Search Results for: hypocrisy

On Exposing Hypocrisy

Imagine that you are a kid, and that you recently acquired a new friend who likes to come over to your house to play. You’ve started to notice that he pays a lot of attention to your sister when he visits, that he likes to visit when she is home, that he likes to play in the house near where she is at the time. You suspect that he has a crush on your sister, and that is why he recently became your friend.

This is a case of hypocrisy, where X is less about the Y that it seems about, but is instead more about Z. Here X is your new friendship, Y is his liking to spent time with you, and Z is his wanting to get closer to your sister. Of course Y is probably true to some extent, though not as much as he’d led you to believe.

Now consider some possible responses to this situation:

  1. Nothing: Do and say nothing; pretend you don’t notice.
  2. Private support: tell him privately about your suspicions, but make sure he understands that you will fully support his efforts, and that you don’t hold any grudge.
  3. Private confrontation: tell him privately about your suspicions. Act mildly offended.
  4. Public exposure: speak loud and clearly, in front of all his friends, as well as your sister, giving evidence of his hypocrisy. Act deeply offended.
  5. Indirect private confrontation: have a mutual friend tell him that his behavior seems suspicious. This mutual friend isn’t offended, and promises not to keep it quiet. But they were wondering, that’s all.

What if you like this person, and so want him to act more like a real friend. Which of the above responses are most likely to turn his hypocrisy, in pretending to do Y while really doing Z, into sincerity, i.e., really doing mainly Y?

In this case #4 is probably the absolute worst approach, and #3 probably isn’t that much better. #2 may usually have good outcomes, but even that risks him feeling embarrassed and avoiding you. #5 is a little safer, but even that could spook him. I’d say #1 is probably the safest: just do nothing.

Consider this as a metaphor for exposing hypocrisy more generally. Sometimes exposing hypocrisy, or confronting the hypocrites, can shame them into actually doing what they say they are doing. But at other times it scares them away, so that they do even less of what they said they were doing.

For example, people pretend to learn at school, but more plausibly they meet mates and signal their features. If this hypocrisy were made clear, would people actually learn more, or would they switch to other ways to meet mates and signal features? People also pretend to give to charity because they want to help, but more plausibly they want to bond with associates and to signal their gentle natures. If their hypocrisy were made more visible, would they try to be more effective at helping with their charity, or would they switch to other ways to associate and signal gentleness?

Consider this a partial answer to Ryan Carey’s request for criticism of effective altruism. A community associated with that label says it wants to promote charity as helping, and it points out how common charity patterns often fall far short of that goal. And if main cause of falling short were ignorance or laziness, this should induce a lot more helping. But if the main cause is instead hypocrisy, then what they are mainly doing is exposing hypocrisy.

And yes, for some people exposing their hypocrisy will shame them into more effectively doing what they had been pretending to do. But for others it may embarrass them into doing less. Maybe they will be more forthright about bonding and showing gentleness in other ways. I don’t actually know which it will be on net. But I do know that we should study hypocrisy more carefully, in order to better position ourselves to answer such questions.

Added 8a: People vary in their gentleness both via immediate system one reactions, and via more considered system two reactions. If people are more interested in signaling their system one gentleness, and if effective charity choices are those that look better to system two, then effective choices can be in conflict with their signaling desires.

For example, in the standard trolley problem people say they would divert the trolley to kill one person on the tracks to save five on other tracks, but would not push one person off a footbridge to achieve the same savings. Pressuring people to admit that pushing in the trolley problem is effective altruism is getting them to resist their system one inclinations, and if they succeed at that they may look less good to associates in terms of system one gentleness.

Added 10a: Sebastian Nickel reminds me of this study showing:

Large prior donors increase the likelihood of giving in response to information on aid effectiveness, whereas small prior donors decrease their giving.

