Data and Code for: Enabling or Limiting Cognitive Flexibility? Evidence of Demand for Moral Commitment

Moral behavior is more prevalent when individuals cannot easily distort their beliefs self-servingly. Do individuals seek to limit or enable their ability to distort beliefs? How do these choices affect behavior? Experiments with over 9,000 participants show preferences are heterogeneous -- 30% of participants prefer to limit belief distortion, while over 40% prefer to enable it, even if costly. A random assignment mechanism reveals that being assigned to the preferred environment is necessary for curbing or enabling self-serving behavior. Third parties can anticipate these effects, suggesting some sophistication about the cognitive constraints to belief distortion.<br><br>