Can a Clean Environment Improve Ethical Behavior?

If you're worried about whether or not your employees behave ethically, a pair of MBA professors have come up with a simple solution: spray a little citrus-scented Windex in their work environments.

TIME reported recently about new research finding that clean smells promoted good behavior. The research was conducted by Katie Liljenquist, a professor at Brigham Young University's Marriott School of Management, and Adam Galinsky of Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management.
The researchers conducted experiments testing subjects' honesty and generosity. One group was tested in a room cleaned with citrus Windex, and one group was located in an unscented room. In one experiment, each group was given a set of tasks to complete. In their packet was a flyer asking for charitable donations. Of those in the clean-smelling room, 22 percent said they wanted to donate money; only 6 percent in the other room agreed to give.

"Economists and even psychologists haven't been paying much attention to the fact that small changes in our environment can have dramatic effects on behavior. We underemphasize these subtle environmental cues," Galinsky said in TIME.

As someone who can't concentrate when my desk gets too messy, to me this makes a degree of intuitive sense. However, others are skeptical that clean smells specifically trigger more moral behavior. TIME also spoke to Brown University psychologist Rachel Herz, who said that participants who liked the smell of citrus might have simply been in a more positive mood, not necessarily a more ethical one.

What do you think?

Image courtesy of Flickr user zsoul, CC 2.0.