The Non-Cognitive Roots of Civic Honesty: Evidence from the US

Alessandro Bucciol and Luca Zarri

No 02/2021, Working Papers from University of Verona, Department of Economics

Abstract: Even though a large experimental literature explored the links between personality traits and honesty, available evidence is inconclusive. In this study, we provide large-scale evidence on the influence of the “Big Five” personality traits on civic honesty, by considering the role played by individuals’ socioeconomic status. To this aim, we rely on survey data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), which is representative of the US population aged 50 or more. We show that most “Big Five” traits significantly affect civic honesty, with Agreeableness being the strongest predictor. We view our findings as complementing and extending to civic-minded behavior the results of prior work on cheating based on small samples and non-representative subject pools.

Keywords: Civic Honesty; Personality Traits; Socioeconomic Status (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D63 D91 I31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 28
Date: 2021-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-neu
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Journal Article: The Non-Cognitive Roots of Civic Honesty: Evidence from the US (2021)
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