Ethics and honesty in organizations deserve unique attention as the workplace context adds additional complexities to be considered. We organize the development in research into three areas: (a) the move from the traditional view of looking at unethical behaviors in organizations as motivated by self-interest to the one looking at some motivated by the desire to benefit others; (b) honesty in organizations

Professional choices influence valued outcomes such as income, life satisfaction, and social status. However, public opinion polls consistently illustrate that an individual’s profession also influences how honest one is perceived to be, and people are motivated to see themselves as honest for many reasons. Why would people choose professions that do not confer them with the benefits of honesty? Survey

Attachment theory—built on the knowledge that infants have an innate need to form an attachment bond with a caregiver and that separation from or loss of that caregiver has a lasting impact on the child’s development—is a useful lens through which to examine the consequences of family separation due to migration. The aim of this review was to highlight the impacts of separation due to migration on

Society suffers when people stay silent on moral issues. Yet people who engage morally may appear hypocritical if they behave imperfectly themselves. Research reveals that hypocrites can—but do not always—trigger a “hypocrisy penalty,” whereby they are evaluated as more immoral than ordinary (non-hypocritical) wrongdoers. This pattern reflects that moral engagement can confer reputational benefits

Feeling heard is critical to human flourishing—across domains, relationships are strengthened and individual well-being is enhanced when people feel listened to. High-quality conversational listening not only requires the cognitive processes of attention and processing, but also behavioral expression to communicate one’s cognitive engagement to others. This need to behaviorally express listening introduces

Feedback is information provided to recipients about their behavior, performance, or understanding, the goal of which is to foster recipients’ self-awareness, and behavioral reinforcement or change. Yet, feedback often fails to achieve this goal. For feedback to be effective, recipients must be receptive and accurately understand the meaning and veracity of the feedback (i.e., discern the truth in

Abstract not available

In this work, we discuss through lens of the 3N model of radicalization vulnerability to conspiracy beliefs and the factors which contribute to acting upon such beliefs. After discussing the numerous empirically supported precursors to conspiracy beliefs, we integrate them within the 3N framework, positing that belief in conspiracy theories are particularly suited to satisfy the need for significance

We review recent research on the well-established relationship between sense of control and conspiracy perceptions, identifying challenges and promising new directions. First, we examine recent efforts to distinguish sense of control from adjacent but confounding psychological constructs (including uncertainty, threat, and powerlessness). Second, we discuss the limitations of experimentally manipulating

There are many examples of people believing in conspiracy theories showing non-normative behaviors. But why is this the case? The current contribution proposes that the non-normative behavior of people believing in conspiracy theories is a natural consequence of a different social reality that is associated with the belief in conspiracy theories. This social reality is characterized by a tendency for

Despite honesty being valued in many settings, there is some ambiguity regarding the conditions under which it is beneficial or harmful for individual and relational well-being. We review and evaluate current work linking honesty to well-being. Specifically, we highlight and distinguish associations between honesty and different types of well-being within people, between people, and among broader groups

Reputations play a pivotal role in everyday life, and having a good reputation is deemed a highly valuable currency in the social world. While much of the reputation literature insufficiently distinguishes between varying types of good (or “cooperative”) reputations – e.g., sociable versus honest, here we review recent research pointing to their distinctiveness. Moreover, countering the growing behavioral

Belief in conspiracy theories results from a combination of intuitive and deliberative cognitive processes (van Prooijen, Klein, & Milošević Đorđević, 2020). We propose a novel construct, conspiracy intuitions, the subjective sense that an event or circumstance is not adequately explained or accounted for by existing narratives, potentially for nefarious reasons, as an initial stage in the acquisition

We review recent work on the relationship between science rejection and conspiracy beliefs. We distinguish between conspiracy beliefs about science specifically and the link between general conspiracist worldviews and science rejection. The first imply the scientific community as the center of a conspiratorial endeavor to misrepresent scientific findings. We outline several potential contributors to

Conspiracy beliefs are not just generated by “under-the-skull” individual factors, but are shaped also by cultural, economic, and institutional realities. A scan of the literature – complemented by our own secondary data analyses – suggests a reasonable convergence of evidence that conspiracy beliefs are higher in nations that are more corrupt, more collectivist, and lower in GDP per capita. There

