Lying (non-)parents: being a parent does not reduce dishonesty

Several studies in economics and finance show that parenthood can affect economic behaviour. Here, we provide a large-sample (N = 2,008) experimental analysis of whether parents are less likely to cheat for monetary benefits than non-parents. We expect that parenting children could increase the psychological costs of lying (both in self- and social-image domains), and thus lead to less cheating by parents than non-parents. Our experimental findings from a private die rolling task show, however, that parents and non-parents lie to a similar extent. In a further treatment, we remind parents of their parent-identity before the lying task and find that when parents are reminded of their children, they lie slightly but not significantly less than without a reminder.