Moral Credential Effect
Past good behavior licenses us to act in ways we otherwise consider immoral.
The moral credential effect (or moral licensing) is a bias where past moral behavior makes people more likely to do potentially immoral things without worrying about it affecting their self-image. Having 'banked' moral credit, people feel licensed to be selfish, prejudiced, or irresponsible. Companies that promote their environmental credentials may feel (and be perceived as) licensed to engage in pollution elsewhere.
What it looks like in the wild.
- Everyday life Virtuous Indulgence After donating to charity in the morning, a person feels licensed to skip their environmentally conscious shopping habits that afternoon, having already secured their 'good person' status for the day.
Recognising a definition is not the same skill as spotting it.
Two scenarios from the app, with distractors drawn from the same family of biases — which is what makes them hard.
After mentoring a junior employee, Karen believes she can take credit for their work without telling them.
After consistently being on time for work for a month, Ben felt comfortable leaving 15 minutes early on a Friday.
Biases rarely arrive alone.
Understand more. Assume less.
188 biases, 18,869 scenarios, and a record of how you actually decide.
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