We examine conspiracy beliefs in the context of misplaced certainty—certainty that is unsubstantiated by one’s own or others’ skepticism. A conspiracy theory held with misplaced certainty may entail, for instance, “knowing” or feeling certain that secret actors are plotting against society yet acknowledging that this claim lacks evidence or is opposed by most other people. Recent work on misplaced

Despite widespread scientific consensus on climate change, conspiracy theories about its causes and consequences are flourishing. In response, psychological research has started to investigate the consequences of espousing conspiracy beliefs about climate change. Although some scholars maintain that the evidence for a causal link between belief in conspiracy theories and behavior remains elusive, others

Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) enable new ways of exercising and experiencing power by automating interpersonal tasks such as interviewing and hiring workers, managing and evaluating work, setting compensation, and negotiating deals. As these techniques become more sophisticated, they increasingly support personalization where users can “tell” their AI assistants not only what to do, but

Although many virtuous leaders are guided by the ideal of prioritizing the needs and welfare of their subordinates, others advance their self-interest at the expense of the people they purport to serve. In this article, we discuss conspiracy theories as a tool that leaders use to advance their personal interests. We propose that leaders spread conspiracy theories in service of four primary goals: 1)

Deception is used by plants, animals, and humans to increase their fitness by persuading others of false beliefs that benefit the self, thereby creating evolutionary pressure to detect deception and avoid providing such unearned benefits to others. Self-deception can disrupt detection efforts by eliminating cognitive load and idiosyncratic deceptive cues, raising the possibility that persuading others

People frequently engage in dishonest behavior. Yet, they do so only to a limited extent, often forgoing potential profits. In the past few decades, the dominant psychological account explaining people’s “limited dishonesty” characterized this behavior as driven by a desire to preserve a positive image of the self. Recently, a new account has been put forward, based on social considerations. This social

Narcissism—a conviction about one’s superiority and entitlement to special treatment—is a robust predictor of belief in conspiracy theories. Recent developments in the study of narcissism suggest that it has three components: antagonism, agentic extraversion, and neuroticism. We argue that each of these components of narcissism might predispose people to endorse conspiracy theories due to different

Conspiracy theories tend to involve doubt and skepticism, but are conspiracy believers really more deliberative? We review recent research that investigates the relative roles of intuition and reason in conspiracy belief and find that the preponderance of evidence indicates that conspiracy belief is linked to an overreliance on intuition and a lack of reflection. This research, in addition to work

Questions are important tools for uncovering information, but to avoid deception, question askers must be strategic in what and how they ask—and consider the social implications of their questions. Askers should consider that in addition to soliciting information, questions also signal information about expected answers, askers' own knowledge, and the parties' relationship. We review literature on

Meta-analytical evidence indicates the robust association between collective narcissism and conspiracy theories is moderated by the content of conspiracy theories. Belief in conspiracies of specific outgroups fits collective narcissistic posture of intergroup hostility but collective narcissism is also bound to other conspiracy theories because it simultaneously comprises a committed belief (that the

Truth-default theory offers an account of human deceptive communication where people are honest unless they have a motive to deceive and people passively believe others unless suspicion and doubt are actively triggered. The theory is argued to account for wide swings in vulnerability to deception in different types of situations in and out of the lab. Three moderators are advanced to account for differential

Unhealthy sleep is a modern epidemic, and recent research has linked it to unethical behaviors like deception. Yet, scholars are also starting to examine factors that could curtail unhealthy sleep and its consequences. The current paper reviews evidence that indirectly implies or directly documents a relationship between unhealthy sleep and deception, detailing critical mediators and moderators. It

A significant trend of research construes conspiracy theories as a power challenging phenomenon. Yet, there is evidence that conspiracy theories are sometimes promoted by members of relatively powerful groups (e.g., a national majority) in order to target relatively powerless groups (e.g., immigrants). Thus, conspiracy theories are not necessarily beliefs held by the relatively powerless. However,

The past two decades have seen major developments in the study of behavioral (dis)honesty and its measurement as well as a surge of interest in the location of trait honesty within models of basic personality structure and the role of personality traits in behavioral dishonesty more generally. The present review provides an overview of the corresponding literature with a particular emphasis on recent

Commentators say we have entered a “post-truth” era. As political lies and “fake news” flourish, citizens appear not only to believe misinformation, but also to condone misinformation they do not believe. The present article reviews recent research on three psychological factors that encourage people to condone misinformation: partisanship, imagination, and repetition. Each factor relates to a hallmark

