dishonest believe that others are also going to lie.
