Benefits Of Deception Research Articles

A sheep in wolf's clothing: levels of deceit and detection in the evolution of cue-mimicry.

In an evolutionary context, trusted signals or cues provide individuals with the opportunity to manipulate them to their advantage by deceiving others. The deceived can then respond to the deception by either ignoring the signals or cues or evolving means of deception-detection. If the latter happens, it can result in an arms race between deception and detection. Here, we formally analyse these possibilities in the context of cue-mimicry in prey-predator interactions. We demonstrate that two extrinsic parameters control whether and for how long an arms race continues: the benefits of deception, and the cost of ignoring signals and cues and having an indiscriminate response. As long as the cost of new forms of deception is less than its benefits and the cost of new forms of detection is less than the cost of an indiscriminate response, an arms race results in the perpetual evolution of better forms of detection and deception. When novel forms of deception or detection become too costly to evolve, the population settles on a polymorphic equilibrium involving multiple strategies of deception and honesty, and multiple strategies of detection and trust.

Viewpoint: The costs and benefits of deception in economic experiments

The historical justifications typically given for the prohibition against deception in economic experiments are less relevant for today’s experiments that are often conducted in non-lab settings with non-student subjects. I describe a variety of research questions that might be most adequately answered with some form of deception, and call for a more nuanced view of the issue that requires a consideration of the importance of the research question relative to the potential costs of deception. For example, in the case of new food products that have not yet been developed, does the sin of hypothetical bias outweigh the sin of deceiving subjects in a non-hypothetical experiment? It is important for journals or professions, which ban the use of deception, to actually define what practices fall under the ban.

Impromptu Decisions to Deceive

SummaryThis research furthers understanding of the factors that induce individuals to choose deception. Its goals were to expand and test a recent account of the cognition of deception, Activation–Decision–Construction–Action Theory (ADCAT), in a mock job interview inviting impromptu deception. Decisions to lie are hypothesized to depend on the truth and other information activated from long‐term memory by the social context. Activated information then guides evaluation of the likely costs of truth telling and benefits of deception; 166 college students participated in the job interview, who learned about the position and then adopted the role of job applicants. Afterward, participants shared their thoughts when responding to five questions from the interview. The most important findings are that the negative expectations of sharing truths and the positive expectations of sharing deceptions each account for unique variance in deciding to lie. Implications for lie reduction and detection are considered. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The cost and benefit of deception

A new wrinkle on the prisoner’s dilemma game reveals the complex evolution of two-faced behavior in a population of individuals.

The cost and benefit of deception

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Deciding whether to deceive: Determinants of the choice between deceptive and honest communication

Even when considered purely as strategic choices, decisions about deceptive communication are unusually complex and difficult to predict or analyze. The costs and benefits of deceptive and honest communication options may lie in very different domains, making direct comparison cognitively challenging. In this study, we use everyday scenarios to assess people's sensitivity to various aspects of such choices, including the probability that a deception will be detected and the costs and benefits associated with successful or failed deception. Factor analysis yields three composite determinants, which we interpret as sensitivities to (1) justifiability of deception, (2) benefit of successful deception, and (3) personal utility of honesty. We show that the relative strengths of these determinants differ in loss- vs. gain-facing scenarios: decision makers facing a probabilistic or certain loss take account of all three factors, while those facing a gain do not appear to make significant use of information about the magnitude of the potential benefit from deception. We discuss several potential explanations for this asymmetry.

The Costs of Deception: Evidence from Psychology

Recently, it has been argued that the evidence in social science research suggests that deceiving subjects in an experiment does not lead to a significant loss of experimental control. Based on this assessment, experimental economists were counseled to lift their de facto prohibition against deception to capture its potential benefits. To the extent that this recommendation is derived from empirical studies, we argue that it draws on a selective sample of the available evidence. Building on a systematic review of relevant research in psychology, we present two major results: First, the evidence suggests that the experience of having been deceived generates suspicion which in turn is likely to affect judgment and decision making of a non-negligible number of participants. Second, we find little evidence for reputational spillover effects that have been hypothesized by a number of authors in psychology and economics (e.g., Kelman, 1967; Davis and Holt, 1993). Based on a discussion of the methodological costs and benefits of deception, we conclude that experimental economists' prohibition of deception is a sensible convention that economists should not abandon.

Balancing risks and benefits of deception in assessing genetic screening utilization.

To advocate that research using intentional deception is sometimes appropriate. A deception paradigm created to assess utilization of genetic screening for alcoholism susceptibility is reviewed in the context of competing ethical obligations and objections to the procedure. The paradigm is ethically defensible, it generates useful knowledge about future utilization of alcoholism screening by college students, and it exposes participants to no more than minimal risk. The use of deception to address questions related to predictive genetic screening will require investigators to balance protection of participants with the need to advance knowledge.