Lying is a behavior that, in theory, is discouraged and punished, except when it isn't. Perhaps as a result, many individuals lie at low levels somewhat regularly. While research has well documented the cognitive skills that support children's early lying, it does not explain how children learn when to lie versus tell a truth. The current article reviews the impact of social-environmental influences

Since 2008, hundreds of studies have been published about conspiracy theories, many of which were in reaction to the COVID-19 pandemic. These studies are often motivated by concerns about the influence of exposure to conspiracy theories on beliefs, and the impact of conspiracy theory beliefs on behaviors. Numerous studies identify supportive correlations, concluding implicitly or explicitly that exposure

Paranoia and conspiracy thinking share many risk factors, such as victimization, poverty and social isolation. They also have many phenomenological features in common, including heightened tendency to attribute negative outcomes to malevolent agents and idiosyncratic pattern detection. Nevertheless, paranoia and conspiracy thinking also differ in key respects. Specifically, paranoid thoughts tend to

Conspiracy beliefs are often viewed as a form of psychopathology, closely linked to anxiety, paranoia, and maladaptive traits. However, recent research has brought attention to adaptive and functional aspects of conspiracy theories. This article presents a framework for understanding conspiracy beliefs as a paradoxical adaptation to historical trauma. There is vast evidence that three essential aspects

The COVID-19 pandemic has illuminated how conspiracy beliefs–that explain important events as the secret actions of the powerful–can severely impact health choices (such as reduced infection-prevention behaviours). However, the consequences of conspiracy beliefs span far beyond the topic of COVID-19. This review shines a spotlight on how conspiracy beliefs could impact public and personal health (e

Can perceptions of economic inequalities trigger conspiratorial thinking? We provide evidence that high economic inequality may enhance conspiratorial thinking because, as a form of collective-level crisis, it undermines the social fabric of society and engenders anomie. We focus on the mechanism through which inequality should affect conspiratorial thinking by outlining how inequality enhances perceptions

Antisocial behavior in adolescents is generally seen as a neurodevelopmental problem; however, in spite of increasing knowledge on the neurobiology of persistent antisocial behavior, conduct disorders, and psychopathic traits, this knowledge is hardly used in clinical practice. The aim of this review is to give an overview of current research on the neurobiology of antisocial behavior in adolescents and

Abstract not available

Ostracism—being ignored and excluded—has received considerable experimental research attention over the last 25 years. Ostracism signals social separation, isolation, and loss, and responses vary across time. Ostracism episodes as short as 2 min result in physiological pain responses, need threat, and emotional distress, followed by cognitive, emotional, motivational, and behavioral responses that

Conspiracy belief intersects with the politics of social change in complex and sometimes contradictory ways. On one hand, social change is experienced as stressful by many, and it can generate feelings of uncertainty, insecurity, and loss of control that elicit beliefs that may impede needed change and even generate new problems. On the other hand, conspiracy belief and conspiratorial thinking, by

Abstract not available

Many people believe conspiracy theories, even though such beliefs are harmful to themselves and their social environment. What is the appeal of conspiracy theories? In this contribution, I propose that conspiracy theories have psychological benefits by imbuing perceiver's worldview with meaning and purpose in a rewarding manner. Conspiracy theories enable an alternative reality in which perceivers

Research has shown that some individuals benefit from using social media because it may help them to obtain social capital. This article questions who are most likely to benefit: the socially rich (i.e., individuals with a preference for social interaction, support, or without interpersonal problems) or the socially poor? It is hard to provide a definite answer to this question: Previous empirical

Despite the prevalence of social media multitasking (SMM), its effects on well-being have received little attention. Of the nine studies that directly examined this topic, six found a negative relationship between SMM and well-being variables, and three found mixed or no effects. We compare the findings with those from five meta-analyses of general media multitasking (GMM) and 15 recent studies on

Although sometimes used interchangeably, the present review highlights the important differences between generalized worldviews suspecting conspiracy at play (conspiracy mentality) and specific beliefs about the existence of a certain conspiracy (conspiracy theory). In contrast to measures of beliefs in specific conspiracy theories, those of conspiracy mentality are more stable, less malleable, less

One of the key challenges faced by many parents is to manage the pervasiveness of social media in adolescents' lives and its effects on adolescents' well-being (e.g., life satisfaction) and ill-being (e.g., depressive symptoms). Parents may manage adolescents' social media use and social media-induced well-being and ill-being through media-specific parenting: parental actions to restrict, regulate

