Cultural, Social, Emotional and Cognitive Aspects of Corruption at Developing Countries

Abstract

This paper aims to contribute to an improved understanding of the role played by psychology and social psychology in corruption in Turkey using enthnographic methods. The social psychological elements are very strong in bribery transactions, linked to the concept of obedience and conformity. Previous works rely on survey questions. However, survey responses may not reflect true experiences in actual corruption scenarios. From this perspective, it is the first ethnographic academic research on corruption. The research questions concern a) in which context corruption occurs, b) what are the physical, cognitive, emotional, social, and cultural situations, and c) what people’s motivations are and why people give into bribery. Knowing people is about gaining an empathic understanding of people’s thoughts, feelings, and needs by interacting. Immersing yourself in people’s bribery transactions and keenly listening to their bribery stories can provide valuable insights whish are sometimes quite surprising and nonobvious. To get to such valuable insights, we should focus on everything that people do, say, and think during ther bribery transaction; we should deeply understand people’s motivations, and overall experiences when we implement policies.