Self-Protection or Moral Outrage: Reasons Underlying Lying and Deception in Competitive Interaction

Deceiving a competitive other may be motivated by self-protection or by moral outrage. Which motivation explains deception was examined in an experimental study (N = 112) in which participants provided information about their own payoffs to a competitive other who would make a decision determining both the participant's and the decision maker's payoffs. Payoffs were valuable or not to the participants (making self-protection more or less relevant) and were valuable or not to the decision makers (making moral outrage more or less relevant). When payoffs were valuable to the participants they revealed fewer pieces of accurate information, especially when the payoffs were valuable to the competitive other as well. Also, the information provided deviated further from accuracy when payoffs were valuable to the opponent. It is concluded that deceiving a competitive other is primarily motivated by self-protection, but that moral outrage seems to play a role as well.