The modern marketplace has made consumers' lives better in many ways, offering a multitude of affordable conveniences and luxuries. Why, then, is the prevalence of physical and mental health deficits higher than any other time in history? Here, we articulate an evolutionary mismatch perspective—the idea that the environment we live in has changed dramatically in a short period of time, but the human

Is this food healthy? Understanding how individuals evaluate food healthiness is important because their evaluation can affect their food choices and consumption quantities, potentially leading to obesity and other health problems. However, individuals often find it difficult to process the health information to evaluate food healthiness, so they rely on their intuition or lay beliefs to make the judgment

While conspiracy theories about COVID-19 are proliferating, their impact on health-related responses during the present pandemic is not yet fully understood. We meta-analyzed correlational and longitudinal evidence from 53 studies (N = 78,625) conducted in 2020 and 2021. Conspiracy beliefs were weakly associated with more reluctance toward prevention measures both cross-sectionally and over time. They

This review synthesizes recent research on consumer self-control, self-regulation, and wellbeing using a perspective rooted in evolutionary theorizing—the notion of Life History Strategies (LHSs), derived from Life History Theory. We discuss both correlational and experimental research that has informed our understanding about how individual differences in LHSs may shape the ‘self-regulatory toolkit’

Living in a consumerist society can afford material abundance, but these gains can bring psychological costs. A developed literature suggests experiential purchases (such as trips or outdoor recreation) represent a more promising route to enduring consumer happiness than the consumption of material goods. The satisfaction from experiences extends across a rather broad time course, including the anticipation

Globally, financial hardship arising from overspending and over-indebtedness, and often leading to poverty, strongly hampers peoples' life satisfaction, well-being, and health. Going beyond the immediate economic issues, psychology has much to offer to identify potential causes and consequences of financial hardship and interventions on how to handle these problems. Many publications in developmental

Research on the effect of consumption on self-esteem is relatively scarce and related evidence is fragmented. We review articles from the literature on consumption, advertising, materialism, mass media, and social media as they relate – directly or indirectly – to consumer self-esteem. We introduce a taxonomy of eight types of processes through which consumption affects self-esteem: self-discrepancy

Evaluating the well-being implications of social media use is challenging for many reasons, including finding appropriate theoretical and methodological approaches that do not exclusively center either the technology (and its structural features) or the user (and their motivations, psychological disposition, etc.). We argue that many research questions would benefit from a more integrated approach

Exposure to early-life adversity (ELA) is associated with elevated risk for depression and anxiety disorders in adolescence. Identifying mechanisms through which ELA contributes to the emergence of depression and anxiety is necessary to design preventive interventions. One potential mechanism linking exposure to ELA with psychopathology is accelerated pubertal development. Exposure to trauma—specifically

Social displacement is the proposition that time spent on social media replaces time spent in face-to-face interaction, particularly with close friends and family, thus reducing well-being. There is clear evidence of growing mobile and social media use, and some evidence of a decline in face-to-face communication. This essay concludes, however, there is very little direct or causal evidence of social

The author comprehensively reviews compulsive shopping (CS), a disorder characterized by excessive shopping and/or spending that leads to subjective distress and impaired functioning. CS has been linked to substance use disorders, mood, and anxiety disorders, and to the obsessive-compulsive spectrum. More recently, CS has been considered a behavioral addiction. Most CS experts consider CS an independent

In response to a recent call to better understand the drivers of self-expressive consumption; this review examines the latest relevant research to identify two broad classes of benefits of self-expressive consumption. First are utilitarian benefits that result from cognitively-driven self-expressions intended to fulfill a consumer's need to create and maintain a self-identity. Second are hedonic benefits

This article reports on the first meta-analysis of studies on the association between government-imposed social restrictions and mental health outcomes published during the initial year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Thirty-three studies (N = 131,844) were included. Social restrictions were significantly associated with increased mental health symptoms overall (d = .41 [CI 95% .17–.65]), including depression

Hundreds of studies have examined the interpersonal effects of video game consumption. This article provides a brief review of the relationship between violent and prosocial, respectively, video gaming and social behavior. Although some studies came to contradicting results, meta-analyses found that violent video game consumption increases aggression and decreases prosocial behavior, whereas prosocial