Most people would probably say they would be more honest if they were being watched. This is human..

Most people would probably say they would be more honest if
they were being watched. This is human nature, isn’t it? A team of researchers
at Newcastle University in the United Kingdom decided to test this proposition
by creating an experiment. The setting for the experiment was the often seen
coffee station set up in a department break room where faculty and staff could
help themselves to coffee, tea, or milk during the day and then place their
payment for the refreshments in a jar or a box. The “honor system” was
requested because there was no one at the station to monitor whether people
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Most people would probably say they would be more honest if
they were being watched. This is human nature, isn’t it? A team of researchers
at Newcastle University in the United Kingdom decided to test this proposition
by creating an experiment. The setting for the experiment was the often seen
coffee station set up in a department break room where faculty and staff could
help themselves to coffee, tea, or milk during the day and then place their
payment for the refreshments in a jar or a box. The “honor system” was
requested because there was no one at the station to monitor whether people
actually paid or not. The department had been using an “honesty box” for people
to place their money in for years. The researchers decided to post the prices
for the coffee, tea, and milk on a poster that featured a banner across the top
that contained images that were alternated without announcement from week to
week. The poster was placed above the coffee station. The alternating images
included a set of eyes and a picture of flowers. The image of eyes was varied
in their gender and position, but they were always situated so that they
appeared to be looking directly at the person. The research team collected the
money each week and recorded how much had been placed in the box. The team
calculated that, on average, the amount collected when the “eyes poster” was
present was 2.76 times the amount collected when the flowers poster was there.
The researchers concluded that the effect of being “watched” had the
subconscious effect of improving people’s honesty. But, the researchers were
surprised at how large an effect resulted from being watched. Later, the
question was raised whether using “watching eyes” could curb dishonest
behaviors in other settings. A police department in Birmingham, U.K. decided to
test whether it worked to deter crime by posting pictures of staring eyes all
over the city. Time will tell whether this approach to keeping crime at bay
will work.

1. Was it unethical for the research team to conduct this
experiment without telling people it was going on?

2. Do the results of the experiment surprise you? What
ethical phenomena were at work here?

3. Evaluate the experiment using Kohlberg’s levels of moral
development. Does the experiment tend to support or refute Kohlberg’s findings?
Do you think it would make a difference whether the coffee drinkers were men or
women?

 4. How could managers use the conclusions reached in this
experiment?

5. Will the police department experiment work? Why? Why not?

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