Toward a computational understanding of bribe-taking behavior

Abstract

Understanding how corrupt behavior occurs is a critical issue at the intersection of behavioral ethics, social psychology, and other related social sciences, laying the foundation for establishing effective anticorruption policies. Despite a substantial body of studies focused on bribe-taking behavior—a typical form of corruption—and its modulators, its underlying psychological processes remain poorly understood. Drawing inspiration from recent literature on neuroeconomics and moral decision-making, we argue that bribe-taking decision-making involves a value-based computational process that can be characterized by a computational framework. We show how this framework advances our understanding of bribe-taking decision-making by (1) clarifying how the cost–benefit tradeoff determines the decision to accept or reject a bribe and its neural foundations, (2) improving the prediction of bribe-taking behaviors across contexts and individuals, and (3) enhancing our comprehension of individual differences in bribe-taking behaviors. Moreover, we delineate how this framework can benefit future research on bribery by examining the mechanisms through which various modulators impact the bribe-taking behaviors or the computational processes underlying more intricate forms of corrupt behaviors. We also discussed its potential fusion with artificial intelligence techniques in offering insights for understanding cognitive processes underlying bribe-taking behaviors and designing anticorruption strategies.