

A simple experiment suggests a way to encourage truthfulness - gruseom
http://www.economist.com/node/21551447

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srl
I find this type of statistical trick (to handle people lying) to be
extraordinarily cool, despite (or because of) how trivial it is.

An especially elegant version: I remember reading an article (probably posted
on here) where to figure out how many people were engaged in some illegal
activity (opiate production in Afghanistan?), they asked each person to answer
the question only after flipping a coin, and if they coin said heads, they
were to always say yes. Thus, saying "yes" was no longer incriminating, and
all the researchers had to do to get the value they wanted was subtract 50 and
double.

~~~
aprescott
Just to make this technique a bit clearer, since "subtract 50 and double" was
a bit vague to me: you ask 100 people the question about illegal activity, and
assume they're going to toss the coin and follow the protocol. That gives you
100 "yes" and "no" answers, of which ~50 "yes" answers are due to following
the protocol and can just be ignored. The remaining yes/no answers are from
the tails results and that's the data you use to get a final answer. As an
illegal opiate producer in Afghanistan who answers "yes", you have plausible
deniability by just saying "I got heads."

The fairness of the coin toss means the researcher asking the question doesn't
need to know who got which coin result so it can be kept secret.

~~~
noja
Isn't the very key to this that the researcher doesn't see the coin result?

~~~
joeyo
That's correct. The researcher doesn't know the outcome of any particular coin
toss but knows the outcome, in expectation, for a large number of coin tosses.

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Resident_Geek
Unfortunately, the paper
([http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/s.shalvi/bestanden/Shalvi%20et...](http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/s.shalvi/bestanden/Shalvi%20et%20al_Honesty%20requires%20time_PS.pdf))
doesn't say whether the lower mean for the people in the low time pressure
group is because they lied less frequently, or because they lied with lower
numbers.

I wish they'd included graphs of the actual distributions of reported numbers.
That would have been more useful than just the mean, standard deviation, and
chi-square results.

~~~
jongraehl
Good point. Obviously this becomes implausible once the mean reaches 3.5 (as
it apparently did in the n=74 single die followup, with 3.4).

And yes, the data should be available for download.

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Splines
It's probably the same psychology that drives many sales ("buy now and get
double your offer!"). Force action before higher reasoning can take hold.

Imagine if they modified slot machines to worsen your odds if you didn't put
in another quarter within n seconds.

~~~
K2h
That is one scary prospect. I think there are a bunch of people that would
fall for such an offering. Look at how alot of the perks are already set up to
comp you a drink or other such thing based on how long you have been playing.
If you were to say the longer you play continuously, the better your odds,I
think you would take every dollar an addicted gambler could scrounge. Sad.

~~~
jleader
I can't imagine the casinos haven't thought of this; some reasons they might
not do it:

\- People already think "the longer I've played without winning, the greater
the chance I'll win now, because I'm 'due'", so there's no need to actually
alter the odds (which would cost money)

\- Or, maybe they're just afraid that people collapsing and dying at the slot
machines (of dehydration, starvation, or exhaustion) would lead to bad
publicity and more stringent regulation.

~~~
starwed
I think slot machines have to (by law) pay out a certain average percentage
over time. That would probably be pretty hard to manage in conjunction with
this scheme.

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ianterrell
Interpretation: We have an evolutionarily advantageous instinct to maximize
short term gains; our reason, however, can override this when we A) view other
things as more important (e.g. honesty), and B) give it time to do its job.

Amusingly, phrasing it this way and combining it with the language in the
article, we have 'original sin' arising from evolution. The religious imagery
comes not from nowhere, but explains the biology in the best terms it could
find. Protoscience.

~~~
pumainmotion
Thats a great connection you've made between seemingly disconnected & distant
disciplines. If we figure out the actual biological and chemical processes
involved in a human body while it is indulging in synthesizing an 'original
sin', that would be a big win in terms expanding our species' knowledge-base.

I'm sure there's research out there that explains at least fews bits of it
through experiments where they monitor bodily processes when a person is
lying. There are some common methods like the lie-detector and GSR methods,
but apart from those external monitoring methods, probably also some
molecular/cellular-level observations have been made.