The Costs of Deception: Evidence from Psychology

Recently, it has been argued that the evidence in social science research suggests that deceiving subjects in an experiment does not lead to a significant loss of experimental control. Based on this assessment, experimental economists were counseled to lift their de facto prohibition against deception to capture its potential benefits. To the extent that this recommendation is derived from empirical studies, we argue that it draws on a selective sample of the available evidence. Building on a systematic review of relevant research in psychology, we present two major results: First, the evidence suggests that the experience of having been deceived generates suspicion which in turn is likely to affect judgment and decision making of a non-negligible number of participants. Second, we find little evidence for reputational spillover effects that have been hypothesized by a number of authors in psychology and economics (e.g., Kelman, 1967; Davis and Holt, 1993). Based on a discussion of the methodological costs and benefits of deception, we conclude that experimental economists' prohibition of deception is a sensible convention that economists should not abandon.

Control without deception: Individual behaviour in free-riding experiments revisited

Lying to participants offers an experimenter the enticing prospect of making “others' behaviour” a controlled variable, but is eschewed by experimental economists because it may pollute the pool of subjects. This paper proposes and implements a new experimental design, the Conditional Information Lottery, which offers all the benefits of deception without actually deceiving anyone. The design should be suitable for most economics experiments, and works by a modification of an already standard device, the Random Lottery incentive system. The deceptive scenarios of designs which use deceit are replaced with fictitious scenarios, each of which, from a subject's viewpoint, has a chance of being true. The design is implemented in a sequential play public good experiment prompted by Weimann's (1994) result, from a deceptive design, that subjects are more sensitive to freeriding than cooperation on the part of others. The experiment provides similar results to Weimann's, in that subjects are at least as cooperative when uninformed about others' behaviour as they are if reacting to high contributions. No deception is used and the data cohere well both internally and with other public goods experiments. In addition, simultaneous play is found to be more efficient than sequential play, and subjects contribute less at the end of a sequence than at the start. The results suggest pronounced elements of overconfidence, egoism and (biased) reciprocity in behaviour, which may explain decay in contributions in repeated play designs. The experiment shows there is a workable alternative to deception.

Control without deception: Individual behaviour in free-riding experiments revisited

Lying to participants offers an experimenter the enticing prospect of making “others' behaviour” a controlled variable, but is eschewed by experimental economists because it may pollute the pool of subjects. This paper proposes and implements a new experimental design, the Conditional Information Lottery, which offers all the benefits of deception without actually deceiving anyone. The design should be suitable for most economics experiments, and works by a modification of an already standard device, the Random Lottery incentive system. The deceptive scenarios of designs which use deceit are replaced with fictitious scenarios, each of which, from a subject's viewpoint, has a chance of being true. The design is implemented in a sequential play public good experiment prompted by Weimann's (1994) result, from a deceptive design, that subjects are more sensitive to free-riding than cooperation on the part of others. The experiment provides similar results to Weimann's, in that subjects are at least as cooperative when uninformed about others' behaviour as they are if reacting to high contributions. No deception is used and the data cohere well both internally and with other public goods experiments. In addition, simultaneous play is found to be more efficient than sequential play, and subjects contribute less at the end of a sequence than at the start. The results suggest pronounced elements of overconfidence, egoism and (biased) reciprocity in behaviour, which may explain decay in contributions in repeated play designs. The experiment shows there is a workable alternative to deception.

Using the Barnum Effect to Teach about Ethics and Deception in Research

The Barnum effect was generated to teach students about the ethics of deception in research and the feelings of subjects who are lied to. Students in research methods classes received feedback based on a bogus personality inventory and rated the perceived validity of the interpretations. Students accepted the feedback, although seniors were more skeptical than juniors or sophomores. The class discussed the ethics of deception based on their own reactions to the knowledge that they were deceived. Students agreed that the approach was effective in helping them learn firsthand about the costs and benefits of deception in research.

Examining an Illusion: The Role of Deceptive Behaviors In Organizations

Viewing organizations as political environments, the paper examines the nature and function of deceptive behaviors in organizations. Key concepts presented are the personal and work-related power acquisition behaviors of individuals and the differential exhibition of these behaviors within highand low-slack organizational systems. Within the framework of deceptive behaviors as a function of the form of power acquisition behaviors and nature of the organization, the underlying basis of deceptive behaviors, the benefits of deception to organizational members, and the benefits of deception to the organization are discussed.