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Punishment Motives for Small and Big Lies

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  • Gerald Eisenkopf
  • Ruslan Gurtoviy
  • Verena Utikal

Abstract

Corporate fraud typically involves deceptive financial statements that are harmful for some stakeholders. We analyze how preferences for honesty and economic fairness shape the punishment of such untruthful statements. Our laboratory experiment disentangles the crucial confound that, for deceptive financial statements, larger deviations from the truth imply both a stronger violation of the honesty norm and an increase in economic harm. Our study measures how people punish increased dishonesty controlling for the corresponding economic harm. We find that punishment increases with the size of the lie. This behavioral pattern is driven by people who are honest themselves. Our results suggest that popular demand for punitive measures in case of financial scandals reflects a genuine interest in the enforcement of social norms.

Suggested Citation

  • Gerald Eisenkopf & Ruslan Gurtoviy & Verena Utikal, 2017. "Punishment Motives for Small and Big Lies," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(2), pages 484-498, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jemstr:v:26:y:2017:i:2:p:484-498
    DOI: 10.1111/jems.12197
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Bernardino, Wilton & Ospina, Raydonal & Souza, Filipe Costa de & Rêgo, Leandro & Pereira, Felipe, 2021. "Risk curves: A methodology to evaluate the risk of fraud by stock price manipulation based on game theory and detection software," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    2. Sascha Behnk & Iván Barreda-Tarrazona & Aurora García-Gallego, 2018. "Punishing liars—How monitoring affects honesty and trust," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(10), pages 1-30, October.
    3. Daniel Herold, 2017. "The Impact of Incentive Pay on Corporate Crime," MAGKS Papers on Economics 201752, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics, Department of Economics (Volkswirtschaftliche Abteilung).
    4. Chadi, Adrian & Homolka, Konstantin, 2022. "Little Lies and Blind Eyes – Experimental Evidence on Cheating and Task Performance in Work Groups," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 199(C), pages 122-159.

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