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mingfu
Something interesting I think the article did not mention is that given the
difference between the two sets of experiments, where you roll once vs you
roll 3 times.

As a participant I'd feel more inclined to lie about my first roll if I rolled
a higher number in my second or third attempt.

I'd be very interested in the results if n was not 76 but instead 7600.

~~~
Resident_Geek
From the paper
([http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/s.shalvi/bestanden/Shalvi%20et...](http://home.medewerker.uva.nl/s.shalvi/bestanden/Shalvi%20et%20al_Honesty%20requires%20time_PS.pdf)),
page 5-6: "Shalvi et al. (2011a) asked participants to roll a die under a
paper cup with a small hole at the top allowing only them to see the outcome,
and earn money according to what they reported rolling (1=$1, 2=$2, etc.). As
participants’ rolls were truly private, the authors assessed lying by
comparing the reported distribution to the distribution predicted by chance
(Fischbacher & Heusi, 2008). Participants were asked to roll three times but
to report only the outcome of the first roll. Although all three rolls were
private, the distribution of reported outcomes resembled the distribution of
choosing the highest of the three observed rolls. Modifying the task to allow
participants to roll only once reduced lying. Participants clearly found value
in being able to justify their lies to themselves. The authors concluded that
observing desired counterfactuals, in the form of desired (higher) values
appearing on the second or third (non-relevant for pay) rolls, modified
participants’ ethical perceptions of what they considered to be lying.
Observing desired counterfactual information enabled participants to enjoy
both worlds: lie for money, but feel honest."

Shalvi et. al. (2011a) is: Shalvi, S., Dana, J., Handgraaf, M. J. J., & De
Dreu, C. K. W. (2011a). Justified ethicality: Observing desired
counterfactuals modifies ethical perceptions and behavior. Organizational
Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 115, 181-190.

~~~
mingfu
Appreciate the link. I'm going to read up. I had an inclination this would be
the case but definitely interesting to see it in actual research.

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ggwicz
I'm shocked that such a poorly done study is front page news.

76 people, comparing to a simple average, "no way of knowing" the actual
results...Come on, seriously? I love science and give credit to everyone
working to understand things; but labeling this as a new understanding (even a
_potential_ understanding) of psychological incentives is ridiculous.

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rodh
Although I wonder if being explicitly told to take your time for such a
trivial task would make you more conscious of being observed.

~~~
lizardwhoskis
Most likely. As another poster pointed out, what this shows is that our reason
--given time to work--can override more instinctual desires to cheat. Part of
rationalizing is considering situations, real and unreal, that may influence
the outcome. E.g. I may be being observed and if they think I am cheating they
may discard me from the pay group.

Without that time you wouldn't consider that "chosen at random" may be a lie.
So, to the automatic mind your odds of getting paid are the same whether you
pick 3 or 6 but the reward for lying is significantly higher. A simple
heuristic the automatic mind may use would be (roll)x(payout): 6 x 10 = 60 vs
3 x 10 = 30

I'd be interested if the money incentive might have influence lying in the
other direction, however. E.g. I did roll a 6, but if I say the maximum number
they may not pay me; if I say a lower number they may be more likely pay me.
This could lead to a new rational heuristic including a chance of being paid:
6 x 10 x 0.10 = 6 vs 3 x 10 x 0.50 = 15

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jongraehl
My guess: immediate temptation to cheat for $10 if you think you can get away
with it.

On reflection, caution accelerates:

1\. The gain is small.

2\. Maybe people will find out via mechanism X I didn't think of (hidden
cameras?)

3\. maybe my report of 6 will be suspicious. maybe a 5 ... no, may as well
just go with my original 3 ...

4\. How will I feel having cheated? How good will I feel going away having a
story of how I was honest even when it cost me?

5\. I want to impress my psych teacher with how honest we college freshmen
are.

6\. Now that I've hesitated so long, I feel even more cautious. I've spent so
much time deliberating, when I could have just taken the extra $5 immediately
... I must actually not want to cheat.

Perhaps also noteworthy: the above experiment was with 3 dice rolls, but the
instruction to report the first. In a second experiment with only 1 die roll,
the averages result claimed by both the hurry-up and take-your-time groups was
0.2-0.4 lower. This suggest that people in the 3 die roll group felt more
comfortable cheating by reporting the 2nd or 3rd roll, perhaps in their mind
lamely equating it with what could have been the 1st roll, or having a
justification ready of having honestly misunderstood (I doubt anyone did
honestly misunderstand). A difference of 0.2 is surely significant (comparing
between N=76 and N=74 freshmen under the 3-dice and 1-die conditions).

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rcthompson
Is it possible that given time to think, the subjects decided that they
probably couldn't get away with cheating, despite wanting to?

