No abstract

Terror management theory (TMT) posits that mortality salience (MS) leads to more negative perceptions of persons who oppose one’s worldview and to more positive perceptions of persons who confirm one’s worldview. Recent failed replications of classic findings have thrown into question empirical validity for this established idea. We believe, that there are crucial methodological and theoretical aspects that have been neglected in these studies which limit their explanatory power; thus, the studies of this registered report aimed to address these issues and to directly test the worldview defense hypothesis. First, we conducted two preregistered lab studies applying the classic worldview defense paradigm. The stimulus material (worldview-confirming and -opposing essays) was previously validated for students at a German university. In both studies, the MS manipulation (between-subjects) was followed by a distraction phase. Then, in Study 1 (N = 131), each participant read both essays (within-subjects). In Study 2 (N = 276), the essays were manipulated between-subjects. Credibility attribution towards the author was assessed as the dependent variable. In both studies, the expected interaction effects were not significant. In a third highly powered (registered) study (N = 1356), we used a previously validated worldview-opposing essay. The five classic worldview defense items served as the main dependent measure. The MS effect was not significant. Bayesian analyses favored the null hypothesis. An internal meta-analysis revealed a very small (Hedges’ g = .09) but nonsignificant (p = .058) effect of MS. Altogether, the presented studies reveal challenges in providing strong evidence for this established idea.

Despite the clear existing theoretical links, ours is the first direct systematic series of studies investigating a potential negative association between Honesty–Humility and general dishonesty in romantic relationships. Eleven preregistered online studies with community samples were run (total N = 5,677). For a first test of our hypothesis, we conducted a series of seven cross-sectional studies based on self-reports; these studies used different methodological approaches to assess relationship-based dishonesty (i.e., closed-ended self-report scales, scenarios, and direct frequency measures). This was followed by one diary study and three studies that base their assessment on more behavioral measurements of relationship-based dishonesty (e.g., a dice roll task and an anagram task). In line with our hypothesis, all studies reliably revealed that participants higher in Honesty–Humility reported less relationship-based dishonesty. The classification of the found results to past research and the general relevance of the Honesty–Humility factor for romantic relationships are discussed.

Academic cheating is a problem that affects many educational institutions and has become increasingly significant with the new challenges of online education. Recent studies have found that learning goals are correlated with cheating behavior among students. In this study, we investigated whether learning goals are still a predictor of cheating behavior when controlling for students’ Honesty-Humility (emanated from the HEXACO model of personality) within a sample of 311 German university students. Regrading students’ learning goals, we assessed their learning approach, performance approach, performance avoidance, and work avoidance. The result shows an intermediate negative and highly significant association between Honesty-Humility and academic cheating. Learning goals did not explain any incremental variance in academic cheating that goes beyond the Honesty-Humility factor. As the only exception, the work avoidance goal was found to also predict cheating behavior, but this positive association seems to be not as strong as the negative correlation between Honesty-Humility and academic cheating. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these results and make recommendations for future research.

Several studies have investigated a potential positive association between agentic narcissism and general dishonesty, revealing both supportive and contradicting evidence. Few have focused on dishonesty within romantic relationships, a phenomenon that occurs in almost all partnerships. With the present research, we first aimed to extend existing literature on narcissism by including its two complementary facets (i.e., agentic and communal narcissism). Second, we aimed to improve the understanding of narcissists’ lying behavior in the context of partnerships by distinguishing between two different types of lies (i.e., self-centered and other-oriented lies). We hypothesized that both, people higher in agentic and communal narcissism, will report increased dishonesty toward their romantic partners (Hypothesis 1). Given the self-benefit function of self-centered lies and given that agentic narcissists aim to fulfill their relationship-based motives by agentic means, we predict agentic narcissism (compared with communal narcissism) will be a stronger predictor for self-centered lies (Hypothesis 1a). Given the other-benefiting function of other-oriented lies and given that communal narcissists aim to fulfill their motive of self-enhancement by communal means, we predict that communal narcissism (compared with agentic narcissism) will be a stronger predictor for other-oriented lies (Hypothesis 1b). In two preregistered online studies (N = 298: N = 256) we showed that people higher in agentic narcissism believed to be good liars, but this does not lead to higher self-reported frequencies of other-oriented and self-centered lies within romantic relationships historically; communal narcissism was also not related to self-reported deception. Limitations and directions for future research are discussed.