In honor of Hug an Economist Day (January 31st), we celebrate our colleagues in the field by sharing a review of recent research exploring how an economic education shapes our very perception of honesty.
“The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. But education which stops with efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society. The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason, but with no morals.”
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1947)
Academic specialization often becomes something much greater than just a line on a diploma. It can become a sort of 'identity badge' for students, shaping their sense of self and serving as a signal of both their skills and their belonging to a specific group. Throughout the learning process, students do not only acquire formal knowledge. They also absorb the ideas, values, and ways of thinking inherent to their field, which gradually become an integral part of their personal identity.
Of particular interest is the field of economics, a discipline where the assumptions of rationality and utility maximization play a central role. Economic theories and their fundamental premises are often perceived as cold, objective formulas that help model the behavior of economic agents and the system as a whole. Macroeconomic policies were built upon these foundations, driving economic growth and increasing overall prosperity. The successful economic reforms in Chile, spearheaded by the 'Chicago Boys,' serve as a striking example of the sheer power of economic knowledge.
At the same time, it has been suggested that the economic theory and analytical frameworks taught to students may unintentionally exert a negative influence on morality. In this light, Ong et al. (2024) conducted an experimental study to test whether students specializing in economics are truly more likely to perceive honest behavior as 'effortful.' Such a belief, framed within a system of costs and benefits, could potentially influence decisions that require ethical evaluation.
To examine this, the authors experimentally assessed the perceptions of economics students regarding the effortfulness of honesty in three stages:
Firstly, the researchers utilized the Implicit Association Test (IAT), a psychological tool designed to measure unconscious biases by assessing the speed at which individuals associate different concepts (Lee et al., 2019, as cited in Ong et al., 2024). Results of the first part of the study show that honesty is implicitly viewed as effortful more often among participants specializing in economics.
In the second part of the study, a Qualtrics survey was administered to a nationally representative sample. Participants responded to statements such as 'Being honest is hard' to measure their beliefs about honesty as an effortful behavior and their willingness to use unethical negotiation tactics. As a result, students with economics specialization were found to view honesty as more effortful. Additionally, they were also more willing to use unethical tactics such as making false promises in negotiations.
The third part of the study was dedicated to determining whether the perception of honesty as an effortful behavior is linked to utilitarianism, a framework centered on the maximization of overall utility that has strongly influenced economic theory. Here, the matched sample was helpful in ensuring the balance of the proportion of individuals who had specialized in economics and those who had not. This would allow the scholars to verify that differences indeed come from the students’ specialization. According to the findings, students with economics specialization were more likely to display utilitarianism in their decision-making, which in turn fostered the belief that honesty is effortful.
According to discussions by the authors, specialization in economics links to utilitarianism through the frameworks of rational choice and utility maximization. These models require performing cost-benefit analysis, making people more likely to adopt a utilitarian approach. This approach, in turn, makes honesty appear 'effortful.' This is because mental calculus and the difficult process of quantifying moral values are required for decision-making.
Regarding implications, Ong et al. (2024) suggest adjusting the curriculum of students specializing in economics in order to incorporate courses such as humanities and other social sciences to develop their critical thinking skills. This would open opportunities for students to challenge the fundamental assumptions underlying the economics field. As a result, economic theories can be perceived as one of many analytical approaches rather than natural laws. Educators should also pay more attention to helping students recognize the limitations of applying economic theory and encourage them to consider the social and ethical ramifications of their decisions. In addition, given the criticism of perfectly efficient markets and perfectly rational individuals (Kuttner, 1996 and Beinhocker, 2006; as cited in Ong et al., 2024), the authors suggest that economics instructors adopt a “new economics” paradigm allowing the idea that markets can be imperfect and inefficient and that individuals operate under bounded rationality.
Ong, M., Cunningham, J. L., & Parmar, B. L. (2024). Lay beliefs about homo economicus: How and why does economics education make us see honesty as effortful? Academy of Management Learning & Education, 23(1), 41–60.