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Boss Hypocrisy

In our culture, we are supposed to resent and dislike bosses. Bosses get paid too much, are mad with power, seek profits over people, etc. In fiction, we are mainly willing to see bosses as good when they run a noble work group, like a police, military, medicine, music, or sport group. In such rare cases, it is ok to submit to boss domination to achieve the noble cause. Or a boss can be good if he helps subordinates fight a higher bad boss. Otherwise, a good person resents and resists boss domination. For example:

The [TV trope of the] Benevolent Boss is that rarity in the Work [Sit]Com: a superior who is actually superior, a nice guy who listens to employee problems and really cares about the issues of those beneath him. … A character that is The Captain is likely, but not required, to be a Benevolent Boss.
Contrast with Bad Boss and Stupid Boss. Compare Reasonable Authority Figure. In more fantastic works, this character usually comes in the form of Big Good. On the other hand, an Affably Evil character can be a benevolent boss with his mooks, as well.
In The Army, he is often The Captain, Majorly Awesome, Colonel Badass, The Brigadier, or even the Four Star Badass and may be A Father to His Men.
For some lucky workers, this is Truth in Television. For a lot of other people, this is some sort of malicious fantasy. (more)

But here is a 2010 (& 2011) survey of 1000 workers (30% bosses, half blue collar):

Agree or completely agree with:

  • You respect your boss 91%
  • You think your boss trusts you 91%
  • You think your boss respects you 91%
  • You trust your boss 86%
  • If your job was on the line, your boss would go to bat for you 78%
  • You consider your boss a friend 61%
  • You would not change a thing about your boss 59%
  • Your boss has more education than you 53%
  • You think you are smarter than your boss 37%
  • You aspire to have the bosses job 30%
  • You work harder than your boss 28%
  • You feel pressure to conform to your bosses hobbies/interests in order to get ahead 20% (more; more; more)

In reality most people respect and trust their bosses, see them as a friend, and so on. Quite a different picture than the one from fiction.

Foragers had strong norms against domination, and bosses regularly violate such norms. We retain a weak allegiance to forager norms in fiction and when we talk politics. But we also have deeper more ancient mammalian instincts to submit to powers above us. And also, our competitive economy probably tends to make real bosses be functional and useful, and we spend enough time on our jobs to see that.

Many other of our cultural presumptions are probably similar. We give lip service to them in the far modes of fiction and politics, but we quickly reject them in the near mode of concrete decisions that matter to us.

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Thought Crime Hypocrisy

Philip Tetlock’s new paper on political hypocrisy re thought crimes:

The ability to read minds raises the specter of punishment of thought crimes and preventive incarceration of those who harbor dangerous thoughts. … Our participants were highly educated managers participating in an executive education program who had extensive experience inside large business organizations and held diverse political views. … We asked participants to suppose that scientists had created technologies that can reveal attitudes that people are not aware of possessing but that may influence their actions nonetheless.

In the control condition, the core applications of these technologies (described as a mix of brain-scan technology and the IAT’s reaction-time technology) were left unspecified. In the two treatment conditions, these technologies were to be used … to screen employees for evidence of either unconscious racism (UR) against African Americans or unconscious anti-Americanism (UAA). … Liberals were consistently more open to the technology, and to punishing organizations that rejected its use, when the technology was aimed at detecting UR among company managers; conservatives were consistently more open to the technology, and to punishing organizations that rejected its use, when the technology was aimed at detecting UAA among American Muslims.

Virtually no one was ready to abandon that [harm] principle and endorse punishing individuals for unconscious attitudes per se. … When directly asked, few respondents saw it as defensible to endorse the technology for one type of application but not for the other—even though there were strong signs from our experiment that differential ideological groups would do just that when not directly confronted with this potential hypocrisy. …

Liberal participants were [more] reluctant to raise concerns about researcher bias as a basis for opposition, a reluctance consistent [the] finding that citizens tend to believe that scientists hold liberal rather than conservative political views. …

This experiment confronted the more extreme participants with a choice between defending a double standard (explaining why one application is more acceptable) and acknowledging that they may have erred initially (reconsidering their support for the ideologically agreeable technology). … Those with more extreme views were more disposed to … backtrack from their initial position. (more; ungated)

So if we oppose thought crime in general, but support it when it serves our partisan purposes, that probably means that we will have it in the long run. There will be thought crime.

