Irene Blanken

A Meta-Analytic Review of Moral Licensing:

Moral licensing refers to the effect that when people initially behave in a moral way, they are later more likely to display behaviors that are immoral, unethical, or otherwise problematic. We provide a state-of-the-art overview of moral licensing by conducting a meta-analysis of 91 studies (7,397 participants) that compare a licensing condition with a control condition. Based on this analysis, the magnitude of the moral licensing effect is estimated to be a Cohen’s d of 0.31. We tested potential moderators and found that published studies tend to have larger moral licensing effects than unpublished studies. We found no empirical evidence for other moderators that were theorized to be of importance. The effect size estimate implies that studies require many more participants to draw solid conclusions about moral licensing and its possible moderators.

A Group’s Physical Attractiveness Is Greater Than the Average Attractiveness of Its Members The Group Attractiveness Effect

We tested whether the perceived physical attractiveness of a group is greater than the average attractiveness of its members. In nine studies, we find evidence for the so-called group attractiveness effect (GA-effect), using female, male, and mixed-gender groups, indicating that group impressions of physical attractiveness are more positive than the average ratings of the group members. A meta-analysis on 33 comparisons reveals that the effect is medium to large (Cohen’s d = 0.60) and moderated by group size. We explored two explanations for the GA-effect: (a) selective attention to attractive group members, and (b) the Gestalt principle of similarity. The results of our studies are in favor of the selective attention account: People selectively attend to the most attractive members of a group and their attractiveness has a greater influence on the evaluation of the group.

When Do People Prefer Carrots to Sticks? A Robust 'Matching Effect' in Policy Evaluation

We find a “matching effect” in policy evaluations. For behaviors seen as positive but voluntary (such as organ donation) people prefer policies that are framed as advantaging those who act positively rather than disadvantaging those who fail to do so. Conversely, for behaviors seen as positive and obligatory, people prefer policies that are framed as disadvantaging those who fail to fulfill obligations rather than advantaging those who do so. We find that these differences in policy evaluations occur even when policy outcomes are identical, i.e., when the only difference between the policies is how they are framed. These differences emerge both for evaluations of hypothetical policies, as well as when implementation of the policy directly affects the evaluator. Furthermore, differences in evaluations are not the result of misunderstanding of — or lack of deliberation about — policy outcomes. Rather, the matching effect appears to follow from lay beliefs about when punishment is and is not appropriate.