Researchers from the United States and Switzerland have discovered that, contrary to popular belief, people are surprisingly likely to try and return a lost wallet to its owner, and even more so if the wallet has money in it.
The study follows an experiment conducted in 355 cities around the world, where research assistants took 17,303 wallets into societal institutions to present it to an employee, saying, “Hi, I found this [wallet] on the street around the corner. Somebody must have lost it. I’m in a hurry and have to go. Can you please take care of it?”
The wallets – which had business cards with contact information of a fictitious male, a grocery list, a key, and either no or some money – were on average 11% more likely to be reported if they had money in them.
“[The research] shows that when we make a decision whether to be dishonest or not, it’s not only ‘What can I get out of it versus what’s the punishment, what’s the effort?’” says Nina Mazar, behavioral scientist at Boston University. “It actually matters that people have morals and they like to think of themselves as good human beings.”