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Social Network Hypocrisy

This paper proposes that networks can act as covers which allow actors to participate in markets while maintaining a plausible excuse that they are not. Such covers are most valuable to actors in long-term relationships, as those who are already employed or in a long-term romantic relationship should not be seen as participating in the market for a new relationship. Data in support of this view are provided on the basis of fieldwork and large dataset from a social on-line network with a global presence. Results show that men in relationships and with large on-line networks are more like to look at women they do not know. In contrast, single men with large networks are more likely to look at women they do know. Implications for network theories as they pertain to organizations are explored. (more)

Now, is anyone surprised?

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Hypocrisy In The Lab

We show with a laboratory experiment that individuals adjust their moral principles to the situation and to their actions, just as much as they adjust their actions to their principles. We first elicit the individuals’ principles regarding the fairness and unfairness of allocations in three different scenarios (a Dictator game, an Ultimatum game, and a Trust game). One week later, the same individuals are invited to play those same games with monetary compensation. Finally in the same session we elicit again their principles regarding the fairness and unfairness of allocations in the same three scenarios. Our results show that individuals adjust abstract norms to fit the game, their role and the choices they made. …

The strong side bends the norm in its favor and the weak side agrees : Stated fairness is a compromise with power. … The adjustment of principles to actions is mainly the fact of individuals who behave more selfishly and who have a stronger bargaining power. The moral hypocrisy displayed (measured by the discrepancy between statements and actions chosen followed by an adjustment of principles to actions) appears produced by the attempt, not necessarily conscious, to strike a balance between self-image and immediate convenience. (more; HT Dan Houser)

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On Moral Hypocrisy

A short review of types of moral hypocrisy:

Although individuals might easily recall worthy behavior, unethical incidents might “disappear” from their memory. … Even when people recognize their ethical inconsistencies, there are various ways to redefine unethical behavior as morally acceptable or at least as not entirely unethical. For example, participants can interpret not cheating to the maximum extent as maintaining ethicality or as resisting obvious temptations. … They can reframe taking a newspaper without paying the full price as paying something despite the absence of external enforcement measures. … People may justify their actions by reference to norms (“everyone is doing it”), to external pressures (“if I do not do it, I’ll be fired”), or to altruism and a greater cause (“this is what it takes to ensure people do not lose their jobs”). Other factors attenuating perceived unethical behavior include lack of intent, lack of clear harm, or absence of a concrete victim. … redefinitions, reinterpretations, and justifications allow one’s own small deviations from ethical standards to go unnoticed and give way to gradual relaxation of one’s ethical code and moral criteria.

That is from a paper focused on one particular type: Continue reading "On Moral Hypocrisy" »

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Seeking Firm Info Hypocrisy Examples

Arnold Kling:

[James] Manzi is a fan of randomized controlled experiments in business and public policy (in the latter, examples include the Rand health care study and the Wisconsin income-maintenance studies). I believe that decision-makers will resist this approach, for the same reason that they resist Robin Hanson’s suggestion to use prediction markets. That is, decisions are not necessarily about achieving results. They are often about establishing the status of the decision-maker. For a decision-maker to conduct experiments or to employ prediction markets is to admit ignorance and doubt, which lowers the decision-maker’s status. (more)

The examples of disinterest in random trials and prediction markets both help convince me that management is often less interested in information that it pretends to be. But since I’m giving a talk on the subject soon, I’d like other examples. So I ask you, dear readers: what common patterns of manager behavior suggests they are less (or more) interested in info than they let on?

