Being honest when tempted to cheat elicits activation in reward-related brain regions and protects mood

Scientific discourse often posits that for humans being honest in tempting situations, where cheating would go unnoticed, is inherently costly. Because honesty requires sacrificing immediate extrinsic rewards and enduring the aversive costs of recruiting control processes, it is difficult to argue that honesty holds inherent value for the individual. In this research, we challenge this assumption by demonstrating that honesty can be intrinsically rewarding, offsetting the inherent costs of control (Study 1) and mitigating the negative emotional impact of foregoing extrinsic rewards (Study 2). Specifically, we found that choosing honesty over a reward was associated with increased activity in reward-related brain regions, reflecting its intrinsic value (Study 1, n = 65), and a weaker negative effect on participants’ mood after missing an additional reward, highlighting its emotional buffering effects (Study 2, n = 2,005). These findings suggest that beyond the moral imperative, honesty carries an immediate intrinsic benefit that can promote honest behavior.