End of study Project: Translation | By
Page 11 of 39
yeah so that's a really important point so what we study is what's called incidental anger
so anger that's triggered by some unrelated event so you might have had an argument with
your spouse and then you have a meeting at work or you might have had a disagreement
with one partner and then you end up meeting with a different partner if the situation is
completely unrelated then that anger should not influence our behavior but we find that
it actually does so what turns out to be important is that here this anger bleeds into this
unrelated situation and we become more likely to engage in deception just because we
were angry before and that anger still influences and guides our behavior
Steve sheretta
Why does it lead to deception and not just you know being hostile or well maybe you're
also hostile but what is it that about anger that leads to that behavior
Maurice Schweitzer
well what's interesting is that we found is that the anger as Jeremy was explained before
dis inhibits us we become less empathetic so we care less about other people in general
and we're now more free or liberated to pursue our self-interest so it's really a self-
interested behavior and across our studies we find that when people feel anger they're
really less concerned about other people and they're not interested in retaliation or just
randomly harming other people it's really just a diminished concern for others and the
pursuit of self-interest now just gets carried away and it's no longer checked by our
empathy for others that's how we usually operate we're feeling angry we just cared less
about others and what we find is that now anger becomes much so that the deception
becomes much more likely to occur
Steve sheretta
So being angry makes you more egocentric in a way and less sensitive?
Maurice Schweitzer
Absolutely!!
Steve sheretta
That’s okay well that’s interesting what were the key takeaways from the study Jeremy in
your view or at least that the main ones?