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Why Winners Become Cheaters (washingtonpost.com)
JoeyRox writes: A new study from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem reveals a paradoxical aspect of human behavior — people who win in competitive situations are more likely to cheat in the future. In one experiment, 86 students were split up into pairs and competed in a game where cheating was impossible. The students were then rearranged into new pairs to play a second game where cheating was possible. The result? Students who won the first game were much more likely to cheat at the second game. Additional experiments indicated that cheating was also more likely if students simply recalled a memory of winning in the past. The experiments further demonstrated that subsequent cheating was more likely in situations where the outcome of previous competitions was determined by merit rather than luck.
That makes sense to me. If you win something based on merit it becomes part of your identity. "I'm a fast runner" or "I'm good at math." That will put you under pressure (internal and external) to make sure it happens.
If you get really good at something, or have a lot of success, you are proud of yourself and define yourself for it. When faced with losing, you're much more motivated to cheat to win because it's more important to you than it would be if you had lost and presumed that it's not your thing, hence not caring nearly as much about it.
"Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
Winning is a natural high, right? People steal to get high. Why not cheat?
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Like a whole bunch of psychological studies, it only applies to college students who incur no costs.
From what I read Bernie Madoff had a compulsion for consistency. When he played golf (and he was pretty good) he would apparently turn in an 80 every time. So I suspect that the vagaries of the market just went against his grain. This then begs the question. Did he run a Ponzi scheme because he was a crook, or did he pretty much have the wrong compulsion for the wrong industry.
I am pretty sure that I see this in other areas. For instance I was at an industrial company some years ago where an IT guy cut himself on the inside of a computer to the point where it may or may not have needed stitches. The company people freaked out. They were hinting that they would even bribe him not to report it. This got my curiosity going thinking that this injury would cause their worker's compensation rates to go up, or that it would spawn some kind of outsized investigation, but then a secratary said something like, "No, Dougie is obsessed with the fact that it has been 400 days accident free." I asked if that were true and she said it wasn't and that now for any minor injury he would hand out a week's vacation to not report it. So there was a huge sign that said 400 days accident free and everyone knew it was a lie except for Dougie's superiors.
So like most things in life I suspect that most people lie somewhere on a spectrum ranging from, "I couldn't give a shit about cheating, to, look at me the most consistent winner in the universe."
So while Madoff might have been scared that a bad report would result in fewer sales and higher redemptions, it was probably a situation where he would feel that he had somehow personally failed if he were to have to say that this year was 11% instead of 12%.
Remember: "Priming studies" (like here: being reminded of prior winning makes you more like to cheat) are notorious for showing anything under the sun and then failing to be reproducible later.
Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman called priming studies the "poster child for doubts about the integrity of psychological research":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priming_%28psychology%29#Criticism
In the Many Labs Replication Project, the two "priming studies" landed at the very bottom, showing no evidence of any real effect in the replication trials:
https://osf.io/wx7ck/
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
Perhaps it's just a matter of intelligence. The first game was won by the smart players. In the second game the smart ones saw the cheating opportunity and took it (perhaps even correctly deducig that that was the point of the experiment).
The stupid players saw no opportunity and no point.
So the experiment is interesting but the conclusions could be all wrong,..
for corruption and crime happening in the "more successful" layers in a population.
Since it's a trait, hard to come by, isn't it?
I can say that I've noticed this desire in myself, although never acted on it... But in games where I know I have a skill advantage, and have won before, the temptation to cheat, as a short cut measure, becomes strong. The mentality is one of "well, I know I'm capable of getting to that point, so is it really cheating if I just skip to that part?" Yes, yes it is. And I have to remind myself of that each. freaking. time.
I thought It was just me, but it turns out to be human nature I guess?
Reporting bias occurs when the opposite result isn't ever reported. So you either see an article or you don't. If you see the article, that's because the result was "surprising". If you don't see the article, that's because it wasn't "interesting".
Trouble is, every possible result, no matter how "surprising", can occur just by chance if you do enough experiments, even if the truth isn't "interesting". Statistics works like that.
So if you keep doing all sorts of different experiments until you find one that randomly happens to look "surprising", then publish it, but never talk about all the other experimental ideas that didn't pan out, you've got yourself a case of reporting bias.
Ask yourself this: what legitimate scientific question is being answered here, and what journal and media outlets are likely to publish the opposite finding?
They should have made also an experiment changing the order. That is, play the game where palyers can cheat, first, and the game where they can't cheat, second.
Maybe the results would be "The ones who cheat in the first game also win in the second game where cheating is impossible".
My theory is that skillful persons find ways to win playing by the rules, where cheating is just rules with certain risk–benefit ratio. They will find out all the rules, legal and cheating, and the best way to use both.
That's my theory, but I need the experiment above to verify it ;-)
So some students with nothing to lose and no real life consequences decided to cheat in a study?
Maybe the first batch were clever enough to win that particular game and as they have already won (nothing) got bored and chose an alternative while those that lost still pursued a valid way to win?
It may be worth noting that people eventually graduate or leave college (or are expelled) and grow up eg. mature. Maybe less mature individuals are more likely to more??
I too conduct a test. In the first phase I gave slashdot readers a grade study to dissect. Those who dissected the study in the first phase were more likely to make toilet paper out of it in the second stage. Headline: this study shows that slashdot readers are more likely to steal and vandalise because they cannot afford toilet paper.
My conclusion? this just proves that low grade studies are first read and in the second stage transformed to being useful in the form of toilet paper. Maybe that means I'm a winner?!
A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
"Why Winners Become Cheaters" - well, because losers say so? Because losers hate the thought some can actually get ahead based on merit, knowledge and/or perseverence? Ehh.
Cheating cmes from several sources: one can't perform any other way (it happens, some barriers have a certain height for a reason); one thinks it's the easiest way (but has several drawbacks and risks that most cheaters don't always realize); one is so much afraid of failure that sees cheating the only certain way to succeed (which if of course bull, but it's a legitimate vause of cheating).
But trying to prove that winners will eventually turn into cheaters, because they're winners, well, that's just so sad it's beyond pityful.
I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I can think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.
Competitive cycling, cross country skiing and biathlon are exceptions. Cheating is required to be competitive.
I recall one Olympic where the results in cross country skiing were overturned after the samples were retested using new tests to find 'undetectable' steroids. The gold medal went to the guy who crossed the finish line almost last. The Silver went to last place. They didn't give a bronze. All the earlier finishers (and some later ones) having been disqualified.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Once you realize that the arbitrary rules imposed on many compettive endeavors are placed there by people with certain skills in order to make sure people with those skills succeed (that is, to keep themselves on top), "cheating" becomes only natural.
Furthermore, if you look around and discover that everyone who is winning is cheating, you might consider that the rules aren't meant to be followed; rather, they are intended to weed out the chumps who follow the rules (as well as those who lack the skill to avoid being caught).
Perhaps the most amazing thing the NCAA has managed to pull off is to get people to think that it's actually immoral for the people out there doing the work and taking the risks to be paid.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes