Excusing Beliefs about Third-party Success

I investigate whether people distort beliefs about third parties – such as the ability of scientists to offset one’s environmental impact – to excuse self interested behavior. In a laboratory experiment, participants choose how much money to take. The money is either taken from passive participants or comes from another source. Which one it is depends on the success of a third party in solving a riddle. I use a between-subject design with two treatment conditions that only differ in whether it is the success or the failure that results in taking the chosen amount from passive participants. After choosing the amount, participants report beliefs about the success of the third party. Indeed, beliefs are 13 percentage points higher when it is the failure that results in taking the chosen amount from passive participants. With monetary incentives for correct guesses the inference is inconclusive. Nevertheless, the difference in beliefs decreases to 6 percentage points and becomes statistically insignifiant. The results suggest that people use belief-based excuses about third-party success.