The question that editorial boards always ask is: are popular articles doing justice to the scientific article they are representing or do they poorly represent scientific research? The scientific article, “Underestimating Our Influence Over Others' Unethical Behavior and Decisions” written by Vanessa K. Bohns, Mahdi Roghanizad, and Amy Xu was posted on the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. The popular article, “It's easier than you think to get people to commit bad deeds” by blogger Christian Jarrett, was recently blogged in response to the scientific article. He effectively showcases Bohns research and findings to a different audience than those attracted to the scientific articles. Examining the blog, it is demonstrated that it indeed does justice to the argument in Bohns’ article; by not only summarizing its findings, but also mentioning other research done in the past, similar to Bohns’ work. Considering the many limitations that we set for popular articles, one being word limit, the article by Jarrett conveys Bohns’ findings and research effectively through usage of simpler diction and tone.
Bohns conveys her information in a scientific manner, where as Jarrett’s blog effectively adds insight to the world of research conducted by scientists, while utilizing diction understandable to everyone. Bohns’ article contains extensive data, for example: “The predictions… (M = 18.33, SD = 19.19) … (excluding the outlier: M = 8.47, SD = 5.14), F (1, 48) = 8.28, p = .006…conservative” (Bohns 4). Her data contains numbers and symbols in order to establish what her results for her research were. Only a scientist would be able to comprehend these findings because the general public would be lost. Someone, like me, a soon to be b...
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...ra research that supports the findings of the argument with an appropriate tone and diction readable for any audience; as my analysis has proven.
Works Cited Page
Bohns, Vanessa, Mahdi Roghanizad, and Amy Xu. "Underestimating Our Influence Over Others' Unethical Behavior and Decisions." Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 1 (2013): 1-14. Print.
Jarrett, Christian. "BPS Research Digest: It's easier than you think to get people to commit bad deeds." BPS Research Digest: It's easier than you think to get people to commit bad deeds. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Feb. 2014. .
"4 Statistics Every Blogger Should Know About Content Word Count." CopyPressed. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 Mar. 2014. .
As depicted in A Few Good Men, authors Fromm, Dalrymple, and Szegedy-Maszak provide evidence as to why blind obedience influences individuals’ motives, such as fear and trust, to examine how unjust authority pollutes a person’s ability to
A man is running late to work one day when he passes by a homeless person asking for help. This man and many others usually consider this particular man to be generous, but since he is late, he ignores the homeless person and continues on his way. One can assume that if he had the time, he would have helped. Does that matter, though, seeing as in that situation, he did not in fact help? Scenarios like this supports Lee Ross and Richard Nisbett’s idea that it is the situation that influences a person’s behavior, not he or she’s individual conscience. Although a person’s individual conscience could play a part in how one behaves in a given scenario, ultimately, the “situational variable” has more impact on the actions of the person than he or she’s morals.
“Most people in the U.S. want to do the right thing, and they want others to do the right thing. Thus, reputation and trust are important to pretty much everyone individuals and organizations. However, individuals do have different values, attributes, and priorities that guide their decisions and behavior. Taken to an extreme, almost any personal value, attribute, or priority can “cause” an ethical breach (e.g. risk taking, love of money or sta...
That alone provides a great source of credibility to the paper. The idea that this is an author who has done the research, gathered the numbers, and analyzed the data, allows the reader to rest in the idea that they are reading a valid article, and receiving good, hard, evidence. Twenge also uses a very logical tone throughout her article, maintaining the idea that the data is as clear as day, and that there is no disproving it; the numbers show true facts.
An experiment by Gerhard Blickle, and Alexander Schlegel attempted to recreate results of Collins and Schmidt’s study about psychological influences on white-collar crime. The experiment involved personality tests on 150 managers currently working in German corporations and 76 white-collar criminals. They compared the personality results of the criminals to the non-criminals, much like Collins and Schmidt’s experiment in the United States of America. Blickle and Schlegel found that white-collar crime offenders were more hedonistic (Blickle et al., 2006). Hedonistic individuals are those who engage in the pursuit of pleasure. According to the Rational Choice Theory, individuals commit crimes when they perceive the reward is greater than the punishment. For those who tend to pleasure seek, crime would seem the most rational choice. The crime’s reward is worth the possible punishment to these individuals. Blickle and Schlegal also found that narcissistic tendencies were more common in white-collar criminals (Blickle, et al., 2006). Narcissism is described as having overindulgent self interest and care for one’s appearance. These traits can add to the temptations of criminal activity. Caring for only oneself would allow illegally soliciting money from
...Virtue, Personality, and Social Relations: Self-Control as the Moral Muscle." Journal of Personality 67.6 (1999): 1165-194. Print.
