Registered Report Stage I: Prioritizing sociability over morality: Preferring false empathic over truthful unempathic emotion communication

Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, vol. 122, pp. 104833

Abstract

Literature on person perception suggests the primacy of morality over sociability in interactions. While theories of emotion highlight the importance of adhering to socially acceptable display rules, a contentious debate surrounds whether individuals prioritize moral or sociable communication of emotions. We investigated how people perceive and react to others who falsely communicate empathic versus truthfully communicate unempathic emotions related to others' (mis)fortunes. Through three preregistered studies, we examined participants' perceptions (sociability and morality) and behavioral reactions (in a Dictator Game) by employing various paradigms (vignette and retrospective recall) and situations (e.g., promotion and lottery). Consistently across our studies, we found that participants perceived targets who truthfully communicated unempathic emotions as higher on morality and lower on sociability compared to those who falsely communicated empathic emotions. Moreover, Studies 2 and 3 revealed that participants formed more favorable impressions of, and were more willing to interact with, the target who falsely communicated empathic emotions, as opposed to those who truthfully communicated unempathic emotions. This preference was explained by perceived morality and sociability attributed to the targets. Building on these findings, we propose two follow-up studies aimed at replicating our results and extending them to a laboratory setting – a Gamble Game where participants will directly encounter an actual (mis)fortune, and a Dictator Game with an allegedly real interaction partner. Our expected findings indicate that falsely communicating empathic emotions is favored over truthfully communicating unempathic emotions, suggesting the primacy of sociability over morality in the context of communicating emotions related to others' (mis)fortunes.

Authors 4

1. Zi Ye corresponding Aachen Unit of Social, Economic and Organisational Psychology

   Leiden University · Durham University

   Affiliation as printed

   Department of Management and Marketing, Durham University Business School, the United Kingdom

   Unit of Social, Economic and Organisational Psychology, Leiden University, the Netherlands

2. Feiteng Long Aachen Unit of Social, Economic and Organisational Psychology

   Leiden University · University of Edinburgh

   Affiliation as printed

   Neuropolitics Research Lab and Edinburgh Futures Institute, University of Edinburgh, the United Kingdom

   Unit of Social, Economic and Organisational Psychology, Leiden University, the Netherlands

3. Roujia Feng Aachen Unit of Social, Economic and Organisational Psychology

   Leiden University

   Affiliation as printed

   Unit of Social, Economic and Organisational Psychology, Leiden University, the Netherlands

4. WILCO W. VAN DIJK