TY - JOUR
T1 - Failure to replicate moral licensing and moral cleansing in an online experiment
AU - Rotella, Amanda
AU - Barclay, Pat
N1 - Funding Information: We thank the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) for a doctoral scholarship to Amanda Rotella (fellowship 752-2015-1328 ) and an Insight Grant to Pat Barclay (grant 430287 ).
PY - 2020/7/15
Y1 - 2020/7/15
N2 - Moral licensing occurs when someone who initially behaved morally or cooperatively, later behaves less morally, as if they had a “license” to act badly. On the flipside, moral cleansing occurs when someone first behaves immorally, which prompts them to later behaves more morally. To-date, few studies have investigated individual differences in the moral licensing and cleansing effects. This paper bridges this gap by investigating how cooperative preferences, as measured by social value orientation (SVO), influence engagement in these effects. We hypothesized that prosocial participants would be less likely to license, but more likely to cleanse. Contrary to predictions, we did not replicate the moral licensing or moral cleansing effects, and cooperative preferences did not influence engagement in the effect. However, checks suggest that our manipulations were successful. We postulate that licensing and cleansing effects are unlikely to be elicited online.
AB - Moral licensing occurs when someone who initially behaved morally or cooperatively, later behaves less morally, as if they had a “license” to act badly. On the flipside, moral cleansing occurs when someone first behaves immorally, which prompts them to later behaves more morally. To-date, few studies have investigated individual differences in the moral licensing and cleansing effects. This paper bridges this gap by investigating how cooperative preferences, as measured by social value orientation (SVO), influence engagement in these effects. We hypothesized that prosocial participants would be less likely to license, but more likely to cleanse. Contrary to predictions, we did not replicate the moral licensing or moral cleansing effects, and cooperative preferences did not influence engagement in the effect. However, checks suggest that our manipulations were successful. We postulate that licensing and cleansing effects are unlikely to be elicited online.
KW - Moral balancing
KW - Moral cleansing
KW - Moral compensation
KW - Moral licensing
KW - Social value orientation
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85081258032&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.paid.2020.109967
DO - 10.1016/j.paid.2020.109967
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85081258032
SN - 0191-8869
VL - 161
JO - Personality and Individual Differences
JF - Personality and Individual Differences
M1 - 109967
ER -