Low cognitive reflection predicts honesty for men but not for women

TL;DR

This study finds that lower cognitive reflection predicts honesty in men but not in women, highlighting gender-specific effects of deliberation on dishonest behavior.

Contribution

It uncovers a novel interaction between gender and cognitive reflection in predicting dishonesty, which has not been previously explored.

Findings

Lower CRT scores predict honesty in men.

No significant effect of CRT on honesty in women.

Men with non-intuitive, non-deliberative answers are particularly honest.

Abstract

Previous experiments have explored the effects of gender and cognitive reflection on dishonesty separately. To the best of our knowledge, no studies have investigated potential interactions between these two factors. Exploring this interaction is important because previous work found that males tend to be both more deliberative than females. Therefore, it is possible that the gender effect on dishonesty is moderated by cognitive reflection. Here we report a large online experiment (N = 766) where subjects first have a chance to lie for their benefit and then take a Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT). We find a significant interaction between gender and CRT score such that lack of deliberation promotes honesty for men but not for women. Additional analyses highlight that this effect is mainly driven by men whose answers in the CRT are neither intuitive nor deliberative, who happen to be particularly honest in our deception game.