Loyalty influences support for indirect ties in moral dilemmas, study finds

In the complex web of human relationships, the choice to show allegiance to someone often shapes decisions and actions. But what happens when loyalty to a friend extends to their relationships?

A new study from the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business explores how the quality and strength of an individual’s loyalty to another can be influenced by the willingness to support an indirect connection, even when the stranger has been accused of contrary behavior to ethics. The article titled “When Your Friend is My Friend: How Loyalty Incentivizes Support for Indirect Ties in Moral Dilemmas” was published in Organizational sciences.

Angus Hildreth, assistant professor at the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management, and Zachariah Berry, Ph.D. ’24, assistant professor of management and organization at the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California, continued his research because he wanted to understand why some people escape wrongdoing over long periods of time.

“We wanted to know why individuals like Harvey Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein, and even those with no power, can get away with unethical behavior and why no one is coming forward to speak out,” Hildreth said . “It seems intuitive that loyalty might explain why close friends don’t come forward, but it’s less clear why those not directly related to the abusers don’t come forward.”

The researchers speculated that this might be because loyalty – or, more precisely, loyalty obligations to direct ties, such as colleagues and friends – might be transferred across a person’s network to others. other links, and that this could explain why indirect links do not arouse interest. an alarm.

Researchers have found that loyalty obligations to friends transfer to indirect ties even if they have been accused of wrongdoing such as sexual harassment, theft, false advertising, fraud, corruption, plagiarism and dishonesty. This transfer occurs regardless of the type of wrongdoing or the strength of the evidence presented against the accused. This finding challenges the prevailing assumption that loyalty only benefits direct ties and suggests a broader influence of loyalty within social networks.

Their findings are based on 11 studies involving 2,249 participants conducted over five years. In several studies, participants were faced with a situation in which one of their colleagues’ friends, whom they did not know, had been accused of sexual harassment. Participants were asked if they were likely to verbally support the accused.

“One of the fascinating things we found was that this loyalty effect persisted no matter how much evidence was presented to support the claim,” Berry said. “We tried to increase the evidence from a second accusation to the videotaped evidence of the alleged crime and we still found that loyalty increased support.”

One of the criticisms of the early studies was the hypothetical nature of the scenarios. Hildreth and Berry therefore conducted a separate field study involving a college fraternity in which they recruited a “confederate”—a member of the fraternity—to administer the study.

The confederate asked for support from fellow fraternity members for an anonymous friend who was allegedly accused of stealing funds from an on-campus organization. Each member of the fraternity was asked to add their name to a petition in support of the Confederate’s friend. Unbeknownst to the fraternity members, they were each given a different petition to ensure that they would be the second signer of the petition (the confederate was the first) if they chose to sign.

Hildreth said this was intended to reduce problems with “social proof” – the possibility that members would only sign if they had seen that several others had done so.

The researchers believe their work reveals important practical implications for preventing and managing unethical behavior in the workplace.

“Most organizations realize that loyalty is a double-edged sword,” Berry said. “On the one hand, organizational loyalty helps organizations attract, retain, and motivate employees, but on the other hand, personal loyalty can prevent organizations from making effective and fair decisions.”

“Organizations are probably not aware that the loyal obligations of others can also influence decision-making,” Hildreth said. “For example, if you know your boss is a Cornell alumnus and one of the candidates your company is considering is also from Cornell, how does that factor into your decision-making, even if you have no connection to Cornell?”