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Elites Excel At Hypocrisy

A few days ago Tyler blogged a study dissing elites:

Upper-class individuals were more likely to break the law while driving, relative to lower-class individuals. In follow-up laboratory studies, upper-class individuals were more likely to exhibit unethical decision-making tendencies, take valued goods from others, lie in a negotiation, [and] cheat to increase their chances of winning a prize. (more)

While Tyler had doubts, I’d guess this is mostly true. I’m reminded of Freakonomics on “What the Bagel Man Saw”:

The same people who routinely steal more than percent of his [honor system paid] bagels almost never stoop to stealing his money box. … Telecom companies have robbed him blind, and … law firms aren’t worth the trouble. … Employees further up the corporate ladder cheat more than those down below. He reached this conclusion in part after delivering for years to one company spread out over three floors — an executive floor on top and two lower floors with sales, service and administrative employees. … ”I had idly assumed that in places where security clearance was required for an individual to have a job, the employees would be more honest than elsewhere. That hasn’t turned out to be true.” (more)

I’m also reminded of Charles Murray’s wish that on marriage, hard work, religion, and (caught) crime, elites would more “preach what they practice.” At least by the usual reading, elites are more moral on these key choices.

My interpretation: elites excel at hypocrisy. Elites can better distinguish ideals which are mainly given lip service, from ideals that really matter personally. Elites can better see which laws and social norms are actually enforced with strong penalties, and those that can be violated with impunity. This ability comes in part from implicit cultural learning, and also from just raw IQ. Homo hypocritus is alive and well – having good enough brains and social connections to manage hypocrisy well is still a core human capacity, as crucial for success in our world as it was for foragers.

This theory suggests that weak culture, the parts without strong local teeth, matter more for lower classes. Upper classes give lip service to whatever they are supposed to endorse, and then mostly ignore it to do what helps them personally. It is the lower classes that are more likely to naively do what culture suggests. They are more likely to “only marry for love” or “follow your bliss” or to think “its all relative anyway.”

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Far Idealism Hypocrisy

Not everything fits this story, but an awful lot does: we are more idealistic in far mode, which helps us hypocritically hold others to higher standards than we hold ourselves:

In 6 studies, we found that advice is more idealistic than choice in decisions that trade off idealistic and pragmatic considerations. We propose that because advisers are more psychologically distant from the choosers’ decision problem, they construe the dilemma at a higher construal level than do choosers. … Studies 1 and 2 demonstrate that compared with choosers, advisers weigh idealistic considerations more heavily and pragmatic considerations less heavily, place greater emphasis on ends (why) than on means to achieve the end (how), and generate more reasons (pros) in favor of acting idealistically. Studies 3 and 4 … [show] that making advisers focus on a lower construal level results in more pragmatic recommendations. … Finally, in Studies 5 and 6, we demonstrate the choice–advice difference in consequential real-life decisions. (more)

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Gossip Hypocrisy

Classic gossip, … telling it entails several … basic motives. … It enables the gossiper “to do dirt to the person he is gossiping about.” It entails “sheer jolly prurience.” It presents the gossiper as “up to the moment, in the know.” By no means least, it reminds us that “part of the delight of gossip, after all, is, to use an old-fashioned word, its naughtiness.”…

“Talk is possible about the great issues and events and questions,” but let’s be honest about it, such talk quickly palls: “So much easier, so much more entertaining, to talk about the decaying marriage of an acquaintance, the extravagant pretensions of in-laws, the sexual braggadocio of a bachelor friend. Most gossip, or most of the best gossip, is about dubious if not downright reprehensible behavior. The best of it is about people with whom one has a direct acquaintance. Served with a dash of humor it can be awfully fine stuff. (more)

Step back and notice the basic puzzle: We are a very social species, and yet we think it illicit to talk about each other. Even when such talk helps to enforce our social norms. Yes we enjoy gossip, but we also accept that it is “naughty.” Well, not naughty enough to make illegal – that would be going “too far.”

Homo hypocritus pretends to support norms of good behavior, but happily coordinates with allies to evade such norms, just out of view of group enforcement. One standard norm is that our group sticks together, and doesn’t break into fighting subgroups. If you see someone violate a norm, you are supposed to accuse them in front of everyone. How are people supposed to defend themselves from accusations they can’t hear? Some of us shouldn’t conspire to take down others of us. But of course we do. Happily. And we don’t want law to stop us.

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