Unethical behavior is a behavior which is not morally correct. When one is encouraged to embrace unethical behavior and actions, they are "trapped." They are psychological in nature, and such traps distort perceptions of what is wrong and what is right. One actually ends up believing that his or her unethical behavior is right and ethical. If one is not aware of their behavior it is hard for them to tell if their behavior is actually acceptable and ethical. Just like in the Stanford Prison Experiment, the volunteer guards adopted to their new roles. Within hours of beginning the prison experiment, some of the guards began to abuse their power and harass prisoners in that experiment. The volunteer guards behaved in a sadistic and brutal manner.
Some reasons why powerful situations and a person 's conscience may influence a person’s behavior are because of situations of a moment, feeling pressured by others, and what someone might believe is an authority figure.
The very idea of controlling society through the threat of punishment lends itself to a society plagued by negative reinforcement. However, this is a necessary step in some social circles where respective citizens may not have had a proper upbringing or simply chose not to respond by learning from their proper upbringing. As the journal article states, it is fairly common practice to spend a considerable amount of money in not only punishing wrongdoers, but threatening society of the risks of wrongdoing as a preventative measure (Wright, Caspi, Moffit, & Paternoster, 2004, p. 2, para. 1). The answers derived in the journal are that everyone responds the same to sanction threats, the motivation of crimes outweigh the threats for some criminals,
The statistic shown in the student survey of fall 2007 and spring 2008 reveal that only a select few of the students willingly uphold the school’s rules (Source: E). This lack of enforcement relates to the percentage of how many students have not been caught doing unethical behaviors. By increasing the number of students who follow the rules, the amount of students who cheat will decrease proportionally, thus creating a healthier environment. Additionally, students have shown to have an overall effect on other students and their behaviors: “Students who enter a college of mostly ‘honest’ types will more often choose not to cheat even if they are not innately ‘cheater’ types” (Source: C). Honest people who abide by the rules provided can influence other students into being ethical and vice versa, implying that the environment should promote the growth of virtuous behavior. Through a healthy surrounding, a school may have a majority of its students become honest people, thus revealing that the students and the environment directly affect each
Criminal behavior is adapted through exuded actions of significant others (Schram & Tibbetts, 2014, p.217). Criminals are not born, they are created. Both nonverbal and verbal communication is pivotal within interaction that influences criminal behavior, along with personal groups. Being that adolescents are easily molded, it is very common that individuals can easily be coerced into participating in deviant activities. If individuals see the benefits of their peers stealing without consequences or repercussions, would it be surprising if they began to steal as well? They are persuaded in the direction of motives that seem favorable CITE 4. These principles also correlate with the crime of murder. If the media broadcasts countless stories of people who commit murder with the justification of self-defense, it is logical to assume that individuals will begin to use that claim. Since the George Zimmerman case surfaced, there have been countless killings of unarmed minority teenage
2005; Piccolo et al., 2010, Zhu et al. 2015). Top management teams and policy makers must carefully
High crime rates are an ongoing issue through the United States, however the motivation and the cause of crime has yet to be entirely identified. Ronald Akers would say that criminality is a behavior that is learned based on what an individual sees and observes others doing. When an individual commits a crime, he or she is acting on impulse based on actions that they have seen others engage in. Initially during childhood, individuals learn actions and behavior by watching and listening to others, and out of impulse they mimic the behavior that is observed. Theorist Ronald Akers extended Sutherland’s differential association theory with a modern viewpoint known as the social learning theory. The social learning theory states that individuals commit crime through their association with or exposure to others. According to Akers, people learn how to be offenders based on their observations around them and their association with peers. Theorist Akers states that for one, “people can become involved in crime through imitation—that is by modeling criminal conduct. Second, and most significant, Akers contended that definition and imitation are most instrumental in determining initial forays into crime” (Lilly, Cullen, and Ball 2011:57). Although Akers’ theory has been linked to juvenile delinquency in the past, it has also been tested as a possible cause of crime overall. Individuals learn from observation that criminal behavior is justifiable in certain circumstances. In connection with juvenile delinquency and crime, peers and intimate groups have the most effect on individuals when associated with criminal behavior. One is more likely to mimic the behavior of someone who they have close ties with, whether the behavior is justifiable or...
Tang, T., & Sutarso, T. (2013). Falling or Not Falling into Temptation? Multiple Faces of Temptation, Monetary Intelligence, and Unethical Intentions Across Gender. Journal Of Business Ethics, 116(3), 529-552.
There is an epidemic of cheating in American universities. Students are finding easier and more efficient ways to cheat. Morals and morality are changing. Students, members of the younger generation, and teachers, members of the older generation, differ on what is cheating. Morality even differs amongst students. Some students still adhere to the traditional sense of morality, and find what other students do an abhorration of morality. This essay is a mostly a pathos and ethos argument that attempts to appeal to the reader’s sense of right and wrong by using so-called “authorities.”