Collaborative Cheating in Hierarchical Teams: Effects of Incentive Structure and Leader Behavior on Subordinate Behavior and Perceptions of Leaders

Abstract

What facilitates collaborative cheating in hierarchical teams, and what are its outcomes for those engaged? In two preregistered studies ( N = 724), we investigated how subordinates are influenced by leaders signaling a willingness to engage in collaborative cheating, and how subordinates perceive such leaders. Participants performed a task in which they could either report their performance honestly, or cheat for financial gain. Each participant was assigned a leader who could choose to check the report’s veracity. In Study 1, leaders who checked less often were perceived as more moral, trustworthy, competent, and psychologically closer than leaders who checked more often. This trustworthiness bonus translated to investments in a subsequent trust game. Study 2 revealed that these relationship benefits specifically arise for collaborative cheating, compared to competitive cheating (at the leader’s expense). We conclude that collaborative cheating in subordinate–leader dyads strengthens in-group bonds, bringing people closer together and cultivating trust.

Communication Increases Collaborative Corruption

“…Thirdly, as previous research has shown that coordinating in a die roll task increases trust and social bonds (Karg et al, 2023), the direction of the mediations in the present studies may be reversed. More research that disentangles the relationship between communication, collaboration, and dishonesty is needed.…”

Investigating the Impact of Social Commitment on Dishonest Behavior

“…On the one hand, social commitment to other individuals, including co-workers or supervisors, has been identified as one major reason to engage in dishonest behavior (Bellé & Cantarelli, 2017;Karg, et al, 2022;Leib, 2021) 1 and might be one of the driving forces behind large-scale corruption (Castille & Fultz, 2018). On the other hand, committing to social norms via oaths or pledges has been found to decrease dishonesty and instead promote honest behavior (Bellé & Cantarelli, 2017;Hertwig & Mazar, 2022).…”

Who's leading whom? Mutual influences in moral decision making between leaders and subordinates over time

“…For example, is it more important to have highly ethical leaders, or highly ethical subordinates? Despite repeated calls for research into these processes (Avolio, 2007;Hofmans et al, 2019;Thoroughgood et al, 2016), most existing empirical investigations into ethical dynamics do not have any explicit hierarchy (Gross & De Dreu, 2021;Irlenbusch et al, 2020;Weisel & Shalvi, 2015), or concentrate on only one side of the leader-subordinate relationship (Gächter & Renner, 2018;Johnson et al, 2017;Karg et al, 2022), and even fewer investigate mutual influence over time (d'Adda et al, 2017;Rilke et al, 2021). Thus, the purpose of this paper is two-fold: To identify the degree of mutuality influence on ethical behavior from leader to subordinate and from subordinate to leader as they play out in repeated interactions, and to find out how these influences are affected by the underlying respective moral character of the leader and the subordinate.…”

“…This so-called congruency between leaders and subordinates is an important factor to keep in mind when examining leader-subordinate interactions. This may be especially true for collaborative corruption scenarios as collaborating successfully generally leads to positive evaluations (Karg et al, 2022;Zelmer, 2003). As leaders and subordinates become partners-in-crime, we thus expect them to form positive opinions of each other.…”