~~~
olalonde
It's an interesting hypothesis but it doesn't seem to change the conclusion
that "cheating is instinctive".

~~~
rbarooah
True, as long as you mean 'instinctive' in the sense of default, rather than
in the sense of innate.

~~~
olalonde
Yes that's what I meant.

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pessimist
The most likely explanation is random noise, and that this experiment will not
be repeatable. Sadly almost all psychology studies are like this, an odd
result thata is most likely statistical noise.

~~~
jongraehl
You mean that the most likely explanation for us hearing about this study is
publication bias, right?

But we're talking p<.01 here, so most likely you're wrong. You'd have to
believe that 100 similar studies have been performed and we only heard about
the one winner.

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idoh
This experiment was done in Israel - I wonder what would other countries would
look like. Israelis seem to be more aggressive and creative in getting what
they want than, say, Southern Californians.

~~~
wiremaus
You've clearly never been to Southern California.

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wtvanhest
It could also be that the group with more time to calculate decided to make
the number closer after thinking that the researcher would know 3.5 was the
average.

If they provided the data set (all the numbers given) we would get the
important... standard deviation which would get us closer to that answer.

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mmj48
> A different bunch of volunteers were asked to roll the die just once

Was anyone else surprised to see "bunch"? Why did they use that, when "group"
would be a much better word?

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seanlinmt
This seems to suggest that you would get a more honest reply through email
than either phone or face-to-face contact.

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its_so_on
Why Perl, you lying sack of shit!!

    
    
      C:\>perl -we "for(1..76){$sum += (int rand 6) + 1;} print $sum / 76
      3.71052631578947
    

If that should have been 3.5, then 0.21 * 76 = 15.9 extra points over average.

Perl, you lying oaf, you owe me 159 shekels. pay up.

I guess I'm being ironic, but with n=76, it would be great if "Those who were
not under any time pressure reported a mean roll of 3.9. Both groups lied,
then." came with a disclaimer about how confident we could be about that.

~~~
bicknergseng
After reading it I was going to say the same thing. What I don't understand is
why they compared it to the statistical average rather than just recording
what they rolled. It would have been fairly trivial to eliminate that
particular statistical variability from the experiment.

~~~
aamar
The experimenters want the test subjects to believe that the die roll is truly
private and therefore that the subjects can, individually, get away with a
lie. An easy way to do that is to actually make the die roll private.

Maybe you could devise equipment that would convince subjects that roll was
private even though it really wasn't. Ideas on how to do that? Hidden
wireless/infrared camera in the cup?

~~~
bicknergseng
I thought a hidden camera scenario would be fairly easy. Two way mirror,
hidden camera, etc.

If Justin Bieber is allowed hidden cameras, surely science is, too.

Also interesting: the experimenters are testing lying but refuse to lie
themselves in order to properly carry out the experiment. I feel like there's
some special irony in there somewhere.

~~~
its_so_on
despite my statistical uncertainty, I think it is a lot easier to show a
subject that they're not being tricked if they aren't. People are REALLY good
at picking up being tricked or not from very slight nonverbal communication
and environmental clues.

~~~
bicknergseng
Hmmm... maybe don't tell the administrator who runs it? I'm sure there is a
way to actually observe the whole thing without giving it away. There is no
cake, after all.

