The Effect of Conscientiousness and Ego Depletion on Undergraduates’ Self-Control Failure: Focusing on Cheating Behavior
AUTHOR : 남재선, 박은영
INFORMATION : page. 69~92 / 2021 Vol.28 No.4
ABSTRACT
Conscientiousness has been related to many positive factors in life due to its superior self-control. However, recently, an ironic effect was confirmed in that people with high self-control increased their self-control failure in which their ego was depleted. This study aims to verify the effect of conscientiousness and ego depletion on self-control failure through experimental research, and to measure cheating as a result of self-control failure. To this end, 308 university students were evaluated for their conscientiousness and 64 students who were in the 25 percent upper and lower on conscientiousness, were selected as participants. The experiment was conducted by dividing the participants into conditions of ego depletion and controlled where no depletion was manipulated. As a result of the study, there were no significant difference in the cheating between the high conscientious group and the low conscientious group under the control conditions. However, under the condition of ego depletion, the high conscientiousness showed a greater increase in cheating than the group with low conscientiousness, confirming the ironic effect. This study is significant in that it identifies the cause of impulsive deviance shown by conscientious people by examining the effect of ego depletion and conscientiousness on cheating behavior.