If you've ever caught someone in a lie and thought "Hmm, I bet they do this all the time," you might be onto something. A new study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology has found that dishonesty is actually consistent behavior — in other words, once a cheater, pretty much always a cheater.
Researchers led by Isabel Thielmann tracked 1,916 participants over three years, repeatedly testing their honesty using different cheating games where they could lie for personal gain (either to make money or to avoid tedious work).
Participants in the study could cheat without getting caught individually — similar to real-world situations where people can fudge their taxes or pad expense reports without obvious detection.
"Contrary to long-standing assumptions, there is notable consistency in dishonest behavior that can be attributed to underlying dispositional factors," the researchers write. In other words: some people are just more prone to dishonesty, and this tendency follows them across different situations.
The study used a statistical model to measure how consistent people were in their cheating behavior. The results showed "strong consistency" in most cases – meaning if someone cheated in one scenario, they were likely to cheat in others, even when the stakes or context changed.
The researchers found that certain personality traits — specifically low "Honesty-Humility" scores and high "Dark Factor" traits (the nasty personality characteristics like narcissism and psychopathy) — predicted not only who would cheat but also who would cheat consistently.
This research challenges the old "situation matters more than personality" view that's dominated psychological thinking about dishonesty since the early 19th century. Turns out your shifty cousin who "borrowed" money and never paid it back probably isn't just having a one-off ethical lapse — it might be a pattern woven into their personality.
So next time someone tells you "I only lied because of the circumstances," that's probably a lie, too. As this research suggests, the truth about lying is that some people just do it more than others – and they'll likely keep doing it, circumstances be damned.
Previously:
• Heroes and sociopaths: behavioral twins?
• Can you trust a sociopath's memoir?
• Lifehacks for sociopaths
• United Airlines staffer pretends bag is too